Top Chef: Alpha Dogs Are Crabtastic

Hello again foodie friends!  Things are a little weird in the house right now.  The BF is currently doing the Atkins Diet.  I have not joined him because my own personal level of Fat Denial™ has not yet reached its rock bottom, and because my addiction to love of Kraft Macaroni & Cheese knows no bounds.  However, part of me suspects he went on this diet not because he wants to lose weight, but because he doesn’t want to make dinner for me anymore (I mean, just because he’s cooked 5,240 out of the last 5,246 meals we’ve eaten together is no reason to get all nit-picky and try to starve me, is it?)  On the other hand, the entire house smells like bacon, so it’s an all-around win.  Sadly, tonight’s episode of Top Chef pretty much leaves us ALL losers…

much like these poor crabs

I love this show, but I can’t remember a single time where an episode left me feeling as cheated as this one did.  It’s almost like they suddenly realized the talent pool had taken a major step backwards and decided to economize and pull back on wasting any interesting or exciting challenges and went straight to the B-list (B as in “backup” and “bargain” and “bullshit).  You’ll see what I mean shortly.

It’s another fine morning in the Bilious Brownstone, and KennEgo’s telling us how “somber” the mood is now that Instructor LynnBian and GayNold are both gone…

guess which one slept on the black flannel pillow and which one slept on the white taffeta?

He’s claiming that the longer they are in the house together “it affects you a little bit more as different chefs leave.”  In most cases this might mean that someone was sorta sad to see people go, but this is KennEgo we’re talking about, so I’m sure it means that his Happy Alpha Dawg Victory Dance™ is getting more and more enthusiastic with every day.

Meanwhile, his arch-nemesis, the Orange One is out on the patio hitting on giving advice to Miss Tamesha.  Miss T says she looks up to OranJello as a role model, and he says she’s become the only person he’s comfortable hanging out with, “but I also feel attracted to her because I see a lot of myself in her…”

or at least six inches’ worth

He’s really laying it on thick with all of his whispered advice and whatnot, and it’s making Miss Swan jealous and bitchy highly concerned for Tamesha’s well-being, “I think she needs to be careful because sometimes the fact that he’s helping out so much?  It might be his strategy.”…

*translation* “I wish he were helping ME out like that.”

Also jumping on the Trying-To-Get-His-Peanut-Butter-Into-Her-Chocolate-Train™ is MassholEd, who’s found himself gravitating towards ChesTiffany (and her pair of planets) in a big turgid way, “She’s got just such a great… laugh.  You know, she’s always smiling, she’s very upbeat, you know you can tell this girl really cooks from the heart!”

it’s hard to say what MassholEd likes better, the way she picks her feet, or the way the cotton of her T-shirt is taut and straining in the middle

I really hope the girl cooks after washing her hands.  ChesTiffany seems to like MassholEd, too, she says he’s the only one she trusts at this point.  Wait, what is that kind of comment even doing on this show?  This isn’t Big Brother.  Why do any of these chefs have any reason to “mistrust” each other?  Is there a lame-ass “saboteur” in the Bilious Brownstone, too?  I thought the whole point of the competition was whoever makes the best food wins?  Strategy can only take you so far, and then it’s gonna be down to how well you can actually cook, right? Ugh, whatever.  Before we move on, though, I want to point out Clue #1 that This Episode Was Lame:  They just spent four whole minutes on B.S. at the Brownstone (and nobody was yelling at each other!) so WTF, show?!?

Time for the QuickFire Challenge!  The chefs walk in and see a table literally teeming with blue crabs and everyone’s nipples are suddenly erect.  Scar’s also there, and introduces us to our Guest Judge for this episode, a James Beard Award Winner for Outstanding Chef In America (and Creepy Old Queen) named Patrick O’Connell…

looks like he’s taken notice of all the erect nipples as well!

JerseyMoobs has the biggest pair, I bet, and rightfully so as he says Miss Patty O’Furniture here is a “five star / five diamond” chef, and that Moobsie actually cooked for him at the Bocuse D’or (which is a big competition, kinda like the World Cup or The Superbowl of Cheffery).  I would have thought this might call in to question Patty-O’s ability to judge fairly, but since the producers no longer care about this season, I guess that question just goes unanswered.

