Top Chef: All-Stars Recap
By David Mumpower
March 2, 2011
BoxOfficeProphets.com
1) Dale Talde – This marks the first time this season that I have placed someone other than Richard Blais at the top of the group. Jason Lee had also done so once during his recaps, but I’ve held firm to the notion that Blais is the best of the best. With Dale’s going two for two last episode and winning three out of the last four challenges, there is simply no disputing the fact that he is the cream of the crop right now, a couple of near-eliminations notwithstanding.
2) Richard Blais – Before this season is over, I still expect Richard to compete for the title and if I could only bet on one player to win, it would still be him. He’s just not been as impressive as Dale. I would maintain that there are higher expectations for Richard than any other chef in the show’s history, though.
3) Antonia Lofaso – When do we stop calling Antonia a dark horse and begin to describe her as a strong contender? She’s been in the top half for three straight challenges and would have won another if her team hadn’t sucked. To a larger point, how great a chef does Stephanie Izard appear to be now that we have seen how strong the competition was in season 4? I said a couple of recaps ago that I think she could hang with the Voltaggio Brothers. The deeper the rest of season four’s contenders go in the All-Stars season, the more I wonder if the Voltaggio Brothers could hang with her.
4) Carla Hall – Carla may never go back in a Target again after last week’s meltdown. She’s been one of hottest competitors over the past several episodes, but I have to drop her due to the near-elimination last week.
5) Mike Isabella – He wins as often as the Detroit Lions.
6) Tiffany Derry – She wins as often as the Pittsburgh Pirates. Seriously, Tiffany’s goose egg at this point in the competition makes us wonder what someone has to do to get eliminated. The more people get eliminated, the more she has a chance to win a competition in which she has had no discernible standout dishes.
This week’s episode begins with a lament for the fate of fallen comrade Angelo. As we had stated early this season, each elimination during the All-Stars competition will be brutal since all of the people involved are respected, popular chefs. Angelo’s a bit on the weird side (and that’s saying it politely) yet he clearly commands veneration from his peers for his techniques. Richard is particularly surprised by the result, querying Tiffany about whether she thought it was her. Since we saw her “so long and thanks for all the fish” speech during the last episode, we know this to be true. She confirms it in a monologue, indicating utter shock that someone else was sent home in her stead. We love Tiffany dearly and note that she out-performed Angelo during season seven of the competition, but he was much better during Top Chef All-Stars. It’s unfortunate that his dish was so much worse than hers, requiring his removal, because all other things being equal, we are certain Tiffany would have gone home. Tiffany has been treading water for the better part of the season.
Tonight’s episode begins with a demonstration of Richard Blais’ preparation. He has filled two sketchbooks with ideas for new recipes. Blais is not there to compete when the challenges begin. He is spending a Brobdingnagian percentage of his downtime thinking up new and original ideas to impress the judges. In the modern NFL, there is a thought process that the best quarterbacks in the league are the ones who show up first and go home last with the philosophy being that preparation prior to taking the field on gameday is the underlying explanation for excellence during the games themselves. Blais’s behavior reveals that he is a kindred spirit to Peyton Manning in this regard. Manning never stops thinking about football; Blais never stops thinking about food. Years from now when he is the most famous of the Top Chef contestants, this will be the reason why.
The Quickfire Challenge sees the chefs blessed with the presence of southern cooking (or at least marketing) icon Paula Deen. “Down south, that’s how we show our love for each other.” This is her description of the way food unites people in the South. As a lifetime resident of Tennessee, I can confirm that she speaks the truth. Whenever a loved one suffers a personal loss of some sort, their kitchen is invariably bombarded with dishes from friends and family. Food is how we commiserate as a people. And we do have a special love of fried foods, which explains our *ahem* robust physiques. Paula Deen asks the chefs to prepare the best deep fried dish they can manage. For Tiffany and Carla, experts in southern cuisine, this is music to their ears. Both have been raised and trained with these flavors.
