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For me, this final episode brought us one of the simplest, best, most defining moments of the entire season: The scene when our three finalists first approached their ingredients at 11,200 feet, on top of Aspen Mountain. What did all three of them immediately do? They looked, they squeezed, and then they gnawed right into every vegetable that piqued their interest to see how it tasted. That, as much as anything else you’ll ever see on this show, is what it means to be a good cook. Everything starts with great ingredients -- the dish, the menu, the music, whatever, all should be inspired by what is tasting great NOW. (In other words, this is no time to be cooking a spring vegetable like asparagus; git yourself some zucchini, friends!)
All three of our finalists are artists. It has been a privilege to taste their food, and a serious responsibility to present my opinions...]]>
(Or, perhaps, “The Other Side of Aspen, Part II”)
Whoa -- what was that? Sweet mother of God, I think I just experienced an … emotion … while watching a reality show. This is creeping me out!
But, you see, at this point in the game, the feelings are really, well, real. We’re beyond most of the silly stuff (although I thought that trout challenge was flawed -- more on that later.) After weeks and weeks of torture in Miami, then interminable waiting, then more torture in Aspen (we only torture in the most fashionable locations), to be followed by several more cruel weeks of waiting, the drama for our beloved cheftestants is at an absolute fever pitch. The challenges are serious, they’re hard, and they’re mostly focused on inspiring the chefs to really do their thing. And any of the final four chefs, now winnowed to three, sadly, would have been a deserving...]]>
One thing’s sure: None of us, and none of you, has any business being pissed off about the four chefs going into this finale. Not the viewers, not the network, not the blogosphere, nor the judges. All four put their passion on the plate every time. All four are charismatic and gifted. All four of them are fighting for this, with integrity, strength, and imagination. All four of them WANT this.
One more thing is sure: Only one of them will get it.
On tonight’s elimination battle:
Casey: I disagree with the quibbling about the (true) fact that a dish isn’t really coq au vin when it’s not cooked for hours using an old rooster. I think that position is too rigid, here. Old roosters are hard to find in supermarkets. And faced with Andre Soltner and the deans of the French Culinary Institute, I think Casey was spot-on and brave to present...]]>
As the sun kissed the horizon in the Bombay Sapphire sky*, a lone seagull wheeled over the bridge of the gleaming white ship, tipped a wing in salute, and carved a farewell arc in the air. (*Unpaid literary allusion)
And then, he pumped his wings and soared out of frame to points unknown, but almost certainly, longingly -- finally -- to home. You could almost hear him keening -- in what? Defiance? Relief? The pain of acid reflux?
Perhaps you missed the shot, barely half a second long; it came midway through this episode’s Elimination Challenge on the Pure nightclub yacht, and, tellingly, it came immediately after guest judge Michael Schwartz called Howie’s asparagus phyllo “cigars” “greasy” and “really f*cking ugly.” (They may be fellow Miamians, but I don’t see Howie and Michael hooking up for Mah-jongg.)
Anyway: The sun setting, a solitary gull on the wing -- metaphors, people! Foreshadowing! Them Top Chef...]]>
Yee-owch, you viewers were lusty for some chef blood last week, weren’t ya?!
And not even just the two or three “politically-correct”-ravin’, Oxycontin-munchin’, Limbaugh-listenin’, Falwell-missin’, hard-right conservative Bushies whose tender feelings I apparently bruised in last week’s blog. (Sorry—really sorry—and I’ll shut up as soon as Ann Coulter goes away for good and you quit voting.) But also the peacenik, Chablis-sniffin’, book-readin’, almost-vegetarian-but-can’t-kick-prosciutto, vaguely bisexual, Volvo-and- Birkenstock set I had always figured for the Bravo audience we love so much!
I kid, you know. I really do. Most of my relatives voted for Mr. “Mission Accomplished,” and some of them don’t even regret it yet. But since you ask, my fundamentalist friends, I LOVE Fred Thompson. On “Law & Order.” Where he’ll be working again in November 2008—can’t wait! J
Oh, yes: “Top Chef.” Apparently, nobody’s happy unless a chef goes down. Me, I’m almost always sad to see somebody go. Tonight, y’all got...]]>
Also in this post: So-called “political correctness” (grrrrrrrr!)
But first: Just wanted to say for the record that I didn’t mean to spark so much Howie-hatin’ in this space last week. I’ve said it before: I really like Chef Kleinberg, and I like his cooking, too (excepting, of course, his infamous “Howie spice”). True, I would have liked to send him home rather than Sara because, upon watching the episode, I found his unwillingness to work with people more troubling than her flawed cooking. However, that was not an option.
As we’ve said over and over, the decision is based on the dish. Booting Sara was the right call.
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But speaking of TC’s dwindling female contingent: Some people posted last week that they feel that the show is routinely unfair to the female contestants, or that some of the judges are biased...]]>
But first, it has always struck me as funny that in a culture where women are still often expected to be the cooks at home, the business of professional cheffing is heavily dominated by Y-chromosomes. I’m sure this is changing, but it remains a very macho world.
I think this played a part in why Sara N. and Casey were so thrown by this cruel and unusual challenge (A challenge for which, by the way, the evil “Top Chef” producers should be ashamed -- this was cold, man!).
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You’ll recall that the "...chefpetitors (Chefletes? Cheftenders? Chefandidates?) were told by our hostess that they would be enjoying a night of Miami-style clubbing -- and how verrrrry excited they were about that. Of course, our hostess lies -- LIES! And then, when the chefs...]]>
Who said what?
1) “You have to do whatever you have to do to survive here. If that means throwing somebody over the bus, it’s gonna start happening.” (*Over* the bus?)
2) “I’m a little bit more of an academic in a lot of ways; I’m a thinker.” (In a minute, you're gonna want to picture this person impersonating the Rodin sculpture -- it’s good. Really good.)
3) “You got Padma looking at you looking all sexy today, and then you got this asshole right next to her, and your mind just goes blank.” (Is that a yucca in your pocket, or are you just happy to see Padma? Also, did you just call Rocco DiSpirito an asshole on national television?!)
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4) “It’s not difficult to identify bowtie pasta.” (True....]]>
But first, I need to go a little “Kitchen Confidential” on you here with a nasty subject, one that has come up often on-set when I’ve judged this and other food shows, but one I’ve never seen aired in public: Chefs that (eww) sweat into (blech) their food--our food, actually. Yecccccccccch! Cue the rising chunks, por favor.
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I’m talking about the Elimination Challenge last night in which the cheftestants were told they’d have three hours to cook a dish for the cast and crew of Telemundo’s telenovella “Dame Chocolate.” Great idea for a challenge since the cast of most Telemundo shows are gorgeous, sexy, and perpetually glistening.
Of course, an actress glistening in the languid Miami air is one thing. A chef gushing into your entrée is something else. And after the...]]>
In Maine, where the finest lobster in the world is found, messing with somebody else’s lobster traps at sea entitles the owner of those traps to, um, shoot you. Legally. It’s kind of like rustling cattle out west -- it is distinctly frowned upon.
We’ve been going to Maine every summer for years, and we love the place. This past fourth of July, we went Down East again, hooking up with a gang of friends (Yo, Sean, Amy, Owen, and Fergus!) in a shingled beach cottage straight out of the LL Bean catalog. We enjoyed succulent orange bugs and seawater so cold it freezes your ankles solid. Brrrrr! Delightful.
But this year -- while, of course, we paid for our lobster fair and square -- I steered clear of lobstermen.
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That’s because, as so many of you noted on the boards in recent days, in the last episode of TC, we at...]]>
