What?!?

Top Chef - Season 5, Episode 1

Previously on Top Chef: Fifteen chefs and one extremely irritating lady cooked their way through Chicago and Puerto Rico. Stephanie emerged victorious, proving once and for all that women can cook, and centuries of mothers, sisters, aunts, and grandmothers ruling the home kitchen wasn't just some enormous fluke. Limecrete had a job that allowed him time to write blow-by-blow recaps. Now, he doesn't, and must be content with medium-length entries like this one. Boo! Oh, and seventeen chefs are starting the competition process anew in New York City. I cannot believe that they haven't done a season in Reality Show Mecca until now, but there it is. Tiffany pauses the DVR and announces that she's betting that at some point during the season, those punny producers will be sure to wedge in a challenge about apples, as they're in the Big one. The show format is the same. The prizes are the same. I hope at least the challenges and contestants are interesting. The last thing we need is a cookie-cutter season.

Opening credits. It's helpful for matching faces with names, especially when there are this many people. I'm already ready to send a bunch of them home, just so we're left with a more manageable number. Top Chef is best enjoyed in a group setting, with plenty of alcohol present. And we all know the recipe for a good drinking game is to add wine to reality show cliche and bring to a low boil. So, let's get started. Every time someone's thick accent is so unintelligible that it warrants subtitles...DRINK!

New York City. I feel like I've just gotten back, and am already looking forward to my next trip there. Fun city. Contestants begin arriving at the airport. As with several other reality show wannabes, some are there for personal validation, and some are raging narcissists. A small handful actually seem to want to use this as a learning experience to help their careers. Weirdos! Radhika's parents are from India, but don't you dare pigeonhole her into Indian cuisine. Don't you dare! Lauren refuses to sit at home and waste time while her husband fights in Iraq. And as we all know, the only way to avoid wasting time is to get yourself on a television show. Meanwhile, through the miracle of science, Howie and Tuscaloosa Joey have managed to mate and create an adult baby named Daniel, who will be making his daddies proud by following in the family tradition of competing on this show. Lauren's heart leaps when she spies Patrick, as they went to school together. Patrick's still a student and "has a lot of passion". Stefan has moved all over Europe. Richard is a big, adorable queer.

The chefs get off a ferry to meet Padma and Ptom. They blah a bit about what a harsh environment the New York culinary scene is, as Ptom knows from experience. Padma takes us into the first Quickfire Challenge, but there's a twist. The chef who finishes the Quickfire last is out. On the plus side, the eliminated chef doesn't need to worry about unpacking all that luggage. The chefs don't appreciate that bright side, and look consternated. Lauren, who has apparently never seen a reality show in her life, says she knows one of the chef coats waiting in the Kitchen is hers, and she'll "be damned" if she goes home early. Fate laughs merrily and strings her bow. The Quickfire is split into three rounds. The first round will be to peel fifteen apples with a knife. Score one for Tiffany! The first nine to finish their apples to Ptom's satisfaction will be safe, and the eight remaining chefs will move on to Round 2. Ready? Go!

Richard immediately gouges himself with the knife and bleeds all over his apples. Yum! Stefan finishes first. Other chefs follow, including a woman whose bangs don't do her any favors. It would be incredibly juvenile and idiotic to point out her unfortunately masculine features by yelling "Man!" every time she appears on-screen. So pretend I didn't do that. Jamie finishes ninth, ending Round 1. Padma informs Stefan that as the first to finish, he'll be immune in the upcoming Elimination Challenge. He gives the Standard Speech. For Round 2, the remaining chefs must brunoise two cups of the apples they've just peeled. The first four to finish successfully will be safe, and the remaining four will continue into Round 3. Ready? Go!

When the dust settles, the four losing chefs are Leah, Radhika, Patrick, and Lauren. Round 3 will be to take the diced apples and cook something worthy of deserving a spot in the competition. The chefs will have twenty minutes, and some equipment and extra ingredients have been provided. Ready? Go! Radhika, who you'd better not pigeonhole as just an Indian chef, leaps onto the idea to make apple chutney, because Indian flavors are her strength. Oh, why must you make it so easy for viewers to mock you? We need a challenge! Leah sees Radhika using pork, and opts for scallops instead, because she doesn't want to use the same protein as someone else. May I ask why? I'm not being snide; I really want to know. Surely, there must be a thousand ways to prepare pork in twenty minutes, and it's not like anybody's going to accuse her of being a copycat when there are so few ingredients available, right? Right?

