- Top Chef is back. - Hot. Very hot. Coming through.
- No, that's not me. - No, you had it on 300.
- After six seasons across the U.S.,
17 chefs have landed in our nation's capital,
Washington D.C.,
to make their mark on culinary history.
- Thank you for coming.
- They've all come here with a lot to prove...
- I want to prove to myself that I'm worthy of being on top chef.
- Winning top chef would show my mom that I can be
everything she said I couldn't be.
- And a lot to fight for.
- My mother is Thai and my father is Burmese.
We support two orphanages in Thailand
because there's a lot of mouths to feed in Asia.
It's missing. It's not there.
- It's a city of idealists, visionaries,
and ruthless power seekers.
- Angelo's team wants to use one of our foam guns?
- No.
- Your group even threw you under the bus!
- This season, new judge Eric Ripert joins
our culinary supreme court.
- I had a hard time to find flavor in that sauce.
- And after 29 challenges...
- That in itself is a feat.
- Welcome to Goddard space flight center.
- It's like I chewed a caterpillar.
- But my name was on it.
- One outstanding competitor will take the title of top chef,
and the grand prize...
A feature in food & wine magazine,
and a showcase at the food & wine classic in Aspen.
$125,000 to help turn their culinary dreams
into reality,
furnished by Dial Nutriskin.
Top chef season 7: Hail to the Chef.
[Rock music]
♪ Top Chef 7x01 ♪ What's Your Constituency Original air date on June 16, 2010
-- sync by elderman -- -- for www.addic7ed.Com --
- My name is Tiffany Derry. I am from Beaumont, Texas.
than everybody else on the side of me
and see what comes out of it.
Now I am the executive chef at go fish ocean club in Dallas.
I think it would be awesome to be the first African-American
to win this bad boy in Barack Obama city!
- My name is Stephen Hopcraft.
Leaving my wife and my 13-month-old tins behind
was probably one of the hardest things I've had to do.
But I also am here to try and create opportunities
for my family.
I came here to change my life and to kick ass--that's it.
- My name is Tracey Bloom.
I'm the executive chef at table 1280 in Atlanta, Georgia.
Last year I was voted one of the top 25 chefs in Atlanta.
I'm ready to compete. Now is my time.
- My name is Kenneth Gilbert.
I've been cooking as long as I would stand up to the stove.
Scrambled my first egg when I was three years old.
My confidence level, on a scale of one to ten,
is--is a ten.
- Immediately after arriving, we went straight to the museum,
where there was a breathtaking view.
- What about the obelisk?
- It's not higher than the capitol or the monument.
- Oh, wow.
I think that D.C. is a great place for top chef to be held.
You have really great chefs here.
You have Jose Andres here, Jean-Louis Palladin.
Eric Ripert's got his restaurant here.
So I'm really excited to be able to compete here
in Washington.
- Where you from, Kelly? - Vail, Colorado.
My husband and I own our restaurant together
in Vail, Colorado.
I was named one of the top
young female chefs in the country.
When I want something, I go after it 100%.
And I don't lose very often.
- I'm Lynne. Nice to meet u. - Andrea. Nice to meet you.
Oh, hugs too?
- My name's Lynne Gigliotti.
I'm a chef instructor at the culinary institute of America.
I might not be the most flashy person out there.
I don't have any tattoos or crazy hr,
but my food tast good.
Just because you're an instructor,
you know, you're not dead yet.
Hi. Love your scarf.
- Thank you. - Nice to meet you, Arnold.
- My name's Arnold myint.
I'm the executive Chef and owner of three restaurants
in Nashville.
Motivational staff dance.
In preparation for top chef, I got a wardrobe stylist,
and I got a facial.
- Hey, I'm Jacqueline. - Kevin.
Jacqueline, nice to meet you. Kevin.
My name is Kevin Sbraga.
Currently executive chef at rat's restaurant
in Hamilton, New Jersey.
I'm expecting to let the world know Jersey is here--
I'm here and I'm the best damn cook out there.
- What's up, man? How are you? - Good.
- Been a long time - yeah, it has.
I've known Kenny Gilbert for about eight or nine years.
Kenny is an amazing, amazing cook.
He's my biggest competition.
- Where are you coming from? - New York, New York.
- Oh, cool. - And yourself?
Brooklyn. - Okay.
- I do catering for a living.
I would like to prove that any self-taught chef
can beat the pants off of all of these guys.
