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A few minutes later, the judges are presented with her dish consisting of chicken’s feet on a scallion pancake - not even the starving patrons seem interested in eating it. The judges love Antonia’s shrimp toast, but Susur finds the soy flavor in Mike’s pork and prawn dumplings too strong. Jamie serves up scallop dumplings (yes, she’s cooking scallops AGAIN . . . viewers were treated to a 60 second montage of Jamie’s previous scallop dishes earlier in the episode) and given that she didn’t even like the dish, it’s no wonder that the judges don’t like it either.

By the end of the lunch service, the kitchen finally finds its groove and the food starts flowing. But it’s too late - the meal has been a disaster by all accounts. Dale says that he would be surprised if there was even a winner in this challenge. Jamie thinks that they’re all gonna get yelled at. Tiffani says that there’s nothing more humiliating for a chef than when a roomful of people are hungry after your service. Richard found everything chaotic. Mike says that the meal was worse than his Restaurant Wars episode.

Back in the Stew Room, Padma calls out Casey, Antonia, Carla, Jamie and Tre. I know the producers are going for a “surprise” here, but it’s obvious that the losers are going out first.

Yup, they’re the bottom five. Jamie isn’t surprised that her dumplings got her in the bottom, and Susur points out that she cooked her dumpling wrappers incorrectly. Plus, she cooked the longbeans in her collaboration with Antonia, and they came out oily and overcooked.

As for Antonia’s solo dish, the shrimp toast, that was great.

Casey wanted to do something different, but her chicken feet were not cooked nearly long enough. Susur couldn’t have eaten one, even if he’d been sitting in front of the TV for hours. Tom describes her pancake as “lead.” Casey does mention that Antonia cooked her dish while she had to be upstairs serving, and Antonia (who is getting blamed for the longbean dish and the chicken feet dish) starts to cry. “It’s just so much,” she says.

Meanwhile, Tre’s dish did not stand up to the heat, with Tom calling it “too liquidy.” Gail says that Carla got too caught up in the look of her dish, which left the rice noodles bland. Susur agrees, saying that she cooked with her eyes and not her stomach. Carla seems really hurt by that (accurate) comment.

Padma asks the losers to send back the winners: Tiffany, Angelo, Dale and Fabio. Wow, these four are really picking up some momentum (except for Tiffany, who was on the verge of elimination last week).

Susur loved Fabio’s imagination with regard to Chinese cooking, Gail loved the brightness of Tiffany’s pork bun, Tom loved Dale’s sticky rice, and Gail loved the authenticity of Angelo’s spring roll. I think that either Dale or Tiffany will win - and Dale wins. Wow, good for him.

For those keeping track, only Dale and Angelo have won two Elimination Challenges so far this season.

It’s time for the judges to figure out who’s going home. Jamie had bad dumplings and cooked some bad longbeans. Antonia had some nice toast, so she’s safe. Tre’s dish was a “nightmare,” and Tom compares it to hospital food. Casey’s dish was terrible (Tom), not good at all (Padma), and a disaster (Susur). Carla’s dish was too bland and “not worth the calories,” says Tom.

I thought it was pretty obvious that Casey was gonna be the one going home - but my boyfriend thinks that Jamie will get her long overdue “pack your knives” direction.

Nope. It’s Casey. Poor Casey. As a chef, it must feel horrible for going home because A) you were in the front of the house and not in the kitchen and B) another chef cooked the majority of your dishes. All things considered, this feels like a pretty unfair decision given that Jamie finally cooks SOMETHING and turns out two bad dishes.

Casey admits that she had expected to hear Jamie’s name, and that so did everyone else. Even Jamie admits that she bore the brunt of the judge’s ire at Judges Table. But, as Casey notes, it’s her time to go . . . and that’s the way it is.

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