Lauren throws together some fruit, lettuce, nuts, and bacon for a salad. A salad. It's hard to judge Top Chef challenge entries from home, because it's not like we can reach through the screen and taste anything. However, a good rule of thumb is that if little ol' me can easily prepare whatever the chef is making, it's not impressive enough. Patrick doesn't hear me, and puts together a simple little apple salad with yogurt dressing. He says that he's a perfectionist, so he's more about quality than speed. OK, but you're making apple salad, not Peking duck. The chefs plate up, and time runs out. Lauren presents her salad, which seriously, I could make in five minutes. Patrick puts forth his apple slaw salad, which includes cinnamon, honey, and mint. Yuck. Lauren's was too easy, but at least it'd taste good. Radhika has pan-seared some pork and topped it with her apple chutney. But she's not just an Indian chef! Leah has put forth the most impressive effort, making an apple hash to top her scallops, and putting it all on a pool of vinegar and apple juice.

The Odd Asian music and its attendant gong come early this season. Padma asks for the good news first, and it's not hard to peg Leah and Radhika as safe. So, it comes down to the salads, as it should. Patrick and Lauren clutch hands. Patrick thinks it's sad, as he's just now getting a chance to reconnect with Lauren. Don't feel bad, Patrick. Perhaps the two of you won't be separated for as long as you think. After a commercial break, Ptom announces that Patrick has squeaked by. Padma tells Lauren to pack her knives and go. The other chefs give her pity applause as she does a walk of shame to the ferry. Good-bye, Karen! I'll never forget you!

Elimination Challenge. Padma brings out the knife block, and the chefs come one at a time to draw one. Each knife has an ethnic neighborhood of New York City printed on it, and as there are two of each neighborhood, the chefs are paired off as follows:

Patrick and Daniel: Chinatown (Chinese - duh)
Ariane and Stefan: Long Island City (Middle Eastern)
Radhika and Jill: Queens (Jamaican)
Fabio and Jeff: Ozone Park (Latin)
Hosea and Carla: Brighton Beach (Russian)
Leah and Melissa: Little Italy (Italian - duh)
Richard and Jamie: Astoria (Greek)
Alex and Eugene: Little India (Indian - duh)

The challenge is to create a dish inspired by the neighborhood each chef has drawn. The two dishes of each neighborhood will be served head-to-head. An ultimate winner will be chosen from the top eight, and one of the losing eight will meet up with Lorena at the airport. With that, the chefs are dismissed to go get settled in their apartment, which is swanky. Everyone admires the view. Richard, Patrick, and Jamie quickly bond together as the gay chefs, calling themselves Team Rainbow. I'm all for the gay bonding, but "Team Rainbow" is so fruity, it's dropping blueberries. That evening, Fabio talks about how much pasta he makes, and kids about how all other Europeans are jealous of Italians. He's subtitled. DRINK! Stefan picks a fight about how a vinaigrette is a vinaigrette. No arguments here. Oh, and he's subtitled. DRINK! In his argument about how vinaigrettes are not emulsions, Stefan tells Daniel to get a life. I'm sorry, but nobody involved in a fight about vinaigrette gets to tell anyone to get a life. Ever.

The next morning, after everyone gets up and fed, they split into their pairs to go shopping in their specific neighborhoods. They've got twenty minutes and $75 to shop. Hosea doesn't know much about Russian cuisine.

Panny: "It's all fucking beets."

He's in better shape than he thinks, because his competition is Carla, who is currently informing us (with her eyes bugging out of her sockets) that she's waiting to be led by her spirit guides. Oooooooookay. Ariane knows nothing about Middle Eastern cooking, but Jeff is confident in his Latin food abilities, coming from Miami. Leah far outmatches Melissa in Italian roots. Patrick is taking a course in Asian cuisine, so he's all good. Well, sure. I took a course in art history, so I can identify what dynasty a vase came from at thirty paces. He picks up some black rice noodles, which he's never worked with before, but "can't be too bad". Fate shakes her head in disgust and pulls out another arrow. Eugene has no Indian food experience, and when he sees that the store has some food cooked and ready to go, he intelligently asks for a sample of some to try and approximate later.

The Kitchen is big, bright, and clean, and has the Top Chef logo in mosaic on the wall, which makes it look like a subway stop. I mean that as a compliment. The chefs have two hours to get their dishes ready, so they get started. Fabio jabbers about the pork he's making. We yell the titular quote at the screen. Jeff says he's got all sorts of time, so he starts on some crispy plantain. Yum. I forgot how hungry watching this show makes me. Stefan tells us he's working with lamb. Ariane, who spent the morning telling us how shy she is, now says she can't compete with Stefan's confidence, because she always second-guesses herself. I'm like that too, so you know what I don't do? Sign up for televised contests. Carla hacks her smoked fish to mush, trying to get all the bones out. She wonders aloud what will happen if the judges find some, and Hosea's like "Um, that's why I bought filets, dumbass." Guess the spirit guides didn't pass that tip along. Richard talks to himself while he cooks, while Jamie withdraws into herself. That works out well for both of them.

