"Rock Stars," "The Mise," Eliminations & Errata

Can I just start by saying how much I love Dale Talde in this episode?  Seriously, not knowing who Joe Jonas was?  I wish I was you.  I really wish I didn't know who he was either.  And really Spike, how much did Disney pay you to call the Jonas Brothers "rock stars?"  It's ok!  You can tell us.  We won't tell anyone.

It's ok, Spike.  I did feel bad for you when you had to go up against Tiffani Faison's sugar bomb with carrot chips and mascarpone.  Seriously.  I think that snack would have gone over better with an older crowd and you definitely tried to play up to the judges (always a smart move), but were just thrown another dreaded twist.  Although...a part of me did jump up and down screaming, "Why are you serving carrot chips to kids at a slumber party?!"  Were you never invited to one?  Parents never wanted you to spend the night with their kid, less they pick up douchey hipster hats too?  Anyway, the two pick teams (Tiffani takes all the girls except Carla; Spike gets all the guys except Tre, and Dale L.) and head to the museum to serve the quickfire dishes to the kids to decide.  And let me say something right now to Richard Blaise.  Yes, you're a "Molecular Gastronomy" guru.  Yes, you know how to use liquid nitrogen and teach a "Liquid Nitrogen 101" course.  Do you know who else knows how to do that?  Most people in a chem lab.  So get off your goddamn high horse with, "It looked like a LN2 101 course."  I'm a jackass, but that, sir, made me pause and wonder what the fuck was up your ass.  If you thought you could have helped, fucking help!  I don't leave fellow students hanging in lab, even if it's not my lab.  Fucking grow a pair and help out and stop lecturing at people from the side lines.  Anyway...Guess who won?  Tiffani with the sugar bomb!  Who the fuck didn't see that one coming?!

And then we have the elimination challenge - cooking breakfast for the kids when they wake up.  As the winner, Tiffani gets to pick between a T-Rex and a Brontosaurus.  She picks T-Rex and gets eggs, milk, meat and all animal products.  Spike gets Brontosaurus, and is left with everything else.  The teams take naps or wander the museums before cooking in the morning.  Tre bitches that he's used to sleeping naked and not on cots in the North American Mammals exhibit.  Pretty sure some of the viewers and other contestants wouldn't have minded, Tre.

Morning comes and Team T-Rex is shocked they don't get access to herbs or veg, because they figured that since T-Rex eats Bronto, they'd eat plums and potatoes too.  I'm not sure where that logic came from.  Maybe this is why they're chefs and not paleontologists?  Biologists?  Although Tom would later be puzzled by this too.  So maybe it was the lack of sleep that caused the confusion.  Anyway, Team T-Rex soldiers on without access to herbs or any type of non-animal protein matter.  Look at it this way, folks.  You still have butter.  The other team did not have butter.  Any butter.  At all.  Fuck you, you better make something tasty.  You have bacon and butter.  And salt is inorganic.  Both teams get that shit.  Butter, bacon and salt.  Don't fuck this up!  What does Team T-Rex do?  They bitch about the lack of herbage and fuck it all up.  Tre and Case do salmon.  Jen and Jamie plan to play on "bacon and eggs."  Tiffani and Dale L. make a play on "steak and eggs."  My biggest problem?  Antonia and Tiffany D. doing three frittatas.  Frittatas.  Mini-frittatas at that.  The kind that look like they come IQF in the Costco frozen foods section.

Team Bronto gets everything else, but rallies around the fact that they still get access to some of the herbage and deeper polyphenol flavors found in vegetable matter - peppers, onions, garlic, etc.  And they make it work!  Fabio and Stephen make gnocchi.  There's a banana parfait from Marcel, Angelo and Richard.  Dale T. and Mike make polenta and stewed peppers.  Carla and Spike make gazpacho.  Oh hey, Angelo.  I kinda rooted for you last season, even when things got iffy and you started "mentoring" other contestants.  But, this time?  Yeah, you crossed a line this time.  YOU DO NOT FUCK WITH SOMEONE ELSE'S MISE!  If it's my shit in a kitchen or a lab, and you fuck with it without me saying so, I will stab the shit out of you.  And if we're not in a lab, I'm dragging your ass to the nearest O-Chem lab to dump your body in a vat o' dimethyl sulfoxide.  They will never find your body.  Bronto wins.  The nanner parfait was the judge's favorite, and Marcel, Angelo and Richard split the win.  Angelo's ego expands, causing a shift in the Earth's orbit.  By 2050, due to the mass increase, Earth will careen into the Sun, pulling the rest of the planets along with it.  Saynoara, everyone.  It was great knowing you.  I will be spending my last years on Earth drinking and whoring it up.