- That's the Smithsonian. The capitol's over there.
The name is Timothy Dean. Born and raised in D.C.
I do have the hometown advantage.
My wife Michelle, she passed away three years ago.
And I know she's looking down on me.
And I gotta win for her.
- I don't know if you know Jean-Georges?
- Of course. I know Wylie, Jean Georges, all those guys.
- I worked with him for a long time.
- Okay. - I was with ducasse in France.
I had a restaurant in the West village,
and we were the first Chinese restaurant
to ever receive a Michelin star.
I was actually just in Monte Carlo recent--
last week, actually.
- How was it? - Amazing.
Have you been to France before? - Yes.
- Whoever's gonna go against me,
there's gonna be blood on the stage.
It's gonna be war.
Did you go to Louis xv? - Yeah.
Charlie was working there when I went.
Angelo, he's like, "I've got it going on."
And I'm like, "this is some bull[Bleep.]
- Hey, Padma's here.
- Yep, that's them.
- I kind of feel like I'm a stranger in a strange land.
But when Padma and Tom walked out,
that's when it's really hitting me--
I'm here. I'm in D.C. I'm on top chef.
- Welcome to Washington, D.C.
And welcome to top chef 7.
[Cheers and applause]
- D.C. is a city where history is made.
You'll have an amazing opportunity
with these challenges
to make a little history of your own
in this competition, and in the culinary world.
- For your first quickfire,
we'll be testing your basic skills and speed
to see how you stack up against your fellow chefs.
You'll be competing in a mise en place tournament.
- The first leg...
You'll have to peel ten potatoes.
The 12 fastest will move ahead to leg two.
Then you'll have to brunoise ten cups of onions.
After that, four chefs will be eliminated.
Moving on to leg three,
you'll have to break down four chickens
into eight parts.
- I think it's an amazing first challenge
because you have to react immediately.
And two, you see the skills of each individual
right off the bat.
The four fastest chefs will move on to the final leg,
where you will have to use these ingredients
to prepare a dish.
Padma and I will taste the dish
and determine a winner.
And this is a high-stakes quickfire.
The winner will receive...
$20,000.
- Wow.
- The pressure is on.
- I have one daughter and a baby on the way.
If I were to win the 20 grand,
I would use it for a down payment on a house.
That alone was be amazing.
- So, chefs, take your positions.
- Okay, chefs...
Go. [whistle blows]
[Rock music]
♪ ♪
- I'm right next to Kenny.
While I'm still on my first potato,
I hear his first potato hit the ground--
like, he's done already.
He's going through potatoes pretty quickly,
and I'm a little bit nervous.
♪ ♪
- I have a really great resume,
but I'm competing against people further along
in their career than I am.
That doesn't mean that I'm not as good as they are,
but then I sliced my palm open.
So I feel like an idiot.
- Good!
- All right, Kenny, you're good.
You're moving on to the next round.
[Whistle blows]
♪ ♪
- check! [whistle blows]
- Angelo, you're moving on.
- Peeling a potato is not difficult.
But when Tom's, like, with a whistle
and a box full of $20,000,
it's a little bit of pressure.
- Check!
- John, you're good. - Check.
- Check! - Check!
- Uh, I can see already you've got a lot of work to do.
- Check. - Timothy, you're good.
- Check. - Alex, you're good.
Only four spots left now.
- Check. - Check!
- Check. - These are good.
One more spot left.
- Check. - Stop.
Okay, we're done. Next round.
- So for the five chefs who didn't complete the task,
you can go stand over there.
- That was total incomplete [Bleep].
I've peeled 1,002 potatoes in my life.
The pressure of it, it was overwhelming.
- Round two.
- You'll be brunoising ten cups of onions
- a brunoise is a small dice--
1/8 by 1/8 of an 1/8.
I don't know if I'll be the fastest,
but I think I'll be the most precise.
- After this leg, four chefs will be knocked out.
Okay, ready? [whistle blows]
[Up-tempo music]
♪ ♪
- after Kenny won the first one, I was, like,
"no way is he gonna win this next one."
So I start chopping those onions like a [Bleep] Wood chipper.
- Check! [whistle blows]
- So master Kenny down the street here
raises his hands and yells "check" again.
The guy's an animal. He's ridiculous.
- Looks good to me. [whistle blows]
- I want him to fall off the building.
[Laughter]
- Check.
- Okay. [whistle blows]
- Check. - You look good.
