Last night was a really interesting episode of “Top Chef All-Stars,” as the judges for the quick fire would be……Cookie Monster, Elmo and Telly from “Sesame Street.” How awesome and cool and what must have been really weird for the chef-testants. Richard pointed out that he has a 2 year old girl and in his house Elmo is like Elvis. The challenge? What else…to make cookies from scratch in 45 minutes. The winner would take home $5K. The least favorites were Richard (who made ice cream balls that weren’t really cookies) and Angelo, who made chocolate hazelnut cookies with a banana chocolate milkshake. The favorites were Dale (no bake potato chip/pretzel cookies) and Antonia (chocolate cookies) and the overall winner was Dale. Elmo joked that while Antonia’s cookies were delicious, they looked like “cow chips”….classic!

Then for the elimination challenge, which held a grand prize of $25K, the chefs had three hours in the middle of the night to use anything on the shelves in a Target store, and cook a meal for 100 employees as well as the Top Chef judges. This week, judges included Ming Tsai and Target’s Thomas O’Brien as well as Padma, Tom, and Anthony Bourdain. Ironically, almost all of the chefs made some form of soup. It was interesting to see what their strategy was. Remember, Target stores are very large, so in order to gather their station materials and cooking utensils, they had to race around the store. Then, of course, they had to figure out their meals and gather the ingredients from the grocery department of the store.

In the end, the favorite dishes were by Dale (grilled cheese/ribeye sandwiches made using an iron and tomato soup from scratch), Antonia (Parmesan cream eggs with almond, tomato and apple) and Richard (pork two ways–tenderloin and ribs). The winner was Dale, making him $30K richer on the day. Man, this dude is really making a case to be Top Chef, isn’t he?

The least favorites were Carla (curried apple soup with tomato/ginger jam), Tiffany (jambalaya) and Angelo (baked potato soup). The judges said Carla’s just lacked flavor and depth and could have been better with a protein such as chicken; Tiffany’s suffered from having too much of a processed taste, made true by the fact that she used a spice packet!; and Angelo just was way too liberal with the salt shaker, to the point where the judges couldn’t get beyond a couple of spoonfuls. I really thought it would be Tiffany, but in the end it was Angelo who was sent packing. The dude just blew it, and as he readily admitted, he was burnt out and so was his own palate.

So there you have it….we’re down to six chef-testants–Antonia, Carla, Tiffany, Mike, Dale and Richard. I think one thing I’ve learned from watching this show is that you just never know who is going to get the boot–especially this season when we’re dealing with the best of the best. Thanks for reading, and see you all next week….

After a week hiatus, “Top Chef All-Stars” returned last night and got from nine chef-testants down to eight, which means we’re past halfway. They began with 17 chefs a little over two months ago. So last night’s episode began with host Padma Lakshmi introducing “Ultimate Collection” host and noted fashion designer Isaac Mizrahi. Isaac would judge the quick fire challenge, which was to create food that was fashion-conscious–i.e. not something that would be eaten, but that was made simply to look good. That’s difficult! You can surely be a great chef but not be able to make something look visually appealing all the time.

The worst-looking dishes were by Angelo (pineapple skin, curry salted egg and dill that Fabio referred to as “vomit in a bag” and Angelo wrote some REDRUM type art that said CROCODILE or something..yikes), Dale (beet puree and mango and other stuff strewn on a plate to look artsy) and Tre (smoked salmon and beets strewn like Dale’s). The best were Fabio, who made these goofy “tuna people” standing in the rain; Carla for her borscht and sandwich with a lattice of cucumber; and Richard, who made black chocolate ice-cream. Richard won, and his prize was immunity. That was a good prize for him to win since he’s always worried he’s being sent home.

Then for the elimination challenge, in walked Francino, Junior and Dino from Rao’s Restaurant in New York City, a place that is notoriously one of the toughest to get a reservation in (just wait, it’s probably about to get tougher!). The challenge was to create an Italian themed feast for these people as well as other Rao’s employees, and guest judge Lorraine Bracco, most famous for her roles in Goodfellas and The Sopranos. They would break into three teams of three, but judged individually. The first group (Antonia, Carla, Tiffany) would do the antipasti; the second group of Tre, Mike and Dale would do pasta; and Angelo, Richard and Fabio would do the meat course. It was hilarious seeing the banter between the employees at Rao’s and Bracco as well as the judges, which this week included Anthony Bourdain.

The favorite dishes were Antonia (mussels cooked in wine and garlic); Carla (Minestrone with homemade ciabatta); Fabio (roasted chicken with polenta); and Tiffany (polenta with sausage and peppers). The winner was Antonia, who said her Sicilian dad would be proud indeed.