Here comes Clue #2 That This Episode Was Lame:  Scar says The QuickFire Challenge today is… “You’ve got crabs!”  Ba-dump-BUMP-tssss!  Ha ha ha, Scar, what a delightfully appetizing association for fine food.  Not everyone is as highly amused as I am…

There are two words that explain why OranJello’s making this face, and they rhyme with “cubic rice”

Yes, Scar’s little joke is causing OranJello to have an unpleasant flashback, “Well, I had crabs… so it just brought back bad memories.”  Cheer up, Oranjie, you’re not the only one!  Yes, yours truly had them once, too, and at the tender age of 18.  No, it wasn’t because I was a giant ho-bag, I was actually quite faithful to my very first boyfriend, even though he lived in Tucson and I lived in Phoenix.  What I didn’t know was that he was the giant ho-bag of Tucson and that his Graduation Night gift was to give me a bunch of microscopic pets.  This also happened to be the catalyst for my Coming Out to my parents, which made it extra fun for them.  My dad took it pretty well though, and he even told me about that old sure-fire remedy for getting rid of the little fuckers:   He said you get a razor, some matches and an ice-pick… then shave off half of your pubic hair with the razor, light the remaining hair on fire with the matches, and when the crabs come running out to the shaved side to get away from the fire you stab them to death with the ice pick.  Then he took one look at my horrified face, apologized and went to the drugstore to get me the shampoo.

So anyhow, yeah, worst lead-in to a QuickFire evah, and Clue #3 That This Episode Was Lame…

this was even more simplistic than the stupid pie challenge!

They don’t even have a variety of crab to work with, for Chrissakes, just the stupid blue crab!  At this rate, next week’s QuickFire is going to be “Make Us Your Favorite Cup Of Tea”!  In any case, Scar says this blue crab is a local favorite, and Patty-O pipes up to say that he grew up in Maryland eating them “in bushel baskets”.  This is before he discovered it was much more fun hanging out eating other things in parking lots and Porta-Potties along the turnpike.

They get an hour to cook and there is immediately a bunch of scrabbling for crabs followed by a lot of this…

heavy traffic into Crab Heaven

Bobby Brown is the local boy who knows his blue crab and thinks it’s funny to see so many of the chefs going up and trying to pick up crabs with their bare hands, “Crabs will bite the hell outta you and it hurts!”

don’t testify to me and OranJello, we already know

Pity the crab that had a chance to claw MassholEd, because he’s mixing up a Thai-flavored sauce and sprinkling Old Bay Seasoning directly on them before baking them (alive) in the oven.  Next door to him, OranJello has shoved his memories of foul-smelling shampoos and teeny-tiny torture-combs out of his mind long enough to decide on making a simple blue crab broth with ginger and lemongrass (and he boiled his crabs alive).  He finds it amusing that MassholEd went with something more Asian in flavor, I guess because he can’t believe anybody but himself can do Asian food justice.  How I wish as awesome Asian chef like Susur “Sussudio” Lee were here to prove him (and the rest of these boobs) completely and utterly wrong.

Meanwhile, Big-Haired Andrea’s bitching because in Miami they use giant stone crabs which are much easier to extract much larger chunks of meat from, while these shrimpy little blue crabs are turning out to be a lot more work for a lot less reward.  At least she knows how to get it out of them, Miss Tamesha has never picked crabmeat in her life!  In fact, she was apparently allergic to them at one point so she never even ate them at all, “So now I’m like… W-T-F…”…

girl, you betta figure the F part out fast!

Lady T eventually decides that WTF stands for Wants-To-Fuck, so she goes and smartly asks her friend OranJello for a few quick pointers on how to best get the meat out of the shells.  He is actually kind enough to take a few seconds to help her out, something that clearly disturbs some of the other chefs…

because it’s something that, say, and Alpha Dawg would never do

Tamesha tells us OranJello’s personality might “throw people off” but for her it works.  Speaking of people I’d like to throw off of something, KennEgo’s here in full on DawgMode™ to tell us he’s thinking about “creating a beautiful-tasting plate”.  I guess that making a shitty-tasting one was an idea he was kicking around for a while?  DUH.  Once again, he’s going with his overkill strategy, because he’s planning on making a shot of crab soup, an open-faced crab sammich and a crab salad.  “Everyone else is going to be freaking out and stressing just getting ONE dish out and *I* can pretty much get out three… You know, I’m just a beast in the kitchen!”

