So I've got this niece. She's a sweetie and a half. This is her first Christmas. She's my first niece. It's a pretty good deal for everyone. Even the dogs like her. Monty! Quit blinking!



I actually just found out that I'm gonna get to be The Godfather for the little bean. She wants to know where my jowls (a la Marlon Brando) are. I tell her, Even Marlon Brando was thin once. Wait a year or two.



Anyway, I'm going to indoctrinate her proper-like. Her parents had her give me a Munchkin Fresh Feeding set that includes a grinder to chop up any food items, and a little netted pacifier thing to pack full of grilled Belgian endive and pork loin with fennel and cardamom for her to enjoy. I also have the Top Chef: America game for the Wii. She approves.



Who's gonna be the cutest little culinarily literate Asian Michael Corleone ever?

Okay, so it's pretty clear I didn't have the resources to get to this recap anywhere close to on time this week. Training on Thursday (which didn't involve sitting in front of a computer), snow day on Friday (which involved planning for a little bachelor party that night), and travel day today.

That being said, I'll give you my abbreviated thoughts on what was a pretty unsatisfying episode for the chefs, judges, and (I'm guessing) the majority of viewers.

I think this might have been the first time that two competing chefs got to share "confessional" space. It was actually kind of cute to see Fabio and Stefan playing Felix and Oscar.

I'm not really sure what was the point of including Martha Stewart in such a very abbreviated role. If you're going to add 10 minutes to the end of the episodes, Bravo, it feels pretty cheap to bring people in with barely-fulfilled promise.

"Barely-fulfilled promise" sums up the performance of Fabio this week, and in the last couple weeks in general. He's winning us over with his charm and genuine humor, while bringing a little too much of The Suck to his cookery. His Quickfire polenta sounded tasty enough, but what is it with chefs on this show having such a hard time working with mushrooms?

I liked the concept of the Elimination challenge this week, if not the execution. Dishes based on the verses of the 12 Days of Christmas is topical, interesting, and potentially challenging (although choosing to do without 4 calling birds is a little unusual; what, no ortolan?). But it goes beyond being challenging when you only let the chefs shop at Whole Foods.

Yes -- you've got a sponsorship. But maybe once or twice a season, when the challenge merits something really cutting-edge, let the chefs shop wherever they want! Maybe next week's apparent "You can do whatever you like" challenge would be a good time to cut the chefs free from Whole Paycheck? Cost and reputation do not equal quality, as evidenced by Jeff's stymied attempt to procure frogs' legs for his lords a'leaping.

I do think that we can let go of the "writing on the wall" editing of the opening segment. Between Ariane feeling upbeat, Eugene feeling lucky, and Hosea talking about his dad having cancer, there were any number of swords of Damocles we could have seen swinging low. In the end, Eugene should have gone home, but the judges decided -- at the last minute, I'm sure -- to allow everyone a reprieve.

Part of the reasoning for that decision was the fact that all the chefs banded together to help out when the sun rose on the day of service to a refrigerator left open overnight. Sure, they were packing it pretty tight. Sure, the food going in was hot. But these are massive, industrial-strength chillers. And if an 11-year old knows not to leave the fridge door open, I'm betting a room of 11 chefs would too.

In other words, I think it was producer sabotage, plain and simple. Crafted purely for the effect of a Christmas episode. And the way it fucked with Radhika's head was a pretty mean goddamn way of ensuring a heartwarming segment full of chefs helping chefs. Stovetops Without Borders. Awww...

But for all the manipulation on the part of the producers (only shop at this mass-market semi-high-end store!; deal with this magically spoiled pork!), there are some fundamental truths coming forth. Truth Number One is that Ariane is completely out of her league. Her no-butter cauliflower puree makes her the Anti-Paula Deen; hooray. She's made a salad, with no cooked component, and won. She made deviled eggs and survived. This is worse than using scallops three weeks in a row (Jamie). This is not being a chef.

Hosea, on the other hand, continues to bring it. Paella's not the most amazing or impossible task, but it's smart in a one-pot Quickfire challenge: accomplishable, on-target, and kinda hard to fuck up. His choice to go with something smoked for 11 pipers piping is the only logical choice, and was done well in spite of the kitchen "accident."

