After a couple of quick shots of the chefs puttering about back at the Fountainebleau and a lingering shot of a goodbye note from Sandee, who was sent packing last week, Episode 3 opens in the GE Monogram Kitchen.
In this week's Quickfire Challenge, the chefs must "catch" shellfish from a murky tank in 30 seconds and prepare a dish using their haul in 30 minutes.
Crayfish go flying. Hung takes more than his fair share. Tre's net gives out on him and he ends up with a rather sorry-looking catch.
Everyone seems to be talking about the conch-what they'll do with it and how to work with it. Seems like a lot of work for a 30-minute challenge.
Dale sums it up nicely, if not eloquently: "We have half an hour to come up with a great shellfish dish, and I don't really have time to dick around with a conch."
Heh, heh. He said conch.
Micah proceeds to attack said conch with kitchen shears. Howie attempts the obvious: ceviche. Brian subscribes to a "less is more" approach, preparing a simple dish of steamed shellfish in white wine.
Dale whips up a spicy Italian sausage with tomato sauce, topped with a sunny egg. Though he incorporates scallops into the sausage, his is probably the farthest thing from a seafood dish that any of the 13 chefs present, and this worries us. (Not sticking to the parameters of the challenge cost Sandee last week, after all.) But this week's guest judge, Alfred Portale, chef and owner of the Gotham Bar and Grill in New York, doesn't seem to notice. Or maybe he just doesn't care. He thinks it has good flavor.
Bottom three honors go to Camille (who?), Tre (surprising) and Micah (not surprising). Camille's tea-heavy flavors are overpowering. Tre's proportions are off. And Micah's conch salad is just not right.
Brian's simple preparation of steamed shellfish wins, giving him immunity.
Next up: Elimination Challenge. The chefs must update much-loved family dinner classics like tuna casserole and sloppy joes, creating modern, lower cholesterol meals for their guests. They have $75 and 30 minutes to shop before cooking for one hour, on location, for two generations of members at the Miami Elks Lodge.
Dale reminds us that his cooking style is based in reinventing classic dishes; we think this challenge should be a walk in the park for him. He plans to draw on his Russian-Lithuanian heritage to create a twist on chicken and dumplings. Instead of doughy dumplings, he'll play on a Lithuanian dish of pierogi-like pockets filled with chicken.
Then we see him at the market with a box of instant potatoes in his hand.
Tall C.J. think that's bulls**t, and says as much. We have a brief flashback to the wedding-cake-from-a-box controversy from Season 1. But really, anyone who's ever made mashed potatoes for a dinner party and found themselves up to their elbows in mash and butter right about the time the doorbell rings feels Dale's pain here. You can't blame the guy. Besides, he fesses up immediately when Tom comes around-and he's using them as an ingredient in his dough, not trying to pass them off as a homemade side dish. It's a smart move.
Service begins, and things go downhill quickly for the chefs. Tall C.J.'s take on tuna casserole is messy, and some of the colors floating about on the plate remind us of lake algae. It's followed by equally unimpressive versions of chicken a la king and franks 'n' beans.
Judge Ted Allen sums things up for the group: "We're in serious need of some Wow here. We've had three courses of Not Wow."
The skies open and down floats Dale, bowls of chicken-filled potato dumplings prepared with broccoli, horseradish and celery root in hand. Wow.
Ted appreciates that Dale seared the outside of the dumplings to add texture. Someone from the Elks club loves the sauce. Tom says very little, but nods approvingly, which is usually a good sign. Nobody mentions instant-tasting mashed potatoes. Padma declares the dish a winner.
We see a few more dismal dishes, and it's clear from the editing that our boy Dale is going to come out near the top. Indeed, he ends up in front of the judges' table with Howie, whose interpretation of a pork chop with applesauce drew raves from the Elks. Dale's dish was good, the judges agree, but Howie's was better. Howie wins a stack of Alfred Portale's cookbooks and a week in the kitchen at the Gotham with Portale and his staff.
Tall C.J.'s tuna casserole, alternately described by the judges as "frightening" and a "green blob" assures him a place in the bottom five. Yes, five. In what we believe is an unprecedented move on 'Top Chef," the judges have called five chefs before them. We're feeling pretty sorry for the Miami Elks right about now.
Micah's dry meatloaf, with its "odd aftertaste," earns her a place at the table too. She's joined by Lia, who undercooked her lentils in an all-around boring take on franks 'n' beans, and Sara M., who clearly had no idea what chicken a la king was before she attempted to reinterpret it. (Not necessarily a bad thing, if you ask us.) And though he has immunity, Brian is called out specifically so the judges can scold him for using lobster, which is loaded with cholesterol, in his dish. Also, the judges are growing tired of Brian's seafood dishes, and they want to remind him that there are other fish in the sea. And those fish are cows, pigs and chickens.
Padma asks Micah to please pack her knives and go, and she does.
This week was Dale's best showing yet, instant potatoes and all. And the carefully produced previews of Episode 4 lead us to believe that he goes before the judges table again next week-we just don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing. We do know that the chefs will work in teams for the first time in the next episode, and this is often the point in the show when things start to shake down. Does Dale play well with others? Is he a leader in the kitchen? Moreover, was his performance this week just an instant potato-fueled fluke? We can't wait to find out.
Did you see the show last night? What do you think? Here's what our friends at The Stew are saying.
Apparently, there's pent-up demand for another El Mariachi. A Wednesday-night crowd jammed the bigger, more modern location on North Broadway, which opened last week across from the closed-for-now original (tiny El Mariachi II, however, further south on Broadway is still open). It took about 30 minutes to get a seat, but a pitcher of Cadillac Margaritas kept us happy enough. Our carne asada dinner was fine -- if not exactly riveting. The real problem: cheap cutlery. I thought my knife was going to snap in a half as I sawed through the steak. One tip: When you go, be sure to insist on what our server called the "molcajete salsa" instead of that rather mild pico de gallo they usually bring with your nacho chips. We left, however, with one nagging question: Who is that man staring at us from the ceiling? We put a call into the manager to try to get an answer. Until we hear back, we'd love to ask you if you have any guesses. (Click the picture for a larger view)