it’s clear the Alpha Dawg would suck his own dick if he could reach it…

word

Well, as everybody knows, quantity usually beats quality, right?  Does this guy really think that he’s coming off as likeable in the slightest?  I’m sure he doesn’t care, but it sure is annoying.  Let’s go visit with the Bravo Dawg JerseyMoobs, who’s in the midst of making a crab chowder and reminiscing about how much it sucks to be in the bottom.  He’s absolutely certain he’s not going to land there today…

still, he’s ready to blow somebody (miss andy) if that’s what it takes to stay in the game

Bloody Mandy’s using some kind of stainless steel food processor thingy to grind up her crabs (alive, I’m sure) for what she calls a “sauterne gelée” and all I can think of is that Marcel TurkeyHair Vigneron liked to make everything into either a foam or a gelée, which made me hate those very words.  She’s noticed that Bobby Brown is in the process of clearing a few dozen crabs of their meat, and seems slightly awed by his skill in doing so.

He better be good at shucking crab, cuz he says he grew up in Maryland, too, and picks crab almost every Sunday.  He believes it’s a mistake to be dressing the crabmeat up in fancy-schmancy Asian influences and the like, so he’s going to keep it extremely simple.  “I feel good about this one.”  Ruh-roh.  Scar comes back and calls time, and we hit our first commercial break…

why oh why couldn’t I have gone to this place instead of stupid Boy Scout camp?

And we’re back with Scar and Patty O’Furniture starting out with Miss ChesTiffany…

which looks rather lethal with that giant claw in the middle

It’s hard to tell if the judges like it when Patty-O makes a face like this…

as if she’s straining her face-lift

They bizzit with MassholEd next…

doesn’t this look like a half-eaten leftover?

Patty seems to like the fact that it’s “Thai-inspired” which is a rather odd comment considering the dish’s usage of a wacky ingredient like THAI BASIL.  Daffy queen.  Let’s check out OranJello’s dish…

that is naturally “infused” with something

They quickly  move on to Bobby Brown’s straightforward crab…

it’s a Crabby Pattie for Patty!

Bobby makes sure to mention to the Judges how this dish is just simple and clean, “You don’t have to do a lot to our crabs here.”  Way to take an underhanded snipe at everybody else who actually put some thought into their dish, Bobby…

but then again, that’s your prerogative

Next up is ShortyPants’ latest attempt…

anybody else notice that he tends to booze up his dishes a lot, too?

Followed by OranJello’s protégé Miss Tamesha…

which unfortunately looks rather canned

Nevertheless, Patty-O calls it “unusual and intriguing” and makes more creepyface at her.  *shudder* Let’s keep it moving with Bloody Mandy…

God, did everybody make something with broth?

Scar takes a bite and says “Wow.”  Naturally, Bloody Mandy can’t help herself, she has to push the issue, “Is that a ‘wow-yes-yummy’ or a ‘wow…’?” and she trails off looking skerd.  “It’s pungent.” clarifies Scar…

sooooo yes, that would mean it’s a “wow-you-suck”, then

Time to see what JerseyMoobs did…

another chowdah, zzzzzzzzz

And here’s Big-Haired Andrea’s offering…

which is the third crab salad of the day, and therefore also zzzzzzzzz

FINALLY it’s time for Mr. Alpha Dawg KennEgo himself, who’s been dying to show off his plate…

well, at least it’s not a crab salad or a chowdah

Honestly, his plate does look pretty good, I will admit that… but the next thing out of his mouth is, “I’m looking at my plate, and I’m looking around the room, and I’m like *snort* who’s gonna be able to touch this dish?”…

aaaaand we’re right back to HATE

Is it wrong that I was hoping the Hand Of Salmonella™ would touch his dish?  Gawd, what a prick…

this is the perfect representation of KennEgo’s sense of self-importance

And here are this week’s unmentionable QuickFire dishes, starting with Miss Swan’s…

and she made crab salad number four, so no wonder they didn’t bother

…and ending with Nosferatu’s…

which looks like an abortion

Blech, was that some of the ugliest food we’ve ever seen on this show?  Every single dish looked to me like it came out of an industrial-sized Campbell’s can!  And aren’t there more things you can do with crabs besides chowdah and salad?  Eh, I’m just being a bitch, expecting imagination from this crew.  Let’s see who the Judges hated…

Patty O’Furniture says he didn’t like Big-Haired Andrea’s because the weight of the taters in it overwhelmed the delicacy of the crabmeat.  She is not surprised.  Also coming in on the bottom is Bloody Mandy’s pungent offering with what Patty-O calls “the FASCINATING gelée that was out-of-balance”.  Mandy’s face isn’t surprised, but it’s not exactly sane, either…

“Thanks for your critique.  I’m going to find you and strangle you in your sleep.”