- Check. - Angelo, that's good.
- Check! - Alex, that looks good.
Three spots left. [whistle blows]
- Check! - Lynne, that looks good.
- Check. - Check.
- Okay, that looks good, and that's good.
We're done. That's it. You two are in.
- That's disappointing.
I was one of food & wine magazine's
top ten best new chefs in America.
But I can't dice up onions. I was pissed.
- Only four of you will make it to the final round.
And be eligible for the $20,000.
[Whistle blows]
- Every time I butcher something,
I butcher it the same way.
Take the breasts off first,
remove the wing, pop the thigh bone.
I'm gonna cut the leg and thigh in half.
So that chicken is done
within a good 30 seconds.
- Check.
[Whistle blows] Yeah!
- Looks good to me. [whistle blows]
- Check. [whistle blows]
- You're clear to move on.
- Check.
- Okay, Tim, you're good.
One spot left.
- Check! [whistle blows]
- All right, Kevin, you're good.
That's it-- the last one in.
- I was 1/4 of a chicken away from $20,000.
I'm pissed.
- The four chefs that are going to the final cook-off,
come to the table down here.
- Damn, Kenny, he's fast.
But does he know how to cook and do it well?
- I'm here to win it all.
I came here to represent, and that's what I'm gonna do.
- We have our final four chefs eligible for $20,000.
- Oh! [laughter]
- The little jerk!
Obviously he thinks I suck.
- Okay, chefs, this is the last leg
of your high-stakes quickfire.
There's $20,000 on the line here.
You need to make a dish using the chicken,
the onions, and the potato.
Plus you can use whatever's I the pantry.
Go to it.
- Corn starch, anyone?
- I have the chicken in, I got fresh herbs on it.
I'm gonna do a potato galette.
It's hot. Feels like August in D.C. right now.
- I'm gonna make a boneless chicken wing.
I'm gonna poach it in a chicken broth,
flavor it with the onions, potatoes, and mushrooms.
- You've got 20 minutes.
- It's all good. [chuckles]
What I end up making is Moroccan-spice chicken two ways
with dried cherries.
I wanted to represent not only speed,
but efficiency and poise.
And I wanted everyone to be, like, "wow,
this guy is truly the Alpha male."
- Drinks are on them. - Drinks are on them.
- My dish is roasted Spice chicken
served with a chilled onion jam.
I'm feeling really pumped up. I'm feeling extremely focused.
I feel like a ninja. - Guys, two minutes.
- Time's up.
- Hello, Angelo. - What'd you make for us?
- So we have a roasted wing, curried onion jam
with potato noodles.
- Very nice. Thank you. - Thank you very much.
- Hello, Kevin. - How are you?
So I have a boneless chicken wing
with hot and sour broth, tomatoes, fennels, potato,
and a little bit of mushroom.
- Thank you. - Thank you so much
- thank you.
- Hello.
- Hi, Padma, hi chef. How you doing?
I did a potato galette with oyster mushrooms
with a little bit of onions.
Make sure you get a cherry.
- Great. Thank you. - Okay.
Hi, Kenny. - How are you?
I did a duo of chicken.
You have a caramelized onion potato puree
as well as onion confit.
- Thank you.
So, Tom, let's get the bad news out of the way.
- Sure. Tim, there was too much cream in the dish.
It really kind of marred all the flavor
trying to come through.
Kevin, the broth was very salty.
I just couldn't get past the salt.
- That means it's between Angelo and Kenny
for the $20,000.
- Kenny, I like how you featured the roasted potato.
The flavors were nice. A lot of different spices.
A lot of different things going on--nice job.
Angelo, I loved all your flavors.
The onion jam was great.
I thought the chicken was well cooked.
I also loved how you used the potato.
- For $20,000, furnished by dial nutriskin--
the winner of our first quickfire...
Is Angelo.
Congratulations. - Thank you.
I want people to know that I'm business.
And I want to set the pace where everybody's chasing me
at this point in time.
I actually want to be the first contestant
to win every single challenge.
- Well done.
- Angelo wins this competition,
and I'm, like, "what the [Bleep]?"
I really don't see Angelo being a threat.
I just look at it as an obstacle.
- And now for your first elimination challenge.
We're in the nation's capital,
where every part of the country is represented.
So as a chef, we want you to represent
where you're from in your dish.
- Every single day of my life,
I cook regional Colorado cuisine.