Eugene, Melissa, Leah, Ariane, and Carla are non-issues now. Space filler. Side characters that will entertain us with their googly eyes, mouthfuls of Golden Grahams, and inexplicable attachment to sushi, but ultimately have no chance of winning. They've shown nothing (Remember that miracle curds and rice dish Eugene made? Anyone notice that in the grocery store, he eats a sample from the deli case and says he'll try to replicate it? Yeah. It was no accident, but the producers chose to portray it that way.), and will not amount to anything in the competition except a black hole of suck that might bring a good chef down with them.

Hosea, if he can stay on task, is becoming the front runner. Stefan's proving to be a little tone-deaf and definitely bull-headed. Jamie's got no killer instinct, and needs to start going with her gut if she's going to make something happen. Fabio needs to stop worrying about playing people and charming them, and start doing something that reflects hisownself. Jeff just needs to slow his brain down a little more. He's made a good go of it so far, but is still a step or two off. Radhika is the only real dark horse. She could blow people away, or she could turn into a powerhouse.

I too hope this season turns around based on this episode. But I don't think that's an improvement to be placed solely on the shoulders of the chefs. Maybe free agent acquisition and new guest judge Toby Young is the catalyst for such an improvement. If he's a one-liner machine, then maybe not. I'd still like to see Tony Bourdain come in on a more regular basis. I think he could make a difference in the future of American cuisine that Gordon Ramsey wants to make, and Tom Colicchio is close to making. But Bourdain's got to want to, and I'm not sure if there's anything he really wants to do that's still located in a kitchen.

Is there a correlation between the dearth of big-name international chefs in this season, and the apparent lack of culinary chops for most of the contestants? I don't think so. What would Daniel Boulud think of these folks? Eric Ripert? April Bloomfield? José Andrés? Probably not much.

So there you go. It was a non-traditional, very meta episode of Top Chef. It purports to be a turning point. I hope you don't mind that I made the recap reflective of that level of introspection. Hopefully, next week's episode will be better and next week's recap more timely.

But you still kinda suck.

The latest food-related column from Time contributor Joel Stein is about SPAM. Note that in the article, for all the compliments he piles on SPAM, he fails to type it out as it should be typed, in all-caps.

Anyway, it's not a terrible column, pretty light and silly. But his lead-in is that SPAM should be witnessing a renaissance as the country slides closer to depression. That was, after all, roughly the golden age of SPAM.

He writes, "Those once crucial food-shopping decisions between local and organic became a lot less iomportant when the recession rolled in." I grant that he's not a foodie (not that he should be a foodie, but to claim that Hawaii likes SPAM because their only other option is poi is just plain stupid). However, in a time when people are struggling to make ends meet, people should be trying more to shop at farmers' markets and local groceries, not only for proper sustenance but to sustain one's community. He might as well argue that people need to eat more Burger King in times like these.

SPAM is a fun novelty, but only that. Real food is still real food.

1) Fringe Foods (my regular feature column at thedailypage.com, for you newbies) is now on Twitter. Recommended reading, event announcements, new column links -- perhaps even the occasional tweetup -- will all be posted there. If you're a Twitterer already, click here to follow fringefoods. If you're not a Twitter member, sign up. There's all sorts of genuinely famous people and impersonations of genuinely famous people posting regularly there. It's free entertainment. (Of course, I'm on Twitter too, and welcome all comers)

2) I've got a blog network on Facebook. If you're a Facebook member, and a regular reader here, why not join the group? I'd like to know what kind of readership I'm generating, and hell, it's just an ego boost. Click that little gadget over on the right margin to join.

Okay, I thought I had more to promote. I guess it wasn't so pimp-y after all.

I just realized why I was getting the "tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow" soliliquy from Macbeth stuck in my head for the last week or two. Two men, whose last names are Pace and Petty, were adjacent in the Interlibrary Loan file until today.

Earthworms Buyer's Guide and Directory, by Patrick H. Shields (Earthworm Guy is back!)

Forbidden Knowledge, by Stephen K. Donaldson (No. You can't have it.)

How to Build a 1933-34 Ford Street Rod, by Jay Storer (Pretty sure the cells aren't big enough for that, but hey.)

And a late addition, just turned in, verbatim as on the slip:

High, by Brain O'Dea (Now, I'd never heard of Brian O'Dea before, so it is in fact a legit book, but look at the layering of this silliness. The title is High; the erroneously-spelled first name is Brain [as in, this is your brain on drugs]; and the last name is O'Dea. O'DEA. D.E.A. You can't make this stuff up, people!)

Tricksy, Bravo. Very tricksy. Last week, Alex's sudden discovery of the microphone was taken as a clear indication that he was doomed. This week, Melissa takes the stage and screws up the formula. Are we supposed to believe she has an actual personality?

And are we supposed to believe that Stefan really does have the hots for Jamie? Jamie, who plays for the other team? Sure, she's cute. Sure, it's the Real World Syndrome. But do I think that it has anything to do with true love (lust), instead of alcohol and an attempt to get her off her game? No. If Stefan showed us anything this week, it's that he is a masterful check-raiser. But he's got some great shirts ("I make good babies"? Nice.).

The Quickfire is one of those cool spelling bee-style competitions we've gotten in seasons past. This time, the chefs will pair off and taste a sauce. The challenge is to say how many ingredients you could name, with the option of calling your opponent's bluff and forcing him to actually name as many as he says he can. Did I mention that Stefan's a good check-raiser? This is his game.

Round One is shrimp and lobster bouillabaisse (thank you, Bravo, for spelling it correctly). Eugene guesses fish sauce (fish sauce??), Stefan re-raises twice on Jamie (what was I saying about putting her off her game?) and then actually successfully names as many ingredients as he says he can.

Round Two is Thai green curry. After a very strong Round One performance, Hosea continues to nail his sauces. Stefan feigns non-confidence and then names eight ingredients. He's the friggin' Terminator. Radhika, meanwhile, can't call her own raise and fails.

Round Three is Mexican mole (actually "mole sauce," which is the same as saying a sandwich comes "with au jus"), and this final round is true spelling bee style. Carla flames out on the very first guess. It's down to Hosea and Stefan, and it is in fact Stefan who guesses wrong first (with tomato paste). Hosea nails his final ingredient, and is given winner's immunity for the week. Dude's got chops, for real.

Knife-draw for the Elimination round groups the chefs into four thematically divided teams: Old, New, Borrowed, and Blue. It's a wedding-themed challenge (Ariane tells us she knows because she's married; she's also old), and Gail glides in to tell the chefs that they'll be cooking for her bridal shower: forty chicks who LIKE TO EAT. UNH. Unless the food is veal or black beans. Gail doesn't play veal and black beans. Okay, veal -- but what's wrong with black beans?

Team Old (Hosea/Stefan/Jeff, looking like superpowers for sure) decides to go heirloom tomatoes and Old World classic recipes. Great concept. Team New (Daniel/Carla/Eugene) has some wacky ideas for how to express "new". Eugene suggests (shock) sushi. Eugene, meet pigeonhole.

Team Borrowed (Ariane/Jamie/Radhika) is the most discomfiting, as Jamie decides "hey, you're Indian, right? Let's do something with that!" But Jamie, Radhika's been trying this whole competition to get away from being the Indian one! Lastly, Team Blue (Fabio/Melissa/Leah) realizes there's no blue foods (literally, there "isn't no any blue freakin food"), and goes for emblematic rather than literal. Their main focus will be on the ocean.

At Whole Foods, no one gets behind the counter this time. Fabio continues to win me over little by little, and Daniel shows just what kind of tool he really is by appearing to buy store-made peach sorbet. Carla's running around using some kind of bird call she uses to attract her mate, but the rest of her team is strangely staying far, far away. Stefan is being a little patronizing to his teammates (he's been talking Jeff down for his savory tomato sorbet since they broke into teams).

Once the chefs get back into the kitchen, the menus start to come to life a bit. Tom arrives to pressure and intimidate the chefs (as he is wont to do), and is generally dubious of Team Blue's level of innovation (and also that they're trying to make blue corn blue--I mean, how could they??). Team New just makes him make googly eyes and get the hell out of there. He's anticipating a tough crowd of foodies at the shower.

