I hope you're not mad at me, readers. But I had a wonderful wedding and an even more wonderful honeymoon in Montreal, and I didn't even get to watch the last two episodes of Top Chef: Masters until this last Tuesday morning's re-airing. And even then, I kinda fell asleep during Michael Chiarello's victory. I do know that Roy Yamaguchi seems to have become a restaurateur now and is not so much of a "chef" in the "working in a kitchen" sense anymore.

(If you'd like to read a little more about my mostly food-related adventures in Montreal, you can read about them on my annotated map journal here)

Anyway, this week's episode is the first of the Championship Round, where the six winners come together and give each other shoulder rubs while knocking out precise brunoises. Seriously, last week was collegial. This week was a friggin' church lock-in.

For a refresher, your competing chefs are Hubert Keller, Suzanne Tracht, Anita Lo, Rick Bayless, Michael Chiarello, and Art Smith.

The Quickfire Challenge, it is revealed, will take after the much-enjoyed mise en place relay race from Season 4; you remember, the one where Asian Dale (as opposed to Season 3's Gay Dale) broke both a locker door with his fist, and the sound barrier with his frustrated exclamation of "FUCK!" The teams this week are divided by knife draw into Team Salt and Team Pepper. Obviously, Hubert's on Team Salt. Ain't no pepper up there, sister!

Tom Colicchio and his slightly ill-fitting pants arrive to provide the usual whistle-tweeting and supervision. (Where's Michael Kors to tell him that crotch is a little insane? Oh--Lifetime, that's right.) Like these chefs need it. Each team of three will compete in four events, with one chef going twice: oyster shucking, onion dicing, chicken breaking-down, and egg separating/white whisking.

Hubert goes up against Team Pepper's Suzanne in oyster shucking and makes up almost all of a sizeable lead built up by Chef Tracht in a fairly superhuman display of acceleration. Chef Keller then clears the board and goes right to work on his onions against Art Smith. Using a technique Rick Bayless has "never seen before" (read: amateur hour), Smith nonetheless whips up on Keller.

Chicken breakdown was one of the highlights of the original run of this competition, I'm thinking because at its most adept, it combines seeming brutality with a graceful fluidity of motion. Anita Lo of Team Salt battles Michael Chiarello, showing much more intuition and feel for the weak spots of the bird's joints, and how to cut through them without needing leverage. She eats up almost all of Art Smith's onion lead.

I think I mentioned it in my recap of his winning episode, but I've always had a vague disdain for Rick Bayless. Can't really tell you why. I just have. I think maybe it's his supreme self-assuredness combined with jarred mass-market salsa. But damned if he isn't defeating my ability to dislike him with every appearance. He faces off against Art, who returns to the stage for egg separation. Michael Chiarello cheers from off-camera, "Get those limp wrists going, Art!" I'm not sure if he's sure that'll be received well, or if it was just supposed to melt into the background.

Anyway, Bayless is just so smooth, and he acquits himself so well in the task that even before his whisk makes machine-like work of the egg whites, it's clear that Smith has no hope of holding on to the lead. Bayless goes from gloppy whites to stiff peaks almost before Smith finishes fishing two errant yolks out of his whites. Team Salt (Keller/Lo/Bayless) takes the relay.

As a lead-in to the Elimination Challenge, Kelly Choi tells the chefs that they're to whip up their signature dish for the other chefs as a "getting to know you" kind of moment. What could be a forced moment of inter-chef smooshiness in a show that really isn't lacking for smooshiness, turns out to be the key to the Elimination. After enjoying all the dishes, the chefs will be tasked with recreating one of their competitor's signature meal. As the double-duty chef of the winning QF team, Hubert gets to pick while the others draw knives.

Bayless' reaction sums up why I'm starting to like him so much: "That's mean!" He articulates a discomfiture in having to take the passion of one person and co-opt it. I can't help but love that thoughtfulness.

Anyway, the assignments are as follows:

-Hubert Keller will recreate Anita Lo's seared scallop with bacon, sea urchin roe, and mustard greens over potato purée.
-Anita Lo, in turn, will recreate Keller's lobster and truffle cappuccino with a sweet corn madeleine.
-Suzanne Tracht will recreate Art Smith's seared grouper with hearts of palm and trumpet mushrooms.
-Art Smith will recreate Tracht's chopped sirloin with green peppercorn sauce and a fried egg.
-Michael Chiarello will recreate Rick Bayless' rack of lamb with black pasilla chile sauce and mission figs.
-Rick Bayless will recreate Chiarello's seared quail with fennel and grapes.