Back to Team T-Rex who lost.  Jen is pissed they lost.  She stands by her dish.  Jen is an amazing chef.  Let me just get that out of the way.  Did I try her food on the show?  No.  I would, however, not be adverse to ever being a guest judge on Top Chef.  Just throwing that out there in case Andy, Tom or Padma reads this.  Seriously, I would love to grill the fuck out of the "molgas" chefs for their lack of chem and physics knowledge.  Or maybe I can pitch a new show at Andy...Top Biochemist!  "For your quickfire today, you have 30 minutes to prepare TRIS-buffer from propane and nitric acid.  Blowing up the lab is an automatic elimination from the competition.  The winner will get immunity and a Nobel Prize for somehow warping the laws of Physics around their bench.  Good luck."

Anyway, back on topic.  Jen's good!  Her pedigree is awesome.  Stints at Julia, Arroyo, Sous Chef at Le Bernardin and  Chef de Cuisine for 10 Arts.  Eric fucking Ripert picked her to be a CdC.  This is an amazingly talented woman who went down in her season to some equally talented competitors - Kevin Gillespie and the Bros Voltaggio.  Jen takes a very vocal stand and insists that Team T-Rex was better than Team Bronto.  And she does not back down.  Go Jen!  And then the finger pointing starts.  Jamie cut herself originally during prep and left to get stitches.  Two stitches.  She came back, after most of the heavy lifting was done and resigned herself to be Jen's sous chef.  Hey, I get it.  You're not so into the food.  Injury offers you way out.  You took it.  Between the two of them?  I'd pick Jamie to be eliminated.  However, remember those Costco frittatas I mentioned?  Yeah.  My choice for absolute bottom of the barrel would have been Antonia or Tiffany.  Why?  They didn't even bother to try to adapt.  They copped out.  Rather than run with the ball, they tried to kick a field goal.  From the 72 yard line.  In their haste to play it safe, some of the eggs were overcooked, some of the eggs were perfectly cooked, and some of the eggs were undercooked.  If you have the title of "Chef" and you cannot monitor some fucking eggs in an oven, please turn in your toque, your jacket and your knives.  How fucking hard is it to peek in the oven and rotate shit around?  Not very!  Team T-Rex is sent back, and the judges deliberate.

Tom stresses that they're only talking about the food, and that personality doesn't come into play.  I'm not so sure.  I think at some point during that deliberation Jen's confrontational behavior needled at the back of the judge's mind.  They obviously disagreed with the arguments put out by Jen.  And sent Jen packing.  Hey, I get it.  I wasn't there and the boiled bacon did look a bit lackluster, but man.  I've gotta say.  Jen took a fucking chance.  If you had to eliminate someone between her and Jamie it should have been Jamie.  And I hate saying that.  I love Jamie!  I love her food.  Seriously.  Come out to SF and we'll go to Absinthe and I'll show you why her food rocks.  Antonia and Tiffany just ticked me off.  They didn't really adapt to the challenge.  They tried poo-poo'ing on Team T-Rex's choices ("Gnocchi is not breakfast food!").  Honey, if the gnocchi was bomb, I'd eat it for breakfast.  Anyone would.  And they threw a team member under the dreaded and proverbial bus.  Seriously.  Way to be a team player.  Remind me if I'm ever in a life and death situation and you two are some of my options, to just go it the fuck alone.  I do not need help like yours.

And Jen is gone.  I had pegged her to be one of the ones up until the end.  With a serious chance at winning (Jen, Tiffani F., Richard and Spike).  And Jen was one of my favorites (along with Tiffani F., Marcel, Jamie and Spike).  Yes.  I like Marcel.  The annoying little shit grows on you.  Plus he's got some balls to just needle the judges and fellow contestants with his food.  If anyone ever told me they were tired of foam, I'd fucking serve them foam table side too.  Fuck you.  It's my dish.  When it's your dish, I'll make it your way.  Eat it and like it or GTFO!