Two very odd segments follow. The first is the night between prep days, with a group of chefs out on the balcony at night. They're all sitting, chatting...Daniel's standing there facing everyone doing bicep curls with some freeweights. Seriously, what is he? Meanwhile, Eugene decides that he's going to do his sushi banchan style, which means basically self-serve, or build-your-own. Stefan pooh-poohs that, remarking that "women don't want to make their own food." I can't believe that you've been twice-divorced, Stefan. Really.

The second odd segment is our weekly mid-break vignette. Stefan is crowding Jamie onto her (bunk) bed, bottle of beer in hand, pressuring her to kiss him; none of that tongue bullshit, just a kiss. Strangely (and remember how I said I thought she was a show stalker who just wanted to be a part of something on TV?), Carla is there too. It's like she's been photoshopped into the background of every scene.

The day of the shower arrives, and the chefs get prepping at Twenty Four Fifth. Fabio: "You don' wanna piss off the bride day before the wedding." Smart man. Team Old serves first; with all those hungry female eyes staring at the all-dude team, I'm reminded of the last scene in the Castle Anthrax from Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Hosea's shaking hands are making his gazpacho glass rattle on the plate. It's kind of embarrassing!

Team Old offers a tomato carpaccio with sorbet, a gazpacho with mint, and a tomato terrine with eggplant and balsamic vinegar. Stefan thinks the sorbet is a complete wrong move; the diners all love it. On the other hand, they find his terrine a bit bland (that's what happens when you make a dish you can't taste before serving).

Team New has a mishmash of responsibility, which often translates in Top Chef-speak as "our whole concept is weak, and by spreading out the blame we hope to survive by attrition." Surf-n-turf build-your-own sushi, frisee salad in a wonton cup, something with peach barbecue sauce, and yuzu sorbet. The presentation is messy, and Eugene offers no explanation on what the diners are to do with the stiff sheets of nori plopped on their plates. Daniel, in a fit of what passes for creativity on his part, plops a couple mushrooms under Carla's salad as a "fun surprise." As a dog owner, I'm not fond of finding small brown surprises under anything. The diners aren't, either.

Team Borrowed is sweating their lamb. Ariane is the lamb cooker, Radhika is the lamb marinater and raita maker, and Jamie is the carrot puree-er and secret spice (vadouvan) provider. This team doesn't know jack shit about lamb if they think that what we saw on the screen is undercooked. I've eaten lamb served closer to raw than that, and I'm not in the culinary capital of the world. Radhika, indignantly: "I'm not serving rare lamb to these women." Um, why? As it turns out, they all love it. Actually, the whole course goes over quite nicely.

Team Blue, with their blue corn-crusted Chilean sea bass, roasted corn puree, and Swiss chard, nominate Fabio to do the talking. He's so dreamy. And it completely works. Panties all be droppin'. It's like one of those knife demonstrations at the mall; "ooh!" "ahhh" "ha ha ha!" Unfortunately, the food does not similarly entrance them. "Old people food" is one phrase used to describe it. Gail is concerned about the political correctness of serving sea bass. Pfft...women.

Guest judge, and Food and Wine editor, Dana Cowin joins the regulars for a bit of criticism. Teams Old and Borrowed are the clear frontrunners, and they're summoned to Judges' Table. The star of Team Old's strong lineup was indeed Jeff's sorbet (take that Stefan, who looks part pissed, part abashed). Jamie's vadouvan carrot puree was subtle for having such big flavors, and the lamb was perfect in every way. The winner, clearly, is the one who brought the best flavor to the table...Ariane? No one standing there expected that, including Ariane. She didn't, and correct me if I'm wrong, provide any flavor. She cooked meat.

Team Old People Food and Team Mushrooms Look Like Poop are brought out for their beatdown. The judges, especially Tom, are none too pleased with either team. Eugene and Carla acknowledge that their plate was flawed, but crazy old Daniel is happy as a pig in shit about it. It is at this point that it was obvious he was done. He's got some kind of mental disorder, and that's saying something when he's standing next to Carla.