Rounding out the Bottom Three is once again, our boy JerseyMoobs!  Patty said his chowdah “illustrated confusion and the crab got lost.”  This makes four in a row for Moobsie to be on the sucky side of the street, and he says it’s making him doubt if he should even be in this competition at all.  I say he shouldn’t feel alone in that doubt whatsoever.

On the bright side, Patty-O liked MassholEd’s dish, claiming that it’s Thai-inspired flavoring helped bring out “all the natural components to the crab”.  Upon hearing this Bobby Brown looks like he could just about shit silverware…

* pppbbbbfffllbffting-tang-tingledy-tong *

Patty also liked KennEgo’s Trio Of ValidateMePlease (mostly because it WASN’T a salad) as well as OranJello’s Infusion Madness for being delicate and again “showing off the crab nicely.”  Poor Bobby Brown now looks positively ill with all of this praise being handed out for the natural crab flavors in everyone else’s dishes.  Or maybe a serving ladle just got stuck sideways in his anus.  In any case, is it going to come down to OranJello vs. KennEgo again?  Nope, cuz MassholEd wins the QuickFire!  Amazingly, KennEgo doesn’t make stankface, which makes me suspect that it only really pisses him off when OranJello beats him.  So how does MassholEd feel about his first QuickFire win?…

derrrrrrrrrrrrrrr, immuniwha??!?

Yup, he wins the ever-irrelevant immunity in the Elimination Challenge, which he looks far too glad to have.  Meanwhile, over in BitterVille, Bobby Brown is ruefully admitting he was wrong about his own approach to the challenge as he acknowledges MassholEd’s winning with Asian-influenced clab, “I shoulda put some sooey sauce in there!”  My guess is that Bobby’s a dight bit jealous of people who can do Asian-style food.  And people who can pronounce “soy sauce” properly.

In any case, it’s time for the Elimination Challenge, and Clue #4 That This Episode Was Lame:  They’ll be cooking a meal for 40 local chefs and farmers at Ayrshire Farms, which is apparently “Virginia’s first totally certified organic and humane farm”.  Did you guys get that?  Good.  Because it’s the last time we’re going to hear anything about it this entire episode, so you better have gleaned all you can from that eight-word description.

Here comes Clue #5 That This Episode Was Lame:  They’ll be cooking in ONE large team, and they have to put out a minimum of six dishes served family-style.  Oh this should be stunningly awful, and Miss Tamesha knows it, too.  “We have a lot of egos in the house.”…

and not all of them are exactly well-earned

Also, they won’t know what ingredients they’ll have, or what cooking conditions will be like until they get to the farm.  Wouldn’t it be great if they got there and it was all solar ovens?  And it was a rainy day?  Enjoy your uncooked chicken strips Daddy Tom!

They all return to the Bilious Brownstone where they sit down to discuss a game plan, which promptly degenerates into everybody squabbling over the most minute details.  The majority of the conflict, shockingly, seems to be between OranJello and KennEgo.  As OranJello puts it, “Kenny and I are very strong entities.  I’m in it to win it, I have to step up and be the leader!”  Ugh, using “I’m in it to win it” is bad enough, but KennEgo’s attitude is even worse:  “I really want my presence to be the Alpha Male presence.  No one’s gonna beat me in that area, because there’s a level of leadership that’s there.”  Yes, and there’s a level of extremely sexist ignorant stubborn shitdickishness as well…

the search is over, my friends, I think we have the Second Coming on our hands

ok, I gotta switch it up a bit

It’s just a nightmare situation, and none of them are willing to compromise as they all try to figure out how to be a single team but still put out cohesive dishes.    I find it very telling while they’re still kicking around the idea of forming new teams that KennEgo makes sure to say “Personally, I don’t care who’s with me…”  Hey, let’s have our own poll this week!  How would you finish KennEgo’s sentence?…

a.)    “…I’m going to make sure I listen to and incorporate your ideas so that our dish will be a true collaborative effort.”

b.)    “…I’ll listen to what you have to say, but most likely we’ll do it my way.”

c.)     “…I’m gonna do whatever the fuck I want because I’m an Alpha Dawg and you’re all poodles.”

d.)    “…if you’re lucky, I might let you lick the spoon.”