The chefs get 45 minutes and $300 to shop, and ample time to chit chat with the confessional. This series really has been a Meet Your Chefs, America kind of experience, and I'm digging it. Suzanne admits that her mother, a great cook in her own right, does a napkin-worthy fish and Suzanne will have to improve on that ability to win this round. Rick chooses to not Mexify Michael's dish, which is impressive (damn you, Bayless!).

Anita's lobster tries to make a break for it; she nabs it, then apologizes for having to do what Bravo actually shows her doing--a proper kitchen dispatch of a live lobster, knife to the back of the neck. Just like the alien/human hybrids in X-Files! Anyone? Up top? No?

Art turns Suzanne's comfort-foody burger with egg into a Scotch egg with lamb, which is fine if maybe a little--ahem--artless. Michael calls the caul fat netting "Sicilian pantyhose," which is grotesquely funny. At the end of prep, Suzanne has finished and plated with more than a couple minutes left, and Art is worried about his lamb being underdone for the sake of making sure his egg isn't overdone.

The critics for this episode are the original line-up--Jay Rayner returns to Gail's well-boobified chair alongside Gael Greene and James Oseland--as well as departed chefs from the first 6 weeks of Top Chef: Masters. It's just one big buddy-fest here, kids! Everyone loves everyone.

Art goes first with his Flintstonian mass of lamb, accompanied by sweet potato fries, a biscuit, and a tomato tart. Chef Cimarusti calls it "Art on a plate," which should not be confused with "art on a plate," as it is most certainly not that. His little comfort sides go over well, but wouldn't you know it--Art has managed to undercook his lamb and overcook his egg. D'oh!

Rick brings out his non-Mexican quail stuffed with parsnips and prosciutto over pancetta-cooked wild greens. Everyone notes two things: Rick has stepped out of his traditional role, and he has married a lot of diverse ingredients really, really well. Everyone loves (even more than they already do).

Next is Suzanne's roasted grouper with gnocchi, bacon, peas, and roasted parsnips. Clearly, her timing issue was more significant than she thought. The fish coasted past "done" well into "overdone" territory, and has cooled off just like her gnocchi. Tough, cold...hard to succeed with those flaws, even with bacon.

Hubert comes next, presenting his seared scallop with cream of sea urchin over mashed fingerling potatoes. Have gone the subtle route with his roe, Keller might have tripped over his own fanciness (as Art might have called it); most diners agree that the urchiny aspects are barely detectable. But the scallop, on the other hand, is delectable and cooked perfectly.

Michael's chickpea-dusted rack of lamb stuffed with fig mostarda and fried rosemary comes through to the diners as a good start on a great dish. They find it a little underseasoned, but love the chickpea crust. Seems to be a safe dish, neither great nor disappointing. The lamb was too rare for Oseland.

Anita Lo, scourge of chickens and lobsters, serves last. She takes Keller's very simple dish into three very creative deconstructive directions: a corn and lobster chawanmushi (kind of a savory Japanese flan), a champange gelée, and a biscuit sandwich of raw lobster knuckle (yes, a knuckle sandwich for the critics). They're all frankly blown away. She clearly suffered no culinary intimidation in facing a classy French dish from a classical French chef.

At the Critics's Table, things break down as you'd expect from the reactions at the dinner table. Hubert's sauce was too subtle, but he defends it well by saying that Pacific urchin is more subtly flavored than French Atlantic urchin. Anita credits her mother's Tennessee education for her perfect Southern biscuits. Art cops to his egg issues (on display in both the Quickfire and Elimination challenges).

Rick's interpretation, displaying what Oseland calls a "fresh innocence" regarding Italian cookery, is hailed by all--and Rick blushes charmingly at Oseland's phrase. Yes, Rick, I like you now. Michael defends his light use of chiles by saying that he'd only do so inartfully compared to Bayless, and wouldn't want to step all over his lamb in the process. Only Suzanne seems a little oblivious to the flaws of her dish, looking a little surprised that the fish was as overcooked as it was. It's not looking good for Suzanne.

The scores are delivered. Rick and Anita are the top two. Rick gets 5 for the QF, another 4.5 from the diners, and 5/4/4.5 from the critics for 23 total stars. Anita, also with 5 from the QF and 4.5 from the diners, gets 5/4.5/5 from the clearly-wowed judges, giving her the one-star victory over Bayless. They should both be considered front-runners, even before this performance.

The bottom four all look very nervous, but really it's a bottom two-and-a-half. There's almost no chance of Keller exiting, and Michael Chiarello should probably be safe for the figs and chickpeas, even if the lamb was a little underdone for the obