Top Chef Chicago - April 16th

So, tax season is behind us and I can have a real life again, so I treated myself to Top Chef and a couple of books, which I will blog about later.

This episode of Top Chef starts with Jen in a funk about Zoi's departure and with a bit of a chip on her shoulder. I wonder if that chip will still be there once she gets to watch the episodes and realizes that Zoi was called out two weeks in a row for lack of seasoning?

So the Quickfire Challenge is pairing food with beer. Okay, I know so of you out there are thinking, what? Beer is beer, they all taste the same, well I am sure all those big name lavels do tend to taste the same, but small, local micro-brewed beers are another thing completely. I don't drink mass marketed beers, but there is a little brewery in town here, Upland Brewery, and I do like a couple of their beers.
I was a little put off by Nikki's comments, that beer to her means fried foods, and that a coupld of them seemed to think beer was beneath them. I wonder how they would have faired on the vending machine challenge or the quicky mart challenge of past seasons.

Some of the foods were good, so missed big time, but in the end Jen and her chip on the shoulder won the Quickfire, and she claimed it was all because she had something to prove with zoi leaving, maybe that Zoi wasn't that good of a cook and she was better?

The Elimination Challenge was to Tailgate for a Bears game. Some of these people looked so lost! Have you never cooked real food? It reminded me of a few years back when Harold said something was beneath him to cook. Yeah, well, this is a test, lets see how good you really are.

I loved that we got to see the comments of alot of the people eating the food, and i was really surprised when they seemed to like everbody's food, but at the same time I am thinking how can you flub up a tailgate? Really!
I also loved Dale's reactions when he realized that he was serving food to Gale Sayers (a Chicago Bears legend) and then Richard Dent and William "The Fridge" Perry, also both bears Legneds from the 1980s SuperBowl fame. I thought it was great, and the way he was so humbled to be serving them, he really got the challenege and the meaning, this was more than just cooking to him, he was serving local legends and he rose to the occasion, so I was pleased that Dale won this challenge.

In the bottom, we had Nikki, Ryan and Mark. Okay, so Mark had no clue, he had never seen American Football, knew nothing about tailgating, and picked the wrong grill. I think he thought that picking the other grill would help him stand out, but it just messed with his flow and timing. He was constantly having to fix the fire and flame, and he was just rushing around and a complete mess. I didn't want to see him go home over this one challenge, I thinhk he is better than that.

Nikki, tried to make a New York classic, which might have went over at a Giants or Jets game, but not at a Bears game, then to top it off she ran out of half the food before the judges ever made it to her table. Not good, poor planning. I would have been okay with her leaving.
Ryan, well, Ryan just made it easy on the judges. He went with way too high class food, this was a tailgate party not a luxury box catering, and then to top it all off, he didn't even make the food well, and it was not good. Okay, so Ryan, pack your knives and go. I am glad. He was just really flying under the radar until this point, and then he talks the whole episode about this all being beneath him, or at least that was the vibe I got from him, so I am glad to see him go.

Now, I have to talk about Lisa. Lisa, Lisa, Lisa. Dale apogolizes for yelling at her the night before, that her negative attitude had just got on his last nerve and he is sorry. I have no problem with this. I think she does have a negative attitude and what does she turn around and say, that Dale apogolized that SHE made him mad, she calimed he could go *&$% himself. Well, no if you would just calm down a little bit, quit flinging the curse words around you might realize that he was right. The girl has driven a nail in the other nerve with me. At this point, it will be none too soon when Lisa and Spike leave for me. I am over them and really don't want to watch them anymore.

So what did you think? Did the right person win? Did the right person go home? Leave me a comment and let me know!

Top Chef Chicago - April 9th

Okay, so I am a couple days in getting this up, sue me! I'm sorry, but it's tax deadlines and I am tired!

So this week starts with the Palate challenge, you know the one they are blindfolded and have to taste test things and identify something. Great! They only told us who was the lowest and who had the top three scores, I really wanted to know everyone's numbers!!
Antonia won, getting 12 of the 15 tastes correct, not bad. Ryan and Jen tied with 11 or the 15 correct. You may be saying Ryan? Jen? Yeah, that is what I thought. Ryan is the forgetable guy that was paired with Mark last week and Jen is the mohawked girl in the relationship. yeah, I know they are both forgetable. i really wanted to know where Spike landed in those numbers....hum, I'm thinking maybe 7 or 8, maybe a 9. Then there is Zoi, and I am thinking she probably didn't do too good, 7.

