“Bachelor/Ette Party”
I keep seeing beer extract powder being used by contestants: something new I’ll have to scope. At least I’m learning about new ingredients. Last season I discovered za’taar spice thanks to the Le Bernardin challenge. I am glad to see that Glad is now awarding $125,000 as the grand prize and there is an additional prize of $100,000 in merchandise from Macy’s. And of course, General Electric is providing the kitchen with its Monogram appliances. So I’d say this season may probably be the best from a financial viewpoint. But it’s still plodding along, personality-wise.
Rita Personal Picks: I’m seeing a top four of the Voltaggio Brothers, Jennifer and Kevin – but that’s as of the second episode. Kevin may look a little bit like a Hobbit, but he puts a lot of thought and concept into his cooking. Jennifer has the right philosophy – whatever you’re asked to do for the challenge, you do. And the brothers are truly skilled.
Episode Two’s Quickfire was another $15,000 high stakes immunity contest. It’s often said that anyone can cook great food when they can go out and get great ingredients, but the chefs were asked to create something terrific out of whatever was in the show’s pantry. Further complicating this challenge, they had to shoot dice to determine the number of ingredients each chef could use.
Jesse and Eve were in the bottom again. Jesse plated an unappetizing mess of seared scallops and mashed chickpeas, albeit the scallops had almost no sear on them. Guest judge Todd English (love his cookware!) visibly shuddered – the texture was too slimy for words. And Eve in her toothsome way paired bleu cheese and asparagus to her detriment. It appears to me that when you cook with this type of cheese a little can go a long way and since the judges are usually leery of it, why tempt fate?
Michael V. took the money and immunity with a Nitro Gazpacho, Compressed Cucumber and Breat Toast dish that was really inspired; English called it a great spin on a classic.
Wednesday’s show featured a standard team elimination challenge: cooking for a major bash. <i>Top Chef</i> put a slightly different spin on it. It was a Bachelor/Bachelorette poolside party. Complicating matters, the men had to cook for the bride-to-be and the women had to cook for the groom’s party. Then came the clincher: they had to pair the food to three shot drinks: a Moscow Mule, Tequila and a Golden Delicious. The Mule was gingery; we all know how tequila is; and the last drink looked viscous and was obviously syrupy and sweet. It’s hard enough to pair food with wine, but to pair it to shots of this type is really tough. Other money wrenches were that the bride does not eat meat, the groom does, he has a sweet tooth and she loves sriracha.
There’s a subtext beneath the cooking in this episode and I would like to address it. Yes, I know that there are gay contestants. It makes no difference to me because I don’t think sexual preference makes anyone more or less of a good cook. It’s talent and skill and quick thinking that make the cook. Ashley seemed to forget this when she climbed onto her psychological soapbox and stated her upset feelings because she is gay and cannot get legally married and feels angry at having to cook for this wedding-to-be party. Preeti agreed so I guess now that Team Rainbow is unofficially Preeti, Ashley and Ash but Pretti was a bit more pragmatic.
She acknowledged Ashley’s opinions, but also said that while she understands, this is how the world is. I think people are losing sight of the fact that this is a cooking contest. It is not about who can come out of the closet first, or anyone’s home life, etc. It is about knowing food and cooking food and seeing how contestants can think on the spur of the moment.
They are there to compete – not to impose their personal agendae on us and part of the competition involves participation in certain challenges which may not be agreeable to them (seasons past had vending machine and gas station challenges). Thousands of people try to get onto this show and for these people to have made it, they should be pretty skilled. But if conforming to the guidelines or parameters of a challenge is that much of a problem, then as the saying goes “if they can’t stand the heat, stay out of the kitchen.”
I think a more professional way to view the challenge was that it was a cocktail party to pair food with various shot drinks; 2 teams had to do 2 dishes per drink for a poolside bachelor/bachelorette party.
Chefs, please leave the posturing at home. Yes I know it’s a reality show, and yes, feelings build ratings, but it’s not a political forum. Whatever happened to the simple task of cooking food in a contest?
I am not unsympathetic to what Ashley was saying, but I don’t think this was the time or the place. She obviously knew how to compete because her carpaccio dish was well-received; she went too far trying for a bay leaf panna cotta. I did learn something – I didn’t know that bay leaves contain tannins and once overheated, the tannins come out in full force.
The task was to compete in a challenge involving two people’s food requirements. Sexual preference shouldn’t matter; I seem to recall that Season One’s chefs pulled an all nighter for a gay commitment ceremony.
The men’s team cooked food that was appealing and visually more appetizing and they were the winners. The Voltaggio brothers are good – this is really a head-butting contest between them. The top four were the brothers V. – and Mike almost won with his apple sorbet and goat cheese cookie, Eli – who make one heck of a tantalizing tuna tartare that was a universal fave, and Hector, who impressed the judges with his skillful execution of a tofu creation that Todd English loved. Bryan V. was the ultimate winner with his tongue-in-cheek play on guacamole and chips: a sweet & sour meringue with a guacamole filling and a ground corn play on chips. A couple of the men’s dishes (Mattin’s and Ron’s and Mike I’s) weren’t great hits, but I thought their performance overall was better. I will even forgive their jumping into the pool at the party’s end.
The women’s team was so busy with half of its members’ resentments, that their food was less focused. While Ashley’s watermelon carpaccio was a winner, she ended up in the bottom four because of that bitter panna cotta. Pretti, Eve and Jesse joined her. Their dishes were disconnected and not well executed, and Eve was asked to leave. This is the second week she cooked flavorless seafood and it is apparent that she felt out of her element.
Next week is a military chow challenge and it looks like a reprise of the good old canned food race. It should be interesting – let’s hope the airmen and airwomen for whom they’re cooking won’t be wounded in “action.”