This is my challenge.
- You'll be cooking for 300 young,
successful Washingtonians at the kickoff party
for the annual cherry blossom festival.
- You'll be divided into four groups,
and you will be competing head to head
within the four groups.
One chef from each group will be up for the win,
and one chef from each group will be up for elimination.
Angelo, Kevin, Kenny, and Timothy,
since you were in the top of the quickfire,
you'll have a big advantage.
The four of you will get to choose
who you're competing against.
So, Angelo, you won the quickfire,
so you get first choice of the chef
you want to cook against.
- All right, Tiffany, we'll do it up.
- All right.
- I'll take the young lady on the end.
- Kenny looks right at me,
and he's, like, "I'll take you."
What a little jerk.
I mean, obviously he thinks I suck.
- Arnold.
- Alex.
- I'll choose Kelly.
- Lynne.
- I'll choose Amanda.
- I choose tamesha.
- John.
- Congratulations. - Thank you.
- Uh, Steve. - Jaueline.
- Who do you think is the worst chef
is the person who gets picked first.
At the point I get chosen, I'm feeling okay
because we're the last three chefs to get picked.
- Timothy. - I choose Andrea.
- Great.
- I'm the last person standing,
but I have a kick-ass resume.
I worked for Todd English, Daniel boulud,
Laurent tourondel,
so I know I'm a very big threat.
- Angelo, since you won the quickfire,
you can choose what group ed will be cooking in.
- This is the strategy part.
Ed, you're gonna go right over here
with Kenny.
Put a little bit more pressure on Kenny.
Let him know that I'm not messing around.
- You could tell that Angelo was sending a message.
When it's all said and done, it's irrelevant.
- So tomorrow you'll have $300 to shop at whole foods.
And then you'll have four hours to prep
in the g.E. Monogram top chef kitchen.
And on the day of the event, you'll have one hour
to set up at the Andrew w. Mellon auditorium
before all the guests arrive.
Okay, you guys, thank you very much,
and good luck.
- Thank you.
- We arrive at the D.C. house for the first time...
[All cheering]
And it's just this beautiful, enormous townhome.
- All right!
- Go, go, go, go, go. - Whoo!
- Who else is in here with us?
- Do you snore? - Yes.
- I do. Mad snorer.
- Great. Snorers. Awesome.
- A lot of chicken sauce.
- I wasn't particularly happy
with my performance on the quickfire,
so tomorrow's a big day.
Finally I'm gonna get a chance to cook something.
I want to give the judges a piece of who I am.
- Kevin chose me for this challenge.
You chose wrong, buddy.
- I unpack it, and my heart just sinks.
- We bolt into whole foods. How you guys doing?
You got short ribs? - A whole rib eye.
There's, like, 17 of us, and, like, everybody wants
to hit the meat counter at the same time.
And I'm really stressed that somebody's gonna take
all the ingredients that I want.
This is the first dish the judges are gonna see from me,
so it's gonna take a lot of thinking on my feet.
Another half.
- The elimination challenge is to represent
the region where we're from.
And I see chicken livers.
And they're from New York.
I grew up in the Hudson valley,
so I think, okay, I'm gonna do a chicken liver mousse.
I really want to win the first elimination challenge.
I want to immediately make a statement.
- 14 minutes.
- That's ten pounds right there? - That's it.
- Nice.
- Wow, this is cool.
- Seeing the Hilton kitchen for the first time,
it's a little surreal. I'm a little nervous, actually.
I haven't touched some of these fancy tools.
I have a mom and pop restaurant in Nashville.
I'm from D.C., so my game plan is
to do something that we're utilizing out of the Chesapeake.
And I have a great piece of rock fish
with the quickfire challenge.
I got to pick the people that I want to compete against.
I picked Alex, tamesha, and Andrea.
One of us is gonna go to the top,
and one of us is bottom.
And I have no intention
on being on the bottom four at all.
- I was born in Russia, so what I decided to do
fuse a little bit of my mom's favorite soup,
which is borscht, and my culinary style.
So I'm gonna deconstruct it.
If I can pull it off, I'm a shoo-in.
If I fail, I'm going home.
- Oh, I don't want to lose my burner.
I'm cooking against Jacqueline, Arnold, and Kevin.
Kevin chose me for this challenge
because I guess he thought that I was an easy mark.
Chose wrong, buddy!