Another team challenge. okay, enough already, I want to see them cook and fall flat on their faces themselves, no more team challenges, please!! So we have four teams, Earth, Water, Air and Fire.....let's see what they can do.

Fire:
This team is Dale, Lisa and Stephanie. Okay, Stephanie deserves a gold medal for dealing with Lisa, and I personally though Dale did a good job of not going off on Lisa, until the last two minutes of the show, but still. They fought tooth and nail on the menu, a first course for 80 people on a $500 budget. The finally decided that Stephanie would do a chile rubbed shrimp, dale a chile salad and Lisa bacon.
Let me move on as say that this team rocked it. The food was good, loved by all and they ended up your winners. Now, of course only one can win the prize and Ming, the guest judge decides to award it to Lisa for the bacon, becuase it was something he had never seen? Excuse me? Come to my house, I have been cooking bacon in the oven, weighted to lie flat for years!! Okay, so I don't add the miso, but still, something new? Do you not get out much Ming? What's the deal?

Air:
Well this team is forgetable. Ryan and Jen and whats-her-face, the one that does pasta all the time. Yep, they do duck, and it ends up being decent. It's not the top and not the bottom. It was funny, there were four teams, and this was the first time they only called one team in the top and then two in the bottom, so this team was just there. They weren't good enough for the top, not bad enough for the bottom, which is about all I can say for the people or the meal, I remember the duck and that is about it.

Water:
Richard, Mark and Andrew. Boil-in-the-bag salmon was their main dish. Fish swim in the water, cooked in water, was Richard's reasoning, and I am thinking, ugh. I am not a big fan of the bag cooking thing he did, I was thinking is would make it have the texture of mashed potatoes. I have never really liked the boil-in-the-bag meals anyway. And then Tom said it was mushy. Andrew went back a round and made the fake cavier again, okay, it might get a good review one time, but leave it alone, it can be over done if you do it over and over again. Really. Poor Mark, I think he was completely out of his element with Richard and Andrew, they are not his style of cooks, and I just don't think he had any idea what they food was going to be and what to do with them.
So they end up in the bottom two, and worse than the food.....scales! Yep, Richard either didn't clean the fish, or didn't clean the fish very well. Ming got a mouthful of scales! UGH! Bad, bad team!

Earth:
Antonia, who has immunity, Zoi and Spike, can you say conflict? Spike wants to make soup and Antonia and Zoi don't think that is a good first course? Excuse me? wasn't soup the traditional first course in history? How can you not want to do soup or not think it was a good first course choice? So they go with something more "earthy", mushrooms and beef....whatever.
Can we say bottom two!! This time is was about flavor, no seasoning, which is one reason I am thinking that Zoi did not do well on the palatte challenge, she claims that she is a heavy-handed seasoner, and Gail admitted that the Rosemary was overpowering, but that it was a bd choice to go with the mushrooms, as is you just shouldn't put the two together, but then what did we expect from Zoi....when the chocolate and wasbi won last week she promised us that is doesn't taste good, and since she knows what does and doesn't taste good better than the judges, why does it surprise me about her mixing mushrooms and rosemary, even I don't think that sounds good.

At round table, they decide since the dinners voted Earth the lowest that they are the bottom, and one of them will go, and since Antonia has immunity it is down to Spike and Zoi. Tom says I would like to send them both home and I about wet my pants, thinking please, please, please send them both home! But alas, my dream was not to be and only Zoi went home.

Okay, I am not sorry that she went home. She was in the bottom last week and really seemed to have no clue as to why and so she is defensive and mean when she gets up the next morning, and I am thinking did you even listen to what they are trying to tell you? Two weeks in a row in the bottom, and I am thinking that she was in the bottom in the first week or so too...so really, no surprise.

Spike, you can just go on home next week, although Lisa is going to give you a run for your money on that one. I can't stand her at this point anymore. She was running around the kitchen complain, slamming things, cursing and whatnot, and I am like, see ya! People were complaining about Dale, but I think she is worse. I haven't seen that much from Dale that bothers me yet, yea he thinks he is good, but you know what, so far he has been able to back up hie thinking that with his food, so I have no problem with him, unlike Lisa who is all talk and Spike who is even more talk.

So....what did you think? Did the right person go home?