'Top Chef Chicago' Episode 9: Ladies Night

What?? No restaurant wars? When Padma dropped this bomb, we were ready to boycott the rest of the season. “Top Chef” without restaurant wars? Impossible. But, hmm … wedding wars … could be interesting, if only because someone always crashes and burns with that pesky wedding cake.

Appropriately, perhaps, the episode turned out to be all about the ladies. Notably:

>> Antonia observes that this is the first time four women have made it to the top eight. You go, girls! (OK, Nikki was gone by the end of the episode and we don't really think Lisa will be around much longer. But still, it’s a landmark.)

>> Inexplicably, Richard’s inner Southern gentleman chooses this moment to step out, and he convinces his team to cook for the bride. The bride seems cool enough (when you volunteer to have the so-called “happiest day of your life” sabotaged by a bunch of competitors on a reality TV show, you’re probably no Bridezilla), but c’mon … does any auxiliary party really want to be held responsible for a woman’s happiness on her wedding day?

>> Gale Gand, Chicago’s grande dame of pastry, is the guest judge. Enough said.

>> Though Richard wins the challenge, he turns around and gives his prize to our hometown gal, Stephanie. Very gallant of him, though it was probably well-deserved, given that Stephanie pulled off a 24-hour wedding cake that didn’t sink the team.

And now, we drink.

This week’s new drinking game rule should be obvious. It’s all about Dale—specifically, Dale’s anger management issues. Every time Dale punches something, yells or insults another chef, we drink. This includes passive direct insults, passive aggressive insults and under-the-breath mumblings, and insults repeated only to the camera after the fact.

To recap:

Rule No. 1: Drink every time Lisa curses (two this week; total curse count was 26.)

Rule No. 2: Drink every time a Glad product appears on screen (34 this week). Chug for the first five seconds of any Glad commercial (just one this week).

Rule No. 3: Drink every time Dale lashes out, directly or indirectly.

Finally this week, with less than half of the original contestants left, it’s time for us to start ranking chefs. Here they are, in the order we think they’ll go:

Lisa: Her cake might have tasted fine, but it looked like an aircraft carrier.

Spike: Something tells us he has a limited number of tricks up his sleeve (or maybe they’re under that hat?) and he’s about to run out.

Andrew: Eventually, he’ll spontaneously combust.

Dale: He spent most of tonight’s episode moaning about how awful his teammates were and yakking about how much better he is than everyone else. His fundamentals will carry him to the top four, but they won’t be able to overcome his attitude. Of course, we said this about Hung last season before he went on to win it all …

Finale (in alphabetical order): Antonia, Richard and Stephanie

Next week: Sabotage! Mind games! Intrigue!

Until then, don't forget to check out what our friends at The Stew have to say about this week's episode.