The more time that goes by and the less they accomplish, the more frustrated everybody becomes.  Then Miss Swan comes along to spew some interview bullshit and claim that OranJello’s getting “worked up” and “aggressive” while KennEgo is “a great leader” and is “calm, cool & collected” and “fierce”.  This is not exactly what I’m seeing on my TV screen, it appears to me that KennEgo’s doing just as much loud talking, and a lot more bullying than OranJello.  I wonder why Miss Swan is being so clearly forgiving of KennEgo’s more obvious faults?…

could it be the Kitchen Beast has found someone who yearns to polish his knob?

Inevitably KennEgo suggests that they revert back to their pairings from last week’s challenge, which I think really shouldn’t have been allowed, but that’s because I would have put some thought into this challenge.  Plus this means a win for him, because he can just tell JerseyMoobs to do whatever and he’ll get no resistance or lip for it.

Naturally, not everyone is thrilled with the decision to revert to their previous pairings…

as ChesTiffany’s face is all but shouting here

She is clearly not happy being stuck on a team with Bobby Brown again.  MassholEd makes his lingering Nosferatu-hatred pretty clear also, and takes the nastiness a step further as he says very loudly in front of the entire group “I’m up for working with somebody else…  uh, I mean, no offense, I’m just sayin’ I’m game for anything!”…

“and by ‘anything’ I mean ‘not working with you ever again’… I hope me saying that doesn’t offend you.”

Yeah, if anything I would say that Nosferatu’s the one who should be asking to get a different partner, not just because MassholEd made so many stupid mistakes in the last challenge, but also because he’s got the damned immunity, which means he could serve a dish made out of nothing but Cheez Poofs and Tic-Tacs and still not go home for it.  Besides, we shortly see who it is he really wanted to be paired up with…

and speaking of great pairs

The next day they make their way over to the Ayrshire Farm and see that indeed their kitchen is going to be completely outdoors, but there appears to be a wide variety of proteins and veggies and fruits and such, plus one of their Toyotas has been converted into a rolling pantry (much like the bottom desk drawer in my cube at work).  They’ve only got 3 hours to cook, and immediately everybody is mobbing the tables trying to pick out what they want so they can get started.

Bloody Mandy’s not too pleased with the conditions, as it appears they’re using propane grills with lava rocks as their main cooking tool, plus a couple of hot plates.  Jeez, Mandy, just pretend you’re back in college and cooking Top Ramen for the 4,862^nd night in a row!  Or, you know, the crystal meth that you seem to be on sometimes.

Everybody’s starting to get set up, and here’s KennEgo to tell us that his teammate JerseyMoobs doesn’t have the confidence in the food he’s putting out “for whatever reason” and goes on to make my mouth drop open when he says Moobsie’s “made some bad judgment calls”…

chief among those being his choice to work with an asshat who constantly treats him like an inferior lackey-boy

KennEgo’s memory is amazing in its selectivity.  They both got buttfucked last week for their dishes sucking, it wasn’t like it was just JerseyMoobs who fucked it all up, and knowing what a control freak KennEgo is, I’d say more of the blame lies with him since he clearly bulldozed the operation in his favor.  Right on time he pulls the same shit again, “So, at this point I know that I just need to take over the situation.”  Yes, Superman, you do that, and the rest of us Lois Lanes will just lay here and sigh over your ultra-awesome masculinity, fighting each other fiercely for the slightest crumb of your attention.  Go piss up a cactus, dickweed.

As for Moobsie, he actually seems to be okay for the moment as he tells us KennEgo’s planning on making hot & sour eggplant while he’s doing what KennEgo told him to do and making cauliflower couscous.

Meanwhile, over in LadyLand, Big-Haired Andrea’s going to head back into making “The Business” (a.k.a. an awesome sauce) for the pork loin she was lucky enough to grab.  She says the biggest problem she’s having is that it’s freezing cold out there and her thin Miami blood is really feeling the chill…

well, of all the days you could have worn all that hair DOWN

DUH.  What she’s saying is the truth, though.  People think we’re nuts here in Arizona (and not just for the wackjobs who came up with that immigration law) because we will wear full ski parkas when it’s 40 degrees out and still be shivering.  Let me tell you, I moved here from Minnefuckinapolis where I spent 8 years as a goddamned paperboy delivering in subzero weather so cold you could literally spit and have it freeze before it hit the ground, and after my first Arizona winter (in which I laughed at everybody for going around bundled up) I got acclimated, too, and now I’m just as much of a pussy about being chilled as everybody else here.