After Daniel and Eugene make sure they know each others' phone numbers (despair abounds), and Team Blue is given a stern warning about not sucking anymore, Daniel is indeed dismissed. Crazy and completely tone deaf, his obnoxious beard and manic demeanor will probably not be missed by any TC fans. His only defense? There are wrong decisions in football games, too. Wha??

Next week, Martha Stewart, more event catering, and an apparent refrigeration malfunction.

Bears build up a layer of fat heading into winter. Squirrels stockpile nuts. Humans look at their layers of fat, take stock of their lives, and resolve to make changes.

I've never been a firm devotee of New Years' resolutions, but it's a natural time of year to be introspective. The ability to look and act outwardly is reduced by inclement weather and the magnetic quality of the comforts of home.

Of course, we stymie ourselves by piling on extraneous responsibilities like so many thick sweaters: holiday travel, holiday gift-giving, holiday decorating. We all turn a little Hamlet-ish, unable to move in a direct line from our contemplative state to one more productive.

So these are the things I know I can start doing now, and not sacrifice the attendant duties of Christmastime. In fact, the two modes will probably dovetail nicely.

- Cook more at home. And not just easy/lazy stuff. Cook.

- Get up on time for fuck's sake.

- Less idle TV, more music. No way in hell I'm swearing off LOST or Top Chef, but I probably don't need to tune in to the entire marathon of House reruns. This, of course, requires the better half to join me in my self-improvement, but I don't think she'll mind.

- Either watch those goddamn Netflix movies, or put the subscription on hold.

- Read more. It'll me a better writer.

Yes, these are getting a little contradictory, but other people seem to have more hours in their day than I do. There's got to be a way to fit more things in. It's time to have the life I feel like I should have. If it takes an agonizingly meta blog post to kickstart the process, so be it. Thanks for putting up with it.

In an unblinkingly colonial and insensitive tradition, the Dutch believe that St. Nick travels with a young black companion named (uncreatively) Black Peter. St. Nick gets the credit for the goodies, Peter carries the switch by which the bad kids will be punished in their sleep.

Growing up with this as their childhood tradition is why the Dutch need pot and hookers.

Happy St. Nick's! Put out your shoes, and settle in barefoot for this week's brief glimpse into the interlibrary loan habits of Wisconsin's finest inmates.

Paper Pop Up, by Dorothy Wood. (Forget the actual content of the book. These jokes write themselves, kids.)

Someone Else's Puddin', by Samuel Hair. (The hip-hop community has officially run out of slang.)

Bodyslick, by John Sibley (Urban lit authors have officially run out of material. Take some time, read the description. I'll wait here. Tell me if you could ever take this book seriously.)

And now let's head to the kitchen, where Hoda and Kathie Lee are hamming it up -- get it, ham? -- with those crazy kids from Top Chef! It's on Bravo, and we own that, too. Aren't we great? But first, this 4-year old boy got his face caught in a pasta roller. We'll have the harrowing 911 call, and his nanny live in-studio, right after the break.

The best thing I could say about this episode is that Kathie Lee and Hoda Kotb (WTF kind of name is "Kotb"? That's a defunct radio station in Evanston, WY. It's not a name) were blessedly spare on-camera. We didn't have to put up with Kathie Lee's mugging grimace (hello, Daniel) or her histrionic spit-take on a food whose worst quality was that it had a funny name.

Thankfully, we can put this episode behind us for hopefully never seeing the Today show clapper monkeys ever again on Top Chef. And it's too bad, because this wasn't a terrible episode. It was actually pretty entertaining.

After a teary reading of Richard's goodbye letter to roomie Alex, we go right into the action with Rocco DiSpirito's very recognizable and very tightly-stretched face. Thank god for Fabio, who I'm really starting to appreciate if not like. His tepid response to Rocco ("He's not real Italian, but...") was priceless and a very diplomatic expression of every snide jab Bourdain's ever taken at Rocco.

