Top Chef Masters Recap

By Jason Lee

May 27, 2010

That's not the pose of a winner.

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We’re left with Rick and Susur for the final round of this Quickfire. Rick takes some time to blather on about his childhood, where he apparently went around his family’s home sniffing things like cigarette butts and trash. “So I have an amazing set of taste references,” he brags. Ummm, that’s disgusting, Rick. And pompous.

Rick and Susur take 15 seconds to taste a lobster sauce. Rick names tomato, Susur names lobster, Rick names red wine, Susur names garlic…and he’s wrong. There’s no garlic here. Susur is outraged. “How do you make lobster sauce without garlic?” he fumes.

Overall, I’m pleasantly surprised that the Masters stayed away from using stupid answers like salt and pepper in this challenge. Rick ends up on top and wins $5,000 for his charity.

The Elimination Challenge for this week is strangely simple: the Masters draw knives with the names of Greek Gods on them and must make a “divine” meal inspired by that god. We’ve got tons of very culinary-friendly gods like Ares, the god of war, and Aphrodite, the goddess of love. Poor, immigrant Susur draws Dionysus and not only does he not know who Dionysus is, he can’t even pronounce his name.




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The challenge itself, though, is really open ended. War, love, wine, water, hell - those are great themes that could each be approached in a variety of ways, suitable for any number of styles of cuisine. There’ll be 50 diners and only four hours to cook, but I really don’t think any of the Masters should be too worried.

Once the Masters get to Whole Foods, there’s a mad rush for the seafood counter. Jonathan has drawn Poseidon and clearly he has to do seafood. Of course, Rick is known as a seafood chef and he wants to play to his strengths. Meanwhile, Marcus has decided to incorporate fish into his dish as well, so once the Masters are done here, I’m not sure there’ll be any seafood left for the regular customers.

The Masters finish up and we’re treated to a funny moment at the checkout counter when Jonathan, noting that Rick has bought swordfish, remarks that he should have purchased some sole. “You could have served ‘roasted soul-food,’” he says dryly. Wow, that would have been really, really clever.

The Masters get back to the kitchen and get down to work. Susur is trying to figure out how to integrate wine into his dish, Jonathan is using the likeness of Poseidon in The Little Mermaid as an inspiration, and Rick deliberately runs around the kitchen laughing maniacally to throw his competitors off their game. In his side interview, he takes pleasure in the fact that his character allows him to be diabolical. I think his character is just making him more annoying.

Meanwhile, beatific, smiley Susan is working on a “love custard” made of coconut jam. She’s trying to incorporate as many aphrodisiacs as ingredients as possible, saying that she wants her dish to be “orgasmic.” I love her. I hope she wins.


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