Bloody Mandy’s back, and she says she’s going to make a minestrone, while her li’l partner ShortyPants plans on showing us how many different components he can shove into something as simple as a salad.  “I don’t wanna be a forgotten side dish… I wanna be the forefrontrunner…”

“…and an egg salad is just the dish to get me there!”

I have no clue what is going through ShortyPants’ mind during these challenges.  The day before during SquabbleTime he had made a silly suggestion that they all put out some kind of fruit plate for dessert to represent the twelve of them and was soundly shot down (maybe because putting together a fruit plate isn’t cooking?) so this salad idea of his seems like more of the same stupidity.

Miss Swan’s noticing that Bobby Brown has snagged an overly large portion of the vegetables (turnips, beets and asparagus) and wants to get the beets from him so that she and Big-Haired Andrea will have some kind of vegetable with their pork loin.  The trouble is, Bobby doesn’t really know what he wants to do with any of the veggies, and ChesTiffany says she’s staying the fuck out of it because she was the one having to tell him where to squat and where to lean in the last challenge, and girlfriend ain’t havin’ none of that this time.  Because (say it with me now) she’s not gonna go home for someone else’s screwup.

OranJello and Miss Tamesha are working their butts off, and he’s giving an overly detailed description of all the things he’s done to his duck:  “I butchered it perfectly, I marinated it, I rendered off the fat, I let it rest, I cooked it more… I basically made love to that duck, to be honest witchu.”…

is it any wonder he came down with crabs?

While OranJello’s off duckfucking, it seems that MassholEd and Nosferatu have found a way to work together, and they’re busy making a filet stuffed with stewed ratatouille, which involves string being tied around the filet and such.  MassholEd’s just kinda looking grim and glancing longingly at ChesTiffany.

Suddenly disaster strikes!  It’s unclear exactly how it happened, but Miss Tamesha is standing next to KennEgo and JerseyMoobs’ prep table when she suddenly yelps and jumps to the side.  Next thing we know, JerseyMoobs’ cauliflower couscous is all over the ground…

maybe throw some lemons in with it and call it Cauliflower CousCous with Lemongrass?

The sad thing is, JerseyMoobs isn’t even nearby when it happens, and as he comes up to see his destroyed dish you can hear him dazedly asking if the wind blew the bowl over.  KennEgo says “I was chopping and… *shrugs*”  Hmmm, kinda sounds like it might have almost been the Alpha Dawg’s fault, but he stopped shy of admitting anything full-out.  Meanwhile, KennEgo’s just standing there watching the couscous lay on the ground getting dirtier while OranJello and Miss Tamesha are scooping it up off to try and see if Moobsie can salvage any of it.  He declines, “There’s no way I’m using cauliflower off the ground.”  So, it’s back to Square One for him, and I thought for sure he was going to look beseechingly at KennEgo for ideas.  Instead, he decides to go get some zucchini squash and broccoli out of the mobile pantry and try for another dish.

Big-Haired Cold-Assed Andrea has come up against her own dilemma:  she’s afraid her pork loin is too big to get a proper sear on these flimsy propane grills (and a chill wind be blowin’ now, too, arrrrgh) so she seems to be soliciting advice from some of the other chefs like Miss Tamesha (who is technically, you know, on her team too) about whether or not she should cut the larger loin into smaller chunks.  This doesn’t appear to sit well with her so-called true teammate Miss Swan, who immediately starts bitching…

you will notice she is not offering any helpful suggestions herself

After Andrea also asks JerseyMoobs and KennEgo (and gets similar advice:  it’s too damned big for these tiny grills) she decides to quarter the loins so they may have a chance of actually cooking.  Miss Swan is all “Ultimately you need to stand up there and feel good about it” which I guess is her little way of saying “You on your own, bitch!”  Week after week I’m coming to feel like Miss Swan is really kind of a cooze.  But then she finds she has a little extra time while her beets are roasting, so she goes and makes a strawberry-rhubarb crisp, and now I kind of love her a little again.