With thirty minutes left, Alex tells us that he's incorporating his strength in Latin food into his Indian dish, because the flavors marry well. I don't see that at all, but who am I to stand in the way of his happiness? Ariane boils some farro, but doubts she has enough time to cook it through. The black rice noodles Patrick has never used before have a gummy texture he's not happy with. The course in Asian cuisine has failed him! He starts a new batch in the hopes that he can get some he's happy with. As time winds down, Jeff realizes that none of the gazillion components to his dish have been plated. He begins running around the Kitchen like a maniac. It doesn't work, and when time runs out, he's missing a lot of his food.

Guest judge Jean-George Vongerichten comes into the Kitchen with Ptom, Padma, and Gail. Hey, Ptom didn't have a chance to Ptimewaste tonight! Yay! Padma explains the whole challenge again. I'll assume you're up to speed. Ariane and Stefan are up first. She's made crusted rack of lamb, and some farro risotto with dates and chickpeas. Stefan has a meat duo, consisting of a lamb chop with tabouli salad and a beef/onion skewer, both of which look wonderful. Jean-George asks about the spices Stefan used with a thick accent and around a mouthful of food. That means subtitle, and that means...DRINK! Gail likes Ariane's lamb, but finds the risotto woefully undercooked. Jean-George roundly compliments Stefan's dish. At least that's what the subtitles would lead me to believe. DRINK! Ptom liked his use of cinnamon, and he's the clear winner of the duo.

Richard and Jamie come up for judging. Richard loses some points with me by rhapsodizing over how dreamy Ptom is. Bleh. He's not bad-looking, but his personality has long since invalidated his appearance. Richard has made a lamb burger and an orzo/feta pasta salad. Jamie has made a deconstructed Greek salad of eggplant puree, seared bass, and a small salad made with arugula and olives. There is an audible crunch when Ptom takes a bite of the burger. Ew. The judges don't like how Richard has overcooked the lamb, even if it was intentional. Jamie takes the round. Radhika and Jill approach with their Jamaican dishes. Jill has made plantain fritters crusted with macadamia nuts and jerk-spiced scallops. They are served on a bed of three colorful sauces, each of which form a circular pool. It's quite pretty. Radhika has made jerk-rubbed halibut and served it with mango salad on three bean rice. Yes, because rice is so very Jamaican. Not Indian at all! Don't pigeonhole her! Jean-George says (DRINK!) that Radhika's fish and rice are too soft to be served together, and Jill wins.

Jeff and Fabio. I'm not even going to attempt to decipher everything Fabio says, but the gist is that his Latin dish is a pork chop with a mango and jalapeno demi-glace, and a mushroom/avocado salad on the side. It looks awful. Jeff has made coffee-seared pork tenderloin, with smoke plantain, black beans, and rice on the side. Now that I could get into. Ptom prefers Fabio's dish, but he's outvoted by Jean-George (DRINK!) and Padma. I assume Gail went for Jeff's too. Hosea and Carla. Hosea, who I have to admit thinking is kind of hot, wins me over even further by presenting a trio of smoked fish and caviar I want to dive through the screen and devour. Carla has made smoked trout and wild salmon cake, and served them on top of potato latkes. Huh. I like all those things, but I wouldn't put them together. Hosea is told that he executed his dish with "culinary eloquence", and he takes the round.

Leah and Melissa. Like Ariane, Leah has made a farro risotto, but has served hers with red snapper and mushrooms. Melissa has seared rib eye steak on tomato sauce, and has dumped a bunch of arugula and fried mushrooms on top. It looks like bar food. The judges' issue is more that Melissa's lacked salt and pepper, and Leah wins. Daniel and Patrick. Daniel has whipped up a ginger-poached chicken salad with bok choy, shiitake mushrooms, and fried wontons. Well, that didn't take long. The subtitles of Daniel's dish gives us the season's first example of the Reliably Shitty Titles Department. I've taken the liberty of correcting their spelling here, which I generally have to do a lot. Like, embarrassingly so. Not just spelling. Their grammar and identification skills suck too.