- We have some great lamb in Pennsylvania and South Jersey,
so I'm preparing my lamb suvee.
Especially for an event like this, it makes it simpler.
I know my lamb's gonna be cooked properly.
Hey, guys, I've got an upper oven
on 250 regular bake.
If you need it, great. Otherwise, please don't touch.
I'm feeling pretty good.
You know, the apple cups look perfect.
And then I have to make a decision--
do I want to go in a more traditional French style,
adding loads of butter?
But then I decide to go light on the mousseline
because I want the guests to have a contrast
of flavors and textures.
- 20 minutes, guys.
- I'm competing against John, Tiffany, and Kelly.
I come from a small town in Connecticut.
It's a country town.
My head automatically goes to stream fishing,
so I took the sashimi of arctic char,
chili tapioca--
which kind of takes the place and looks like char roe--
and a smoked bacon froth.
I'm confident with my food.
I mean, really, I feel like an orchestra with flavors.
I really can control every single note.
I can tell you when it's gonna hit your mouth,
why it's gonna hit your mouth
that's what I do.
- So you're probably gonna have that thing
shaking the table the whole time, right?
[Laughter] - For the next two minutes.
Sorry.
Maple really flows through the trees in Michigan,
so for this challenge, I'm gonna make a maple mousse Napoleon.
Now a dessert...Risky move.
But I think it's gonna be tasty.
I think everybody's gonna love it.
And I'm a strong enough chef to be able to beat everybody.
- What are you doing, guy?
- Doing potato-crusted rib eye.
- Where are you from? - Where am I from? Ohio.
- I'm competing against Kenny, Lynne, ed, Stephen.
Stephen's a little hick from some country town.
I'm sure he has no idea how to cook.
[Laughter]
- One hour left.
The region that I'm representing in this dish is Colorado.
So this dish that I'm preparing
is a cinnamon coffee-rubbed trout--
black Bean mole, goat cheese polenta.
I think it's important to be able to set the tone
for the first elimination challenge.
I've already set the tone on the quickfire.
I want this to continue.
- I'm having some problems with the ovens.
Apparently I set the temperature for the upper one
to the lower one,
so I burnt my macadamia nuts.
The clock is ticking down quickly,
and I'm gonna have to redo that recipe.
I still have to cook up the puff pastry.
- The puree looks pretty good,
and since time is just flat out running out,
I decide not to pass it through a Tammy--not to strain it.
Hot behind you.
I'm not sure if I've made the right choice.
This is a little bit risky, but it's also a safe bet
because it's something I know.
- Time! Let's go, guys.
Let's go, all right?
- Looks amazing here, huh, Kelly?
- Yeah, it looks really good.
- So we show up to the Andrew w. Mellon auditorium,
and it's beautiful.
The challenge is to create a dish
that represents where we're from.
I love making food for these little cocktail events.
No problem.
- I unpack my chicken liver mousseline...
And my heart just sinks.
I taste it, and it's grainy.
I decide at that point to cook the chicken liver terrine again
because the more I cook it, the more it will smooth out.
- Ten minutes!
- Doors open, and bam-- people at your station.
Plate, schmooze, serve. It's showtime.
- This is a mustard aioli.
- Hello. How are you?
- I'll get you another plate all ready.
- Mmm, this is wonderful.
- Hi, Amanda.
How are you today? - I'm good.
- I'd like to introduce you to your judges
for this elimination.
Tom colicchio, our head judge--
chef and owner of craft restaurant.
- We have Eric Ripert... - Hello, Amanda.
- Of Le bernardin and West end bistro here in D.C.
And, of course, the luscious Gail Simmons
of food & wine magazine,
and the host of the upcoming top chef: Just desserts.
- It's so surreal to have Padma and Tom
and Eric and Gail, and they're just, like,
"hey, Amanda, what do you have for us?"
This is a throwback
to the Neo-classical California cuisine
from, like, the Wolfgang puck era.
So what we have here is a red snapper carpaccio
with cucumbers and a daikon and caraway gelee.
- I'm from Nashville, Tennessee,
and my mother's from Bangkok, Thailand.
So the cake is kaffir lime and Thai basil cake
with a palm sugar anglaise.
- I'm from South Jersey, right outside of Philadelphia.
So we did a Pennsylvania lamb, Meyer lemon marmalade,
spring onions, and a little natural jus.
- I am from New York, so I made a duo
of chicken liver mousse.
They're both very delicate.
I went very light on the fat-- basically none.
- No fat in chicken liver mousse?
- Just a touch of egg whites bind the whole thing.
- Thank you.
- Okay, this is Amanda's ode to Wolfgang puck.
It's sort of a messy slice of fish, I find.
- I always thought Wolfgang seasoned his food
a little better than this.
- This is Kevin's dish, right? - Yes.
- Seems to be very tender. - I taste some ginger.
- Flavors are good. Seasoned well.
- Great. - It's lovely.
- Thank you.
- What's your name, chef? - My name's Kevin.
- The lamb was delicious.
It was the first one we had.
- This is Jacqueline's dish from New York.
- It's definitely not my favorite.
- It's coarse.
- I just served grainy-textured pate
to one of the best French chefs in the world,
and there's just no way it's gonna be okay.
- After making this 100 times, you need a recipe?
- They looked like chicken nuggets.
- Are you [Bleep] Serious? Are you joking me?
- Of course it's handmade gnocchi.
- Hello.
- Hello. How are you? - I'm well.
- The elimination challenge is cooking a dish
that tells about me and where I'm from.
Every ohioan's favorite meal-- meat and potatoes.
I've taken some rib eye, crusted it with potato.
High in the center and round on the outside
like o-hi-o.
- I was born and raised in Boston, Massachusetts,
so a little Boston baked beans with a cod cake.
- I am from the culinary institute of America
in New York.
So I've got waffles and corn and Camembert ice cream.
- I'm from Atlanta, Georgia. We got grits,
port royal shrimp, and a little bit of cream.
- I'm coming to represent telluride, Colorado.
We did a black Bean mole, corn polenta.
The trout itself has been marinated
with a cinnamon coffee rub.
- Thank you. Nice to meet you.
- Okay, should we start with Tracey's shrimp and grits?
- The shrimp is as bland as can be.
- That's too bad.
- What do you think of Ed's beans and cod cake?
- A little heavy. There's not enough cod.
There's too much filling. There's too much breading.
- I was surprised at the flavor of the baked beans.
But the cod just didn't cut it.
- Meat and potatoes from Stephen.
- I don't taste the flavor of the rib eye.
- Because it's deep fried.
So all I'm tasting is the fried, and not the steak.
- Something in that...
I wouldn't serve that to my kids.
- Okay, let's move on to Kenny's dish.
- There is a lot of flavor.
The fish is seasoned really well.
- I like the texture of the crispy quinoa.
- The layers of the flavors.
You can taste all the different layers a little more.
- Eric Ripert is a guest judge,
and he's like a seafood God in the culinary world.
And so I'm pretty nervous.
- Hello, Alex. - How are you, Padma?
Well, I'm from California now. You know, I was born in Russia.
So what I decided to do was deconstruct
my mom's classic borscht.
This is a beef short rib.
A little red beet puree, cabbage,
and a little creme fraiche.
- I'm from Barbados, originally,
and I made a jerked chicken sphere,
mango, papaya, and jicama, and voila.
- I kind of went Miami-Italian inspired.
So I made gnocchi,
but I infused it with chorizo, a little calabaza.
- I have a pan seared rock fish,
because I'm from D.C. and the Maryland area.
And I did a little pickled leeks,
then I finished it with a little ginger and sesame seed.
- Thank you so much. - Enjoy.
- So this is Andrea's gnocchi.
I don't know how much it makes me think of Miami,
but it's tasty.
- Well seasoned. - This is the borscht.
- The deconstructed borscht of Alex.
- The meat is well cooked.
- A lot of times when someone deconstructs something,
it doesn't work.
This actually works quite well.
- I don't normally like beets,
but the way he served it was just amazing.
- Who's next? Timothy's dish.
- The problem I have with this dish is the two sauces.
They weren't distinct in any way at all.
- He cooked with the skin.
And it's very difficult to cook fish
with a thick skin like that.
- It's too big for one bite. It's awkward.
- The intensity that I had with the quickfire,
and with the confidence that I have in my dish,
I plan on going all the way to the finals,
and I plan on winning.
- Where are you from, Tiffany? - I am from Beaumont, Texas.
So I did chicken-fried tomatillos
with a shrimp and crawfish salad and a bacon Sherry vinaigrette.
- I am making for you today a New York strip steak
served with an asparagus, fiddlehead fern,
and wild mushroom saute.
- I'm from Connecticut-- a small town.