The Quickfire challenge puts our chefs to the task of making a one-bite breakfast. An amuse-bouche, if you will. Oh, for the days of Hung's Smurf village hallucination of a breakfast. This week's creations are all a little boring, especially since Rocco did us the disservice of mentioning that he looooooves bacon. Well, no shit, Sherlock. Who doesn't love bacon? Now the paradigm has been fucked, and everyone is either going to make something with bacon, or get screwed for not making something with bacon.

Stefan is confident like the Terminator is confident. Daniel's doing some crazy-ass thing with zucchini flowers that I just cannot make out from his pre-cooking description. Melissa tries to do a really precise egg and breaks about 19 yolks in the process.

So what a shock, Daniel's bacon-less cornflake-crusted zucchini flower gets low marks, as does Fabio's brioche with brûléed banana and espresso cream; it's a great dessert, but not a breakfast amuse-bouche (again, great response from Fabio: maybe I should have done some bacon and "some bullshit eggs on top"). Melissa, Prettyboy (who I'm really considering calling by his actual name), and Ariane all made bacon bites but didn't make it to the tops. There can be only three.

Stefan fights the system by making huevos rancheros served in the empty and cleaned eggshell. Two bites, but ingenious and tasty (plus, no bacon!). Leah, who complained that ugh, like no one else is really doing an amuse-bouche, gets props for her bacon/quail egg/cheese bite's great layering of flavor and (surprise) perfect portion size. For once, someone bitching about rule literalism is actually vindicated! And Jamie is a last-minute inclusion in the top three, but her well-executed BLT-ish thing is a two-biter. That gives the win to Leah, again.

Pay no attention to the resounding failure of the chef next to me

With her second straight Quickfire win, immunity, and the latest book from old Snare-Drum Face in her grasp, Leah runs headlong into a total bellyflop. Seriously, her performance in the Elimination challenge almost merits zero discussion. Indeed, it takes up very little of the rest of the show. Lucky for her she doesn't need to show up to remain safe.

Padma explains that marketing yourself is a big key to success for a modern chef. Rocco's highly visible face shows no shadow of self-doubt, no indication that he's thinking about his Italian grandmother's meatballs or his aggressive financier or his old restaurant and TV show in any way. Hm. Maybe marketing yourself well is the key, Padma. Just maybe.

Anyway, the chefs will need to create a dish that can be prepared in a two and a half minute segment on live TV. It's got to be simple enough, it's got to be tasty, and you've got to be able to sell it to the host and the viewers. Fabio immediately recognizes that dees will be tall order for heem. He really is winning me over, just a leetle.

Questionable decisions abound in the shopping segment. The chefs have 30 minutes and a scant C-note with which to shop. Questionable decision number one: the Whole Foods meat counter staff let the chefs get behind the counter and cut their own (Eugene's doing sushi again; watch out for yer pigeonhole, bud). Health inspectors and injury liability attorneys all experienced heart palpitations at that moment. Questionable decision number two: Alex decides to do a dessert. Two-B is that he decides to do a crème brûlée. And he's only got an hour to prep it. [Cue opera singer] MIS-TAAAAAAAKE!

Now, I'm not supporting Kathie Lee's hammy, "look at me find unusual things disgusting; doesn't that make me just like you?" spit-take routine, but Prettyboy's decision to choose a malfouf roll with muhammara sauce is just begging for some talking head to say "whoa, now that's a mouthful! Ah-ha-ha-ha." Daniel, meanwhile, is so sure of his ability to be smug, smarmy, annoying and barely educational that he's already comparing himself to Bobby Flay. Easy, big fella. You've got years of practice to get to be that obnoxious.

Dry runs of the 2.5 minute presentation begin right after prep, and the chefs have all the judges hovering around them. I guess that's one way to simulate the pressure. It's worth noting, I suppose, that the chefs don't know at this point that they're going to be on the Today show.