Top Chef All-Stars has been comprised of several shocking moments, starting with the elimination of Jennifer Carroll in the second episode. For this reason, I should not be surprised by the turn of events in the Quickfire Challenge yet I still am. What is intended to be a genteel celebration of southern hospitality goes to a dark place due to the misguided decision making of a single chef. Mike Isabella, who had been the one perusing Richard Blais’s sketchbook at the start of the episode, steals one of Richard’s ideas. There is no other way to describe this.
A picture of Chicken Oysters in the book gives Isabella the inspiration (if that’s the right word for stolen intellectual property) for his dish. When Blais realizes what Isabella has done, he is shocked. The worst part is that the dish Isabella takes from Blais beats the dish Blais himself cooks. For the second time this season, Mike Isabella wins a Quickfire Challenge, which means that he has won as many times by stealing someone else’s dish than he has through his own talents. As Blais points out, Isabella won’t even make eye contact with him during the judging portion. The worst part is how shameless Isabella is about his behavior.
In fact, he forcibly reminds me of another, similar situation. Marcel, the whiniest bitch in Top Chef history (not counting the awful Desserts show), posted a recipe in Wired Magazine that was eerily similar to a dish he is known to order at Wylie Dufresne’s wd~50 restaurant. The employees there displayed total disbelief that he would so brazenly steal one of their dishes to claim as his own in a national publication. Isabella has just done something even worse by being filmed looking at the dish, cooking the dish, and taking credit for the dish. People get kicked out high schools and universities for this sort of behavior. Isabella is rewarded with $5,000. That’ll learn him.
The elimination challenge tonight will be judged by John Besh, a New Orleans native. He represents the Greater New Orleans Foundation, an organization devoted to aiding those food providers negatively impacted by the Gulf Oil Spill. A benefit is being held for which the chefs will produce food for 300 people. At this point, Besh reveals that the remaining chefs will be aided by the following returning players: Spike, Marcel, Angelo, Tiffani, Fabio and Tre.
In order to make some of the chefs more attractive (read: Marcel), they are paired with a serving entrée. So, Marcel is packaged with delicious white shrimp (mmm, metaphorical), which appears to be the best ingredient there. Mike, who gets to pick first as an additional reward for stealing the challenge, even comments that Marcel’s dish is the most appealing, but he instead chooses Tiffani’s black shrimp in order to avoid working with a nightmare of a human being. Richard comments that he is more concerned about his working relationship than the dish; he ignores Angelo since the most recently eliminated player may not have his head in the game quite yet. Instead, Richard picks Fabio and his snapper (NOT metaphorical, at least not as far as I know).
Carla picks Tre and his red grouper. Tiffany, who does not pick last, bites the bullet by selecting the white shrimp. Moments later, she realizes she left Marcel out of the discussion, which diminishes the already wildly insecure brat. Their meal is off to a shaky start and they haven’t even turned on the oven yet. Antonia either gets in a brilliant dig or has a huge slip of the tongue when she offers the following, “I’ll take Spike and his crabs.” Someone will be needing a few trips to the pharmacy this week. Angelo (and his amberjack) is last picked, probably for the reason Richard mentioned, as he goes to Dale. In terms of pure cooking ability, however, this is probably the most impressive tandem of the sextet of teams.
Most of the preparations go swimmingly. The cooks are familiar with one another and have almost all worked together on previous challenges. Since the eliminated chefs know their designated roles, most of them attempt to complement the remaining competitors as much as possible. Then, there is Marcel. The egomaniacal jerk has forgotten that he was eliminated four episodes ago and had been a total bust in almost every other episode prior to that. Unwilling to show any deference whatsoever to Tiffany, he is militant to the point of being mutinous about her menu choices. I’m half surprised he doesn’t suggest that she make a foam. At this moment, Tiffany appears likely to be eliminated this episode. The only good news I have for her is that Carla was in the same situation last week, but somehow survived when other contestant screwed up even worse. Then again, Carla was cooking by herself rather than stuck with Marcel.