Anyhoo, Daniel's food looks very tasty. Patrick has made seared salmon on bok choy with ginger/garlic scallion on a bed of the black rice noodles. I don't mean to harp on the simplicity of Patrick's dishes, but the fact that he's still a culinary student really stands out. He is completely out of his league here. His Quickfire was a basic salad, and this is fish on noodles. Anyone with a modicum of cooking skill could do this. The judges don't like the texture of the black rice noodles, and don't find a lot of Chinese flavors in the dish. Daniel's isn't very popular either, as it's messy and unoriginal. However, it was more flavorful than Patrick's, and that's enough to win the round. Alex and Eugene. Alex has grilled lamb chops, which are served alongside a spicy ragout and rest on a bed of basmati rice. The lamb looks overdone to me. Eugene has made rack of lamb rubbed with masala (a mixture of spices), served with basmati rice and tzatziki. I always thought of tzatziki as Greek, not Indian. Padma informs Eugene that he's accidentally created curds and rice, not tzatziki. Luckily for him, that is very Indian, and he's done it very well, so he wins the round.

Ptom thinks the overall level of the dishes was very good. I don't know, a lot of those looked either overly simple or were a glut of traditional ingredients thrown into a heap. That's understandable on the first challenge, but let's not pretend that things like a lamb burger are terribly exciting. Jean-George garbles something which is helpfully subtitled to indicate that he's pleased. DRINK! Nobody's dish was out-and-out awful, but Patrick's was certainly the work of an amateur, Radhika's textures were off, and Ariane's farro was raw. The judges reach an agreement. After the commercials, Padma summons Stefan, Eugene, Leah, Patrick, and Ariane to Judges' Table. The Odd Asian music and the gong have a union contract stating that after they show up in an episode, they can knock off for the day, and have gone home.

The judges start with the winners. Leah has captured the spirit of modern Italian cooking. Stefan has made a complicated dish look simple. Jean-George says something about lemon and couscous. What?!? I don't look at the television screen as I type, and he is just impossible without the subtitles. DRINK! Eugene has fallen backwards into a great Indian dish. Padma seriously intones the tradition that in all but one season (Season 3), the person who has won the first Elimination Challenge has won the whole season. The person under that pressure this time is... Stefan, who has taken the rare double win. Stefan says that it would be great for a European to win Top Chef, complaining that only Americans have won this game produced by Americans that takes place in America. It's times like these that I bemoan the lack of culinary opportunity in Europe. They just have no appreciation for food over there!

The winners leave Judges' Table. Ariane is asked how her dish came about, and she says she looked around the store, and just bought what there seemed to be the most of, guessing that those ingredients would be popular. That is a terrible answer. Her undercooked farro is brought up, and Ptom says that cooking grains properly is a basic skill chefs need to understand. Both Ariane and Patrick's dishes lacked inspiration. Patrick says he wanted to present clean flavors ("clean" is often code for "ridiculously easy"), and Ptom nails it by saying that his food was like a cliche of Chinese food, rather than actual food one would eat in Chinatown. Ptom says that both losing dishes prove that chefs need to get out of their comfort zones. That's all well and good, but you can't know everything. People need to specialize. Would you slam your dentist for not knowing how to deliver a baby? After some more grousing in this vein, Ariane loses her patience and points out that that's why people have cookbooks. Another terrible answer. True, but terrible. Ptom whines that people learn to cook through experience, not book-learning. Frankly, I think both are important.

Both chefs are asked why they should stay. Ariane has "a lot to give". Patrick is "driven by [his] passion". More terrible answers! Passion doesn't equate to talent. Wanting something is not the same as deserving it. Padma dismisses the chefs. Deliberations. Ptom says that Patrick is still a student, but the competition is a level playing field. Well, then maybe pitting a culinary student against executive chefs who have lived and worked in multiple countries wasn't the best idea. The judges say he lacked inspiration and doesn't have the ability to think on the fly. Patrick is busy telling the other chefs that he wants to share his passion with them and the world. All right, I feel bad for how badly this kid is outmatched. But enough with the friggin' passion, already. The judges say Ariane should have known better. Jean-George: "Bkelreljleryjhbje." What?!? Ptom thinks she lacks a basic cooking skill. The judges reach a decision.

Elimination. Ptom tries to find something good to say about an established chef being evenly matched against a relative upstart, and winds up insulting them both. Ariane's inspiration was good, but her technique was off. Patrick's was executed well, but had no inspiration. Ptom throws it over to Padma for the chopping. Patrick. Please pack your knives and go. Jeez, whoever taught him and Laurel needs to turn in their teaching certificate now. The judges wish him luck. This is kind of sad, and not in the emotional way. More of the discomfort-of-seeing-someone-so-clearly-set-up-to-fail way. He gets a group hug back in the Kitchen, and shrugs that he's got his whole career ahead of him. That's true. He had no chance of winning this, but that doesn't speak to a lack of skill; just a lack of experience. That's cheering.

This season on Top Chef: Cooking. Fire. Cursing. Fights. Tonight's hints of Stefan's arrogance and douchebaggery come to fruition. Martha Stewart. Crazy Carla. Bad food. Crying. So... Standard issue, I guess.

Overall Grade: B