Ariane
-Beefsteak tomato salad with watermelon and feta
-Almost no live TV wherewithal (at least during the dry run), but she finishes on time and the dish is tasty
-"Hit(s) it out of the park," says Padma

Jamie
-Frisee salad with duck egg, caviar, and lardon
-Egg doesn't cook all the way, attitude bombs out as the clock runs out
-Just didn't have it; apparent anger/frustration bothers Rocco a lot

Alex
-Rose-infused crème brûlée
-Time runs out, and his brûlée hadn't even set to begin with; total failure
-Judges agree it was just a bad idea

Jeff (see, I did it!)
-Malfouf roll with shrimp and muhammara sauce
-He's got all the composure and charm you'd expect him to have in this situation
-Tom recognizes that he had a lot of balls in the air and still pulled it all off, and in time

Fabio
-Seared ahi tuna with roasted carrots and asparagus
-It's uncomfortable to hear Padma and Tom mimic the blithe chatter of the morning host, but it's clear Fabio would be a great guest; food's good too
-He made everyone happy and amused; also made good food

Daniel
-Ginger soy skirt steak and cabbage salad
-Throws off a LOT of smoke during the sear; out Emerils Emeril on the obnoxious catchprase scale
-Messy, smoky, charmed most of the judges, but not Tom. Good man, Tom!

Stefan
-Minestrone soup
-He doesn't appear to speak very much; judges confirm later that personality did not live up to food; who's surprised?
-Tasty, technically sound, but cold and robotic (like, perhaps, a... TERMINATOR?)

Hosea
-Crispy ahi tuna roll with crushed wasabi peas
-Didn't get to see much of his performance
-I'm not sure the judges said anything about him. Odd...

Eugene
-Tuna sashimi and pea shoot salad
-Rocco asks the obvious "what's the difference between sushi and sashimi" question, and Eugene absolutely bombs the answer, like Jill-quality bomb
-Again, no judge commentary that I caught

Melissa
-Blackend habanero shrimp
-Another real judge spit-take! Tom has to tap out from the pummelling hotness of Melissa's shrimp
-All judges agree it's way too hot. Like, WAY too hot

Carla
-Tortilla soup
-Runs out of time
-Her crazy nervous energy creeps Rocco out; THANK YOU ROCCO for being the one to say it on-camera

Radhika
-Sweet shrimp and cucumber salad
-Runs out of time
-No commentary

Leah
-Duck breast with corn and blueberry hash
-Runs out of time, and the judges can tell that she's phoning it in
-Not only is she phoning it in, but they judges are sure that she just doesn't have what it takes to carry off something like this

Melissa, Jamie, and Alex comprise the bottom three; Jeff, Fabio, and Ariane (who is really bringing it) are the top three. Judges table will be in the morning, y'all can go to bed. Jamie cries herself to sleep, like she says she does every time she fails at something. Yeesh. Alex is bitchy and defensive, but is getting married in less than a month and ultimately unworried if people don't like his stuff. Melissa takes exception to that attitude, and is pissed that someone who doesn't want to be there might stay longer than her. Seriously, she looks like she's about to turn into the Hulk. Seething quietly.

At 2 AM, a black-clad stalker creeps into the apar--oh, it's just Colicchio. Oh, that sneaky Tom! He's here to tell the top three chefs that they'll be cooking in a mere hour or so, and the hosts of the dreadful fourth hour of the Today show will be sampling their dishes live, on-air, and will select the overall winner live, on-air. Since this was before the season actually began, the chefs will observe from the green room. The chefs left behind wake up to find a nice new TV and instructions to tune in.

Tom, hopefully crawling a little inside his skin, stands beside Hoda, Kathie Lee, Meredith Viera and some other chick who probably does the news, as they descend upon plates of the three best dishes. Watermelon makes Meredith sick (or so she says), so she abstains from the full experience. But they all like Ariane's dish, making "mmm" noises with full mouths. Fabio is clueless as the cross-talk chatter rises over the analysis of his dish. "I have no idea what's going on," he quietly remarks. It's official, I like him. Not love, but at least strongly like.

Now, it's early, so I forgive Jeff for pre-emptively bashing the "unsophisticated palates" of the ladies of Today. Especially since he was 100% right. They bite, they chew, they all go "Arroo?" like dogs listening to whistles. And then Kathie Lee sees her opening and gets all melodramatic. What a fucking tool.