Time runs out and here come the 40+ “local chefs and farmers” to enjoy their free meal with Daddy Tom, Scar, Erique The Rippert and Patty O’Furniture…

who really lives up to her drag name since she’s wearing my old easy chair

It’s really too bad that we don’t get to meet any of the chefs or farmers, because clearly they’re not important enough for air-time, instead, let’s just stare at Patty-O making her Death’s Head Grimace™ some more…

I would not want to be near Miss Thing here when those staples spring free of her skull

Before the judging, it becomes clear that the Magical Elves are pretty clearly on the KennEgo side of the KennEgo/OranJello battle, because they devote tonight’s vignette to him and all the awesome nicknames everybody in the house has for him, such as “Big Daddy” and “Black Magic” and “Black Lightning” and “Black Angus”…

here’s my contribution:  how about “Black ‘Hole”?

I guess that must be the butch way to drink wine.  Anyhow, KennEgo says he really wants to win this challenge because it will show THE WORLD that even though he didn’t cook the main entrée, he was still able to make something that “took over” from OranJello’s duck or Big-Haired Andrea’s pork loin…

Puh-LEEZE

The WORLD?!?!  Yes, KennEgo, your influence is global in proportion and you will soon have fans far and wide who will look back upon this day and fondly recall that your changed their LIIIIIVES!

They start out by digging into Bloody Mandy’s soup, which earlier she was saying could beat Progresso-like quality…

ummm, aim higher, girl

Patty-O says “The rusticity of everything is shocking.”  Well, after all, you ARE eating in a cow pasture.  Le Rippert says he’s fine with a rustic dish, but he doesn’t like the fact that the carrots in it are so hard and in such big chunks.  Daddy Tom echoes that, saying if you cut all of your other veggies into smaller pieces and leave others as large clunky slabs, nothing will cook uniformly.  Ruh-roh.  Looks like maybe Mandy better be hoping Progresso has a “Shit Soup” flavor.  Patty finishes by complaining “It’s hard to get into the mouth, also.” which I find impossible to believe where she is concerned.

Next they move on to ShortyPants and his Salad ‘O’ Many Components…

and is served with MORE BOOZE!!!

Scar says it left her cold, it was wet and heavy and overseasoned.  Patty-O says serving salad in a bowl is not a good choice, while Daddy Tom bitches about finding a lot of bruised up lettuces in it, which completely ruined it for him.

Now, for some reason this week, Bravo was too damned cheap to take separate pictures of the rest of the dishes, so we’re going to have to talk about KennEgo’s, JerseyMoobs’, Big-Haired Andrea’s, Miss Swan’s, OranJello’s and Miss Tamesha’s dishes all at one time…

and here I thought they made things hard for me a few weeks ago, this picture was a BITCH

KennEgo – Scar says the curry was lovely, although Patty-O thought it was “very hot”.  Daddy Tom says that’s no problem “I expect my curries to be hot and my beer to be cold.”  Oooh, how butch!

JerseyMoobs – Erique likes the combination of his couscous with KennEgo’s curry, saying that it has “a cooleeng eefect”.

Big-Haired Andrea – Le Rippert says the pork was delicious and kooked pairfecktlee.

Miss Swan – Scar liked her roasted beets’n’apples in conjunction with Andrea’s pork dish, and Erique also thinks they were kooked pairfecktlee.

OranJello – Daddy Tom says he liked the duck, but doesn’t sound overly enthusiastic about it.  Scar thinks the seasoning of it is very tasty.

Miss Tamesha – Daddy says while her cherry compote was good, the asparagus doesn’t have a lot of flavor to it.

They move on to Bobby Brown, ChesTiffany, Nosferatu and ImmuneHolEd’s dishes…

Bobby Brown – Patty-O says the turnips and asparagus “didn’t register” with him.  Scar and Daddy Tom agree, “The overall impression is… it didn’t make one.”  Patty puts the nail in Bobby’s Bottom Chef Coffin™ when he calls it “a bit of a mish-mash”.

ChesTiffany – Daddy Tom says her collard greens are undercooked, and Patty agrees.  Well, I guess now you’ve got that solo fuckup you were looking for, girlfriend.

Nosferatu – Le Rippert says the quality of the beef is exceptional.

MassholEd – Erique is not a fan of stuffing good beef with ratatouille, he doesn’t think it brings anything to the meat.  Patty-O decides to get all sassy and retorts “We learned that stuffing technique from the French by sticking truffle in the center!”  Le Rippert is all “Troffel eez deefairent from ratatouille!”…

*through gritted teeth* “Yoo seelee fockeeng queen.”