The meals are a struggle for all of the chefs. Not one of them is in the habit of serving 300 people consecutively. Even by Top Chef standards, this is a swarm of diners. The constant need to produce food has all of them in various stages of panic. Fabio tells Richard Blais that he hasn’t cooked this much in seven years. That puts the whole thing into perspective. When the judges arrive, the chefs are unable to painstakingly prepare their dishes the way they ordinarily would. As such, there is a rawness to their output, not in terms of meat preparation, but rather emotional strife.
Mike’s dish is the first presented. His meal is a grit-crusted Gulf shrimp, sour cream & chives potatoes with pork & lobster sauce. The judges love it. I had hoped tonight was Mike’s time to pack his knives and go, but he sounds like he’s a strong contender to win twice today…and this dish is even his idea! Richard isn’t actually ready to plate his dish when the judges arrive and while they’re friendly about it, they seem a bit stunned that the details oriented competitor isn’t rising above the chaotic conditions. His dish of crispy Gulf snapper with pulled pork & citrus grits looks divine. Their praise of it is a bit tepid, though. Tom and John Besh both say, “It kinda works.” That doesn’t sound like an overall winner to me.
The chef who is in the weeds the most is the breakout star of this season, Dale. He and Angelo wind up so far behind in their preparations that they stop the line for a bit in order to catch up. By the time the judges arrive at his table, he is producing unevenly cooked dishes and he knows it. He delivers amberjack stew with andouille sausage & potatoes and creole mustard crouton. Padma and Paula Deen both immediately comment that their potatoes are not done while Tom and some of the guests indicate that the mustard is far too strong. Dale appears to be in serious danger of going home.
The good news for him is that Carla and Tiffany both struggle. Carla’s fried grouper with collard greens & chow-chow pico disappoints Paula Deen, who is “kind of a bitch about (her) collard greens”. Tiffany’s honey glazed shrimp, grits with jalapeno & cheese, shellfish sauce is an okay dish, but one that leaves everyone wanting for more. Carla thinks she needs someone else to mess up worse in order for her to be safe tonight while Tiffany’s mistakes are probably not significant enough on their own. Cumulatively, she may be in some trouble for her overall lackluster performance this season, though.
The top and the bottom this week are easily divisible. Mike, Richard and Antonia are called to Judges Table to have praise heaped upon them. The shock here is that Richard Blais wins for a dish that didn’t seem particularly well received at the time. Blais wins a trip to Barbados for the effort and states that he will take Fabio along with his family on the vacation. Mrs. Richard Blais might want to keep an eye on this burgeoning relationship.
When Dale, Tiffany and Carla go to Judges Table, they know their fate already. Tiffany is queried first about the shrimp and Marcel and to her credit, she takes the hit when John Besh indicates Marcel’s efforts led to mealy shrimp. Even after his elimination, Marcel is having a train wreck of a performance on Top Chef All Stars. Dale is hammered for, well, everything. The mustard was too strong, the potatoes were undercooked, and the amberjack was almost unnoticed in a dish where it was supposed to highlighted. Carla is critiqued for a dish that didn’t seem to mesh well at all and while her problems seem elimination-worthy, all of them seem to know that Dale’s mistakes are by far the worst.
During their return to the waiting room, Tiffany explains that Marcel screwed up her chili mixture by forgetting her instruction to dilute it with water to prevent the flavor overwhelming the other components of the dish. Richard also marks Marcel for bad-mouthing Tiffany behind her back after the meal was completed, moments before his mistakes almost got her eliminated from the show. This is the time where I point out that SyFy Channel wants Marcel to host his own cooking program. This is like naming a career .200 hitter your team’s batting instructor.
In the end, everyone knows how this will play out. By naming Dale as number one in the power rankings for the first time this season, I have clearly jinxed him. His dish is unequivocally the worst of the night and among the worst of the entire season. The brutal reality of Top Chef All Stars is that a single lousy performance will lead to a player’s elimination. Dale has been the ultimate performer for the first 11 episodes of the seasons as well as someone who has demonstrated tremendous personal/professional growth. Unfortunately, he will not be taking his rightful place among the finalists. This is a truly unfortunate turn of events, but at least Dale won $30,000 the episode prior to his elimination.