During their kibbutz, the ladies discuss the finer points of which plate was prettier, and I heard a "doesn't seem too unusual" in there as a point of analysis. LAME. Guess there goes Jeff's chances of winning (and this is why I'm going to call him Jeff from now on, because he fucking brought it to those retards, won over the real judges, and completely nailed his prediction that it wouldn't go well with the four stooges). Pretty unsurprisingly, Ariane's tomato and watermelon salad is declared the winnner. It's cool for her, since she watches the show (clearly the only one of the top three who does). Carla goes apeshit back at the ranch. What was that about crazy nervous energy, Rocco?

At the semi-toothless Judges' Table, Fabio is gracious and kind. Ariane is humble and excited. She gets not only a bag full of Rocco's favorite tools (presumably all kitchen related, since it's clear he is his own favorite tool), but will appear on Today the morning after this episode airs (that would be this morning; anyone submit themselves to the horror?). Again, a good prize for the right person, all around.

The losers come out to stave off dismissal. Melissa claims she tasted her shrimp, but Rocco doesn't buy it. Jamie knows she got frazzled, and Tom reminds her that in a live situation like that, she could have just flipped the egg, but it's her frustrated recoil that sticks in Rocco's craw. Alex has no defense for his choice or his performance. He says something about how the whole point of this competition is to push yourself, and he didn't. Tom reminds him in classic Colicchio style that "the whole point of this competition is to win."

My first question is, what's up with those flood pants, Alex? My second question is, why say anything about dedication, Melissa? You don't have the chops to stand up there and elocute, so don't even bother. All you're doing is passive-aggressively calling out Alex, and Padma seizes on it to ask Alex why he should stay. Stumble, mumble, cliche, blah blah blah.

It's the pre-elimination commercial break, and that means weird Top Chef vignette time! At least this one's sort of funny, with porn music accompanying more Leah/Hosea snuggle time in the stew room. Carla comments on the sexual attraction between the two; I don't want to hear Carla talking about sexual anything.

Anyway, all three dishes were inedible by Rocco's estimation, but it's Alex that finally gets the boot. Wrong dish at the wrong time, and it never really worked out even going over time. Go forth and get married, young man. And Carla? I think she's a Top Chef stalker. She just wants to be part of everything. First to cheer, first to say "hi," first to stand up and hug Alex. If she cooks rabbit at any point in this season, I'm going to be very afraid.

Next week, Gail gets married (not to Alex), and the chefs have to cook for her boobies--I mean, her bridal shower.

Okay, just a part of a deer. That tasty recipe I mentioned a few posts back finally came to fruition tonight.

First, I marinated the hell outta that loin. The recipe, very roughly:

1/3 cup chopped scallions
3 tbsp honey
4 tbsp hoisin sauce
2 tbsp soy sauce
2 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp rice vinegar
2 tsp grated fresh ginger
3 cloves worth of minced fresh garlic
a few pinches of kosher salt
a few cranks of medium ground black pepper

Mix it all up. It's enough to cover a trimmed venison loin and then some. I'd make a little more to reserve for dipping later (I didn't this time around).

It marinated almost 24 hours. Probably not necessary to do it that long, but it's such a lean meat that a good soak won't hurt anything.

That was last night. Tonight, I deconstructed a quarter of a pomegranate, removing all the bits of pith and whatnot, rinsing them off and setting them aside. I chopped up the green ends of a couple scallions and set those aside.

For the veggies, I sauteed snow peas and water chestnuts in a little canola oil with minced fresh garlic and some scallions. Tried to make some rice, but I didn't plan far enough ahead (read: make enough room in our tiny kitchen to rinse it off first), and it was a little dry and not as tender as I'd prefer.

The venison loin, with most of the scallion bits from the marinade removed so as not to burn, went onto a rip-roarin' grill and sizzled. It's what meat does on fire. Turned it a couple times (I know, Alton, don't yell at me), let the internal temp get to about 150º (I'd say that's around medium to medium well).

Brought it out, sliced it on the bias (I gave myself the bigger crusty end piece because I'm the chef, dammit!), and plated. Pomegranate jewels and scallions sprinkled on top. In lieu of reserved dipping sauce, I put a little more hoisin into a ramekin and squeezed the juice of about 10 jewels into the sauce and stirred.

Eat. Enjoy. Or, don't eat and wish you could enjoy.

Thanks for reading, everyone.