The least favorites were the entire pasta team—Dale (fresh pasta with pancetta and Brussels sprouts); Tre (risotto with roasted vegetables); and Mike (rigatoni with spicy calamari). This was especially difficult for Mike because he knew his pasta wasn’t cooked enough and he was the “Italian representative” for that grouping. But in the end it was Tre that was sent home, because his rice was too grainy and not soft and mushy like Italian risotto is supposed to be. I think they looked at Tre’s overall body of work, though, because they could have just as easily sent Dale or Mike home.

So now we’re down to eight chefs—Antonia, Carla, Tiffany, Fabio, Angelo, Richard, Dale and Mike. I think I had picked Richard, Dale, Carla and Angelo as my final four so I’m sticking to that. We’ll see what happens in the next month or so! Thanks for reading…

Last night was the part of the “Top Chef” season that everyone looks forward to–contestants, judges and viewers. But it was especially cool for “Top Chef All-Stars,” and the show began last night with Antonia mentioning how she seems to be bad luck to fellow teammates, who kept getting eliminated around her. Anthony Bourdain hosted the quick fire challenge at Eric Ripert’s Le Bernardin restaurant, and this dude, Justo Thomas, was butchering fish like a madman. This guy is amazing…he can cut perfect portions of fish while leaving a carcass and skin, and do it in like 8 minutes. The challenge was to do this in 10 minutes, butchering portions of cod and fluke. The top four would compete for immunity by making a dish or dishes using all parts of the discarded fish–head, bones, skin, etc. (BLECH!!!!!) in the elimination challenge. In the bottom were Fabio, Tiffany, Carla and Antonia, and the best were Dale, Richard, Mike and Marcel. Dale won with his Fluke backfin sashimi with fluke liver sauce, and he had immunity for the main challenge.

Guest judge Ludo Lefebvre was on hand with host Padma Lakshmi, and his concept of a “pop-up” restaurant in which the menu of small bites constantly changes was the theme for restaurant wars. Dale won the quick fire, so he would head up the first team, and he would pick the head of the other team. He went with Marcel, who he doesn’t get along with, and it was a brilliant move. Marcel then had the first pick and went with Angelo while Dale snagged Richard. Marcel also wound up with Mike, Tiffany and Antonia; while Dale had Fabio, Carla and Tre. He called Fabio the “steal of the draft” because Dale knew Fabio was the best front of house guy in the history of the show. Also a brilliant move.

The challenge would take place at the Foundry Restaurant, and right from the start you could tell that Dale’s team was going to kick ass, while Marcel’s had no leadership and a bunch of bickering. Dale’s was called “Bodega” while Marcel’s was called “Etch.” The diners would be voting, not the judges, though the judges would be among the diners and so would folks like Food & Wine’s Dana Cowan.

As suspected, this was a blowout. Dale’s team was totally in synch, had a great menu and executed it nicely. Marcel’s team was just a mess, put out some bad food and offered horrible service with Tiffany running front of house.

Some of Bodega’s dishes included a play on bacon, egg & cheese; tuna in a “can” with fried chicken skin; pork shoulder with grits; and a play on blueberry pie with dry ice cream. Etch made dishes such as crudo of fluke; asparagus and egg salad; slow cooked lamb chops and a duo of peaches. The service with Fabio for Bodega was light years better, and the Bodega restaurant team won with 59 of 76 votes.

Richard was the overall winner, and his dish was a chicken fried cod with “Brussels kraut” and ginger beer. I don’t like seafood and it looked amazing. So up on the chopping block were Marcel, Angelo, Mike, Tiffany and Antonia. Of course Antonia was on the losing team! And of course she wasn’t going home. That distinction went to Marcel, who couldn’t lead and made some mediocre dishes. Even during the chopping block scene, Mike blurted out that Marcel was a “time bomb.” Ouch. But he was right,and Marcel went home. Dale had a positively brilliant strategy because he knew Marcel would shoot himself in the foot and be sent home.

So now we’re down to nine–Dale, Richard, Fabio, Carla, Tre, Angelo, Mike, Tiffany and Antonia. I’m going with Dale, Richard, Angelo and Carla as my final four. What do you think? Or is it still too early to think about that? Thanks for reading and see you next week…

If you follow “Top Chef All-Stars” on Bravo carefully, you know that Jamie has been skating for weeks. Whether it was a finger cut that required stitches, hiding when her dish should have been presented to judges, or playing it safe as others were eliminated for taking bigger risks, she just clearly didn’t belong here. With that, here is our recap of last night’s episode….

The show began with Jamie feeling quite lucky and being surprised that she was not eliminated last week, and rather that Casey was sent packing after the chicken feet debacle. Then they showed Marcel acting like a total douchebag toward Dale because Dale did not follow the challenge rules properly, yet won.