We used to go fishing in the stream.
So what we've done is taken a smoked arctic char,
and I've deconstructed it.
We have a chili tapioca with some beautiful
smoked bacon froth.
- I am from Detroit, Michigan,
and in April, maple syrup is running through the trees.
So what I did was a maple mousse
with a vanilla sauce and a white macadamia nut crunch.
- Thank you. - Thank you.
- Well, let's start with Angelo.
- It's really good.
- It's big.
And that dill did still feel like a lot of dill.
- I didn't think so.
If there's any less dill, I don't think you'd taste it.
- And you guys can lick your bowls too.
- This is Kelley's New York strip.
- I like the seasoning and the juniper.
- It's well seasoned. It's well cooked.
It's a nice medium-rare.
- This is the maple mousse from John.
- I hate to say it but I don't really taste the maple.
- I don't either. I taste sugar, sugar, sugar.
- I have one left.
- I've got a one in four chance of being a loser.
And I'm in a real strong group, I think.
I feel I have a strong dish, but am I safe from elimination?
I'm not sure.
So I'm really nervous.
- Well, from every group we're going to have to pick
one from the top and one from the bottom.
So let's go back to the judges' table.
- Thanks a lot, bro.
- Appreciate it. Thank you.
- Bye, guys.
- You ready to go? - Yeah, I'm ready.
- Let's go. Let's do this.
- We'd like to see one of you from each group.
Kevin, Alex, Kenny, and Angelo.
[Suspenseful music]
♪ ♪
- congratulations.
You represent the top dish from each of your groups.
- Thank you.
- Let's start with you, Kenny.
- My instinct was
that it really lacked editing, but I have to admit,
as soon as we put it all in our mouth,
it really was well-balanced.
- I felt the same way--there was a lot of things going on.
I thought it was really flavorful.
And it was a nice plate of food.
Thanks. - Thank you very much.
- Kevin. - I liked the dish a lot.
And it was the complete opposite of Kenny's dish.
Very simple, but yet it had a complexity to it as well.
So you did a very nice job. - Thank you.
- Angelo.
- Everything came together.
You really tasted the chili. You really tasted the acid.
I thought it was really smart.
- I thought also that bacon foam
was really a great surprise, and I was very pleased.
- Thank you.
- Alex.
- I think that you honored your mother because
you put together a nice borscht.
But also, too often when people deconstruct food,
you lose the original dish, and we didn't at all.
All the flavors were there. - Thank you very much.
- Eric, as our newest judge,
we'd like for you to announce the winner.
- The winner tonight is...
Angelo. - Thank you.
- Congratulations.
- [Chuckling] I win.
- Congratulations. - Thank you.
They're gonna be chasing me this whole time.
And I will set the precedents.
Everything that I do will be outstanding.
- Now, unfortunately, I'm gonna have to ask you
to bring back one person from each group.
- Hey, guys.
[Cheers and applause] - Who's the winner?
- Angelo. Congratulations, dude.
- All right, I hate to do this to you.
The judges want to see Stephen, John,
Jacqueline, and Timothy.
- Interesting.
Angelo looks over at me and says,
"Tim."
I'm, like, at this point, are you [Bleep] Serious?
Are you joking me?
- Good luck, guys. - Good luck.
[Suspenseful music]
♪ ♪
- the four of you had the least successful dish
in your group.
And one of you will be going home.
Let's start with you, Stephen.
- Why was the choice to cut a rib eye so thin
that you really almost had no choice but to overcook it?
- Um, my thought behind it was I could crisp the outside,
meanwhile keeping the inside mid-rare.
I thought I could pull it off.
Apparently that was not the case.
- You had this fantastic rib eye,
and then you cut it into small pieces,
and they looked like chicken nuggets.
- Jacqueline.
- I was actually surprised that you told us up front
that you were trying to make a low-fat liver mousse
it's liver.
I don't think anyone's looking for a low-fat
chicken liver mousse.
- I've never made this without my recipe.
I've served this dish hundreds of times around the country.
- Did you make it hundreds of times
or just serve it hundreds of times?
- When I tasted it, I thought it was slightly under-seasoned.
Which is why-- - that's not what I'm asking.
You said that you've served this dish
hundreds of times.
- Did you make it hundreds of times
or just serve it? - Yes.
- After making this 100 times, you need a recipe?
- Not memorized.
- John.
- We all had the same issue with the dish.