Lastly, Daddy Tom brings up Miss Swan’s last minute dessert…

I heart strawberries & rhubarb, even when they’re made by a bitch

He absolutely loves it, too, pointing out she made it of her own free will.  Of course, if it had tasted like shit, he’d be asking her why she bothered, but let’s not talk about judging inconsistencies right now.  Instead, let’s head over to the Judges’ Table.

Scar calls in KennEgo, Big-Haired Andrea, Miss Swan… and JerseyMoobs.  You can instantly see the first three have a split-second where they’re thinking his inclusion means they’re on the bottom, but no, they are the favorites of the day!  At least, that’s what they hope Patty O’Furniture’s wizened rictus-like grin means for them…

he really ought to stop doing that or else go back to wearing his hooded robe and carrying a scythe

After giving everybody their kudos the winner of today’s so-called “Farm Competition” is… FUUUUUUCK, it’s KennEgo!

guess who just jizzed all over his own Jockeys?

Good, maybe now he’ll change clothes and get out of that fug green sweater he’s always wearing.  Ah well, I been googling to see if his win had the worldwide effect he was hoping for, but so far it seems people are still more interested in the oil spill, Gaga, Bieber, and the latest remix of Mel’s racist rantings, so, sorry KennEgo, looks like it’s going to take more than your awesome curry to make Planet Earth sit up and take notice of your greatness.

Back in the Stew Room, after accepting applause for his win (and making a short 3-hour thank-you speech) KennEgo says Bloody Mandy, ShortyPants and Bobby Brown are wanted.  Bobby Brown says being in the bottom never entered his mind at all.  Sadly, he’s the only one who feels that way…

“But I made my best Tenderoni!”

Bobby tells the Judges he was going to make a mousseline, but changed his mind and left the turnips in tiny chunks instead.  Le Rippert says the pieces were too small to really taste the turnips at all, and the seasoning was bland.  Daddy Tom wants to know why he put asparagus in it.  Bobby says it’s because otherwise between the taters and the turnips everything was just plain white, and he wanted some color.  Daddy then accuses him of not liking his own dish, “You were trying to figure out how to fix it, and… I don’t think you did.”

Next, ShortyPants gets a smackdown from Patty-O for being so crass as to serve salad in a bowl, which I find amusing since that’s how I eat it just about every night.  And I don’t wear ugly-ass sportcoats that sear everybody’s eyes, so I think the pisselegant fairy can just cram it sideways about that part of the critique.  I do think he’s right on the money when he says to dump a gloppy dressing on top of a salad is like pouring concrete on top of silk, it just ruins everything.  Daddy Tom also thinks instead of giving them big slices of apple, he should have diced it like substitute croutons instead.  ShortyPants is starting to make cry-ey faces again…

maybe he can make some wahmbrosia next time

As for Bloody Mandy, Erique Le Rippert starts out by asking exactly what she thinks “minestrone” is.  She says in her version (because she already knows she’s wrong) it’s beans, pancetta, parmesan rind and veggies.  Erique eez flabbairgasteed, “Eena meenaystrohn, yoo doan theenk eet haz pazzta, too?”…

someone should have read their Progresso can label more thoroughly

She’s sticking to her story that the way she makes minestrone it does not have pasta in it.  Daddy Tom doesn’t give a shit about that, he just wants to find out if she understands why chefs are supposed to cut their ingredients into uniform sizes.  Bloody Mandy answers correctly (so that the ingredients will cook uniformly) but can’t answer him as to why she then left giant chunks of uncooked carrot in her generic-storebrand-not-really-minestrone.  Scar says it seemed amateurish.  Owie.  On that note, let’s go to the Viewer Poll…

I like my version better

And the chef going home tonight?  Well, damn, every little step he took just sent him right on out the door, it’s Bobby Brown!…

who gets in one last look up to Jesus

Thanks for playing Bobby, we’ll rock wit’cha later!

Well, there we go!  What did you think of this episode?  Was Bobby’s really the worst dish?  Or do you think ShortyPants or Bloody Mandy should have gone instead?  Which would you rather have leading you, OranJello or KennEgo?  Can you believe how lackluster these challenges were in this episode?  And how many of the remaining cheftestants do you think will be boinking before the end of the season?  I’m just loving all the swirly chocolate-vanilla love going on!  Now I just need to go find my Stevie Wonder CD with the soundtrack from “Jungle Fever”…

Thanks for all the commentary and your guys’ everlasting patience, we’ll be together again sooner than you know it, K?

Love,  J-Mo  : )