POSTED: Thursday, July 15, 2010, 10:31 PM
Filed Under: Food TV |
Top Chef
Mmm, crabs.
Quickfire:
Top Chef must've realized how soul-crushingly stupid
last week's baby food challenge was, so they gave them a doozy in Ep 5. Guest chef
Patrick O'Connell of the classy
Inn at Little Washington his dapper sensibilities scream "tweedy impertinence" a la
Lester Freamon, do they not? is a D.C.-area chef, so he sticks the cheftestants with the task of cooking up dishes highlighting the Maryland blue crab. "Is that some CRABS?!"
Tiffany squeals upon entering the kitchen. Hell yes that is some crabs Tif! Look at all those squirmy, pinchy fuckers!
I was excited about this QF challenge picking and cooking crabs is a challenge, while forcing professionals to fill jars with mushy shit is not since I'm from Maryland, but also since I assumed this would be cake for Baltimore chef
Tim, who's been catching all sorts of bad breaks in recent episodes. He does up his crab with avocado, passion fruit and an heirloom tomato vin. "Give it the microphone and let it sing," goes his crab-cookin' philosophy. Hell to the yes, my fellow Terp.
Angelo is the first to take the bait. "I had crabs, so it just brought back some bad memories," he deadpans in a sit-down. That is decidedly not "sexy" like your food always is, homey! He does lemongrass/ginger-infused blue crab broth, and is surprised when he spots
Greatest-Generation Ed whipping up a Thai-inspired crab preparation. Elsewhere, our dude
Jersey Kev (
follow him on Twitter!) does a chowder spiced up with espelette pepper oil,
Amanda serves a crab salad with a buried sauterne/ginger/juniper gelée ("It's ... pungent," says
Padma, turning up that transcendently beautiful nose of hers) while self-proclaimed "beast in the kitchen"
Kenny Blalicchio puts together a trio of crab dishes.
Blalicchio and Angelo get love for their respective dishes, but
Staff Sergeant Ed ends up winning the QF and immunity for his dish. They also take an opportunity to plant the seed for an Ed/Tiffany romance angle. You ain't fooling me,
Top Chef I seen this movie already!
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| Taraji P. Henson is sooooooo mad at you right now! |
We also really have to mention the combo Jedi master/Padawan learner and Patrick Wilson/Ellen Page in
Hard Candy-style storyline they're pushing ridiculously hard as far as Angelo and
Tamesha go. How is this going to turn out? Is Angelo truly just interested in Tamesha because he sees a lot of himself in her? Or is there some sort of weird attraction thing going on? OR, is this all part of the extremely cunning Angelo's insidious master plan to win it all?! So much to think about! Ah fuck it, let's just go Round 2 with this shit:
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| You are pissing Blair Underwood off! DO NOT PISS BLAIR UNDERWOOD OFF! |
I don't have time to match up skin tones and I'm sorry about that.
Elimination: Chef O'Connell invites the chefs to a Virginia organic farm one so goddamn organic that it's actually capable of growing "strawberries, eggplants, tomatoes, turnips and apples all in the same season," as
Adam Erace astutely points out (sustainable maaagiccccc!) and they're tasked with putting together a celebrate-the-bounty-of-the-earth dinner in some field for a bunch of local chefs and farmers. Cue an interminable period of cheffy bickering over who works with who (they eventually agree to team up with the
same partners from last week). "We should act like civilized human beings and come to some kind of peace that way," says Tamesha. Wait a minute, that actually sounds mature and reasonable. Tamesha, please pack your knives and go.
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| Is Eric Ripert rocking an American Apparel circle scarf right there? Yes! |
Angelo believes he is bringing epicurean sexy back with his dish. "I basically made love to that duck, to be honest with you," he coos. Haha Angelo likes doing it to food! I can't wait for his
Washington Square pop-up here in Philly. (Do you have insurance to cover this kind of thing,
SRO?)
Stephen does some sort of crunchy salad that he hopes will stand out. "I don't want to be a forgotten side dish," he says. "I want to be a fore ... front ... runner." Fore front runner? That sounds like one of those
Wheel of Fortune "Before and After" puzzles, Steve. "I'd like to solve the puzzle, Padma?" Speaking of Padma, who else thinks she should rock equestrian/Amelia Earhart chic every episode from now on? Giddyup!
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| "Fuck, Colicchio gave our seats away to Nene from The Real Housewives
of Atlanta again. Classic Colicchio ... " |
Tim plans a turnip mousseline, but abandons the idea halfway through. Amanda does minestrone and makes fun of Progresso while doing it.
Alex stuffs ratatouille inside beef tenderloin, which is awesome if only because we get to hear
Eric Ripert say "ratatouille" out loud. Jersey Kev's cauliflower couscous falls on the ground, so he promptly duplicates it with broccoli.
At the top: Jersey Kev (back in action!); Blalicchio, with a sweet/sour eggplant that sounds awesome;
Andrea, with some pork; and
Kelly, with some beets and an extra-credit dessert (wow, my Dark Horse selection was so wrong). Blalicchio takes it! Dude had some other nicknames established in this episode Black Magic, Black Lightning, Black Angus but we're riding with Blalicchio to the death, believe it.
At the bottom: Tim, whose call-an-audible decision to veer away from mousseline proved ill-advised; Amanda, who gets ripped by Tom C. for unevenly cooked components of her soup ("When we cook,
why do we cut things uniformly?"); and Stephen, who also gets Colicchio-d ("You're not paying attention to your lettuces!" Put that on a damn tee!). O'Connell comments that Amanda's chopped-up veggies look like "your grandma might have done it with her ax." Do grandmas typically have axes? My grandmas didn't but they were rather unorthodox chicks, so ... anyway, after some hardcore "there's a cause and effect to everything"-style scolding from Tom, the judges send Bmore boy Tim packing. Aw, Tim!
