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Top Chef - Season 11, Episode 7

Previously on Top Chef: Though her dad may have been Prime Minister, it's Nina's turn to rule now. Competitors quaked in her presence, as she calmly went about dominating both the Creole tomato Quickfire and the cream cheese Elimination Challenge. Is her winning streak about to come to an end? There's only one way to find out! Oh, and Bene went home. Twelve chefs remain. Who will be eliminated tonight?

Sickness has come to the Top Chef household. A doctor is called to examine Nicholas, and she diagnoses him with strep throat, cautioning him to stay away from food and other people for at least twenty-four hours. This must be one of those magical TV cases of strep throat that has the potential to clear up overnight. I was unfortunate enough to get the Real Life version, which I can assure you does not go away in one day. Nicholas stays home to rest, and the other chefs head out for the day.

Quickfire Challenge. Padma explains that if Nicholas isn't feeling better by the time the Elimination Challenge rolls around, he'll have to forfeit. Fair enough. Today's guest judge is jazz musician Kermit Ruffins, and while he seems like a cool guy, this challenge... Well, let me explain a bit. The chefs will begin cooking at their stations, but when Kermit begins to play, they have to walk around in a circle. When the music stops, the chefs must continue whatever dish is cooking at their new station. This could happen any number of times, but when the final note dies away, the chefs will be judged at whatever station they happened to end up at. Winning chef gets immunity.

Huh? Listen, I don't mind off-kilter challenges. I think it can be fun to watch them forced out of their comfort zones, and even kind of valuable as a teaching tool. Sure, chefs will never have to create a dish out of gas station convenience store food or need to base a dish around a particular color in their real careers, but when I was watching those Quickfires, I at least felt that each chef's individual skill was being tested. There's something to be said for having the chefs continue someone else's preparation in mid-stream, but immunity for the winner? You may as well give it out at random.

So I'm not going to bother getting into the Quickfire's details too much. Some chefs are delighted by what they find when they arrive at new stations, and some are horrified. Justin out-and-out tosses Shirley's couscous in the garbage without a second thought. When Kermit's tune is at its end, Brian is lucky enough to be standing behind the winning dish, a duck and mussels concoction. He has the good grace to thank the other chefs that made his win possible, but he's also understandably jazzed (see what I did there?) to have immunity basically served to him on a platter (and there?)

Elimination Challenge. The chefs will be preparing food to bring to a restaurant that Kermit plays at often. Dishes should be potluck style, and the chefs will pick their own teams. This should have been an interesting segment. How do you treat Brian? Avoid him because he has immunity? How do you treat Nicholas? Treat him as if he'll be there and at full strength? There and weak/distracted? Not there at all? How do you treat Nina? Do you grab her to give your team a boost, or avoid her to lower your chances of elimination should the team falter? Zero of these avenues are explored. People just grab whoever happens to be near them or who their best friends are. Boring. The teams shake out to be:

Blue: Shirley, Justin, Sara, and Louis
Gray: Brian, Travis, Nicholas, and Patty
Green: Nina, Carrie, Carlos, and Stephanie

The chefs go shopping, and Nicholas is looped in via phone call so he can have some input. He rallies enough to join the prep in the Kitchen, so no forfeit tonight, thankfully. Let's hope he doesn't infect a restaurant full of jazz enthusiasts. Although maybe they'd like to have froggy voices for a while; it's one way to infuse your music with some soul. Prep goes fairly smoothly. Nicholas does a lot of the grunt work for the gray team. Brian doesn't much care what's going on, and I think he's the first contestant in history to happily acknowledge that having immunity is giving him some breathing room to rest on his laurels for a bit. None of the standard "I'm going to work as hard as I can despite my immunity!" speeches here. It's actually kind of refreshing. Nina makes gnocchi yet again, which I believe is her third time in seven episodes. Time to give it a rest, ma'am. You don't want to turn into Jamie.

Service. The restaurant's patrons and staff are delighted by the dishes. A lot of them do look good, but let me say that any notion of a "potluck" theme has been violently tossed out the window. The judges may have harped on dishes that didn't match the Halloween theme a couple weeks ago, but they don't really give a shit about this one. Annoying. Words mean things! A couple of things on each team's menu do really appeal to me, though. Just because it's not potlucky doesn't mean it's not tasty. Louis' pickled vegetables with crispy sunflower seeds and Justin's shrimp and hominy grits look fantastic. The gray team presents a fried chicken with bee pollen and ponzu that makes me claw at the screen. Over on the green team, Stephanie makes fried baby artichokes with preserved lemon and anchovy aioli. WAAAAAAAAANNNNNNT. Carrie and Carlos make a nectarine trifle that they insist on calling a tiramisu for some reason. No, really. Words mean things.

Fret 'n sweat. Stephanie's artichokes are praised, and it's funny to watch her during these segments, because no matter if the news is good or bad, every time her name is mentioned, she looks like she's about to pass a kidney stone the size of a baseball. Other dishes are not as popular. The screen goes off, and Padma comes into the Kitchen to summon the gray team to Judges' Table. The other chefs are puzzled by this, because it didn't seem like that team was getting winning reactions from the judges. Indeed, the gray team is the losing one this evening. Patty's watermelon salad was bland, and she admits that time ran out before she was able to dress it with the chili she was going to use. Travis' ribs were well-cooked, but the rub was off. That sounded dirtier than I intended. Nicholas' fish was dry. The fried chicken was good, though.

Before a loser is picked, though, we have to crown a winner. That winner will hail from the green team. Stephanie's artichokes were remarkably good, and Nina's gnocchi are also popular. Carrie and Carlos' dessert is much less lauded, so it comes down to the former two. Stephanie scores her first win, and her face finally registers something other than blind panic, which is nice to see. Elimination. Brian has immunity, so it comes down to the other three, and Patty gets the axe for her disappointing salad. Aw. I had developed a big ol' soft spot for Patty these past few weeks, but given her overall performance in the competition, I think it's fair to say she lasted longer than expected. She sheds a few tears on her way out, and yeah, it's a bummer to get cut because you didn't shake a container of chili powder for three seconds.

Overall Grade: C+