Then host Padma Lakshmi came in and announced that the chef-testants would be going to Montauk, Long Island, known to be the best fishing spot in the state based on the fact that it’s a good hundred miles or more from New York City into the Atlantic Ocean. There would be no quick fire challenge this week–only this elimination challenge in which they would break into four teams of three and catch fish, then create dishes based on that fish as well as a local produce market in Montauk for a beach-themed party in Brooklyn overlooking the East River. Atlantic Ocean, East River, same thing!
But this challenge was especially important to win because there would be a double elimination this week. Acclaimed seafood chef Kerry Heffernan would be a guest judge. PS–where the heck is Anthony Bourdain these days?

The teams were Fabio, Richard and Marcel; Jamie, Antonia and Tiffani; Angelo, Mike and Tiffany; and Dale, Carla and Tre. Dale was thankful he did not have to work with Marcel, and he also was gloating over catching a huge sea bass since his dad is a commercial fisherman.

It was interesting to note that the Richard/Marcel/Fabio team only made one dish, and as they were cooking head judge Tom Colicchio reprimanded them in a backhanded way, which was not a good sign heading into the party. He also found fault with the other teams too, however.

The winning teams were Dale/Carla/Tre (smoked bluefish lettuce wrap; fish taco with corn and avocado relish; and striped bass with gazpacho salad) and Tiffany/Mike/Angelo (striped bass with tomato, corn and watermelon; and pickled bluefish with watermelon, chiles and dill), and

The losing teams were Richard/Marcel/Fabio (sea bass with corn, tomato and some kind of weird foam) and Jamie/Antonia/Tiffani (porgie po boy with old bay mayo and slaw; striped bass with watermelon salad; and smoked bluefish with tomato, corn and zucchini )

The winner was Carla for her lettuce wrap, and her prize was a trip to Amsterdam…wow, the prizes on this show are amazing. And so Richard, Marcel, Fabio, Jamie, Tiffani and Antonia were all on the chopping block. The guys were berated for making one dish and the succotash not being very good and also for having too much going on on the plate that didn’t make sense. The ladies made three dishes and while Antonia was mostly guilty by association, Jamie (dish bland) and Tiffani (too fishy) failed the most and were sent home. Finally, Jamie was sent home. Whew. So Antonia, Fabio, Richard and Marcel were safe.

Now we are down to 10 chefs, and the show is moving along nicely. Who do you like? Who do you think will win? I’m picking Dale, Carla, Richard and Angelo as my final four, but all of them have surprised at various points, because, after all, it’s Top Chef “all stars.” See you next week everyone…

The episode of Top Chef All-Stars began this week with shock that Jen was sent home last week. Really, it’s going to be a shocking elimination every week with this cast of heavyweights, isn’t it? But many of them felt Jamie deserved to go home since she got hurt and went to the hospital, thus skating by last week. Then the quick fire was announced with host Padma Lakshmi and chef David Chang. They would break into four random teams, based on how they were standing at the moment. They would each have the same ingredients to work with–to prep and create a meal as quickly as possible using lamb, garlic and artichokes.

The teams were:
Red–Antonia, Jamie, Dale and Casey
Green–Angelo, Fabio, Tiffany and Mike
White–Dale, Tiffani, Carla, Marcel
Blue–Spike, Richard, Stephen, Tre

David’s least favorites were red and green; and his favorites were white and blue, with the blue team winning with their crispy lamb and artichokes three ways. Each player won $5K, and there would be no immunity this week.

For the elimination challenge, each team as they were constructed would go to a hot NYC restaurant, dine there, and then work against each other to create a meal that would represent the kitchen of that restaurant. The green team got Ma Peche, which was Chang’s restaurant; Red got Townhouse; the blue team Marea; and white team WD-50. They would compete against each other and there would be one winner per team, and one overall winner. There would be four losers, one from each team, with TWO of them going home. Yikes.

This was an interesting and apparently very difficult challenge. The judges would be the chefs from each of the restaurants and also included Kate Krader from Food & Wine Magazine.

The winners were Dale T (sunnyside up egg dumpling with pork belly), Antonia (pea and carrot purees with seared scallop), Angelo (turmeric marinated fish with salmon roe and white chocolate) and Tre (grilled swordfish with braised artichoke). The favorite dish was Dale, based on Wylie Dufresne’s WD-50.

The losers were Stephen (salmon with figs, broccoli and fennel pollen), Tiffani (broken summer heirloom melon with powdered ham and cheese), Fabio (roasted lamb with hoisin bbq sauce and homemade ricotta) and Dale L (roasted veal loin with peanuts and popcorn). The two going home…..Stephen and Dale L. Fabio dodged a bullet, and I was kind of surprised Dale went home before he did.

So we’re now down to 14, and these eliminations will not get easier on the judges as they go. It sure is going to be interesting. Thanks for reading and see you next week…