I didn't get enough maple syrup, the pastry was soggy.
- The puff pastry, I bought it pre-prepared,
and that might not have been the right move.
But I did feel the puff pastry was just an instrument
to bring the mousse to your mouth.
- You know, there were only
three main components to your dish.
If you discount 1/3 of it, and you say that, you know,
it was just supposed to be a vessel,
that's 1/3 of your dish.
It's a bit part of what we're tasting.
- I guess I just was being stupid.
- Timothy...
What did you think of your dish?
- I thought I had a great piece of rock fish.
I thought the parsley puree was seasoned nicely,
the aioli was done nicely.
- I was surprised by the fact
that you kept the skin on the fish.
That skin was becoming chewy
and was not pleasant in the mouth.
- You were one of the four that chose your competitors.
- Correct.
- And you're the only one who ended up on the bottom.
They all actually won.
- I felt that I didn't let you guys down,
I let myself down today.
I know that I can cook just as good
as anybody that was in here before me.
And I plan on doing that.
- We'll call you back when we're ready.
- We know nothing... Except that it's brutal.
- There were a lot of mistakes between our four chefs.
John admitted to us that he did not make his own dough.
So what was he doing making that dish in the first place?
It doesn't reflect who he is.
And that's what the challenge was.
- The cream was grainy and too thin.
- It was an amateur attempt at making a dessert.
- So let's talk about Stephen's dish.
- It was just a bad idea.
He took something that could have been great
and turned it into, you know,
something that just wasn't very well cooked.
I think he got caught up in the story of it.
- I think that Jacqueline had, actually, a great idea,
and could have been great flavors.
- Had she made a good mousse. - Had she made a good mousse.
- I don't know why she was thinking diet.
"I want to do a light mousse."
- She made a point of mentioning the lack of fat
as a selling point to her dish
when it, in fact, became its downfall.
- What about Tim's dish?
- It was a big mistake
to have the fish cooked like that with the skin
because you lose the pleasure of having
such a beautiful product.
- He should know better.
He was one of the top four in the quickfire.
And, you know, I think I expect a little bit more.
- I think we have our answer. - I think so.
- I think so too. - I agree.
- So we're in the stew for the first time ever,
and some people are a little bit nervous.
- There's beer back there.
- Who said beer back here?
- There's some people that are excited,
but I'm not there to party, drink, or anything like that.
- I ripped it off!
- People are making dice, making games.
I don't know if they're not taking it seriously.
I was taking it very seriously. - 7-11 wins.
- Shooter! Shooter! Coming down.
Usually when I deal with stress,
I just want to laugh at just how crazy it is.
I'ma throw my fruity snacks on a hard six.
- Winner, winner!
- Once everybody started drinking too much,
I just stood back and looked.
- Right there, baby!
[Laughter]
- I'm just here to cook, and that's it.
I'm not here to play with dice. Wow.
[Laughter]
[Suspenseful music]
♪ ♪
- for our first elimination challenge,
we asked that you cook something
that shows us who you are, where you're from,
and who you are as a chef.
But unfortunately, the execution wasn't there.
Stephen, you gave us a story of coming from Ohio.
If Cleveland rocks, the dish really didn't.
Jacqueline gave us a great story of New York.
You gave us things like apples and chicken livers
that can go together.
Your dish failed because your mousse just wasn't well made,
and that was your downfall.
John, I love the story of maple syrup.
Unfortunately, I don't think we saw who you were as a chef,
unless it was a first-year pastry student.
I believe you're much better than that.
Timothy, coming from D.C.
And representing the Chesapeake area,
you gave us parsley, aioli, and bass.
I think there's a lot more to this region.
And I know you know that.
It's always tough to be the first one out,
and it's not a pleasant task for us,
but unfortunately, we had to make a decision.
[Suspenseful music]
♪ ♪
- John...
Please pack your knives and go.
- Thank you for the opportunity. - Thank you.
- I am very disappointed.
Making a dessert on top chef is a very big risk.
And it just didn't work out the way I'd hoped.
All right, it's me. I'm going home.
[All groan]
I feel I've let down myself and my family and supporters.
I didn't expect this to happen.
But hey, it happens.
- Sorry.
- I just prayed that I could make it through
the first week or two.
But I've found that every negative experience
that happens to you makes you grow
in a way that you've never known
or anticipated could happen.
- This season on top chef...
-- sync by elderman -- -- for www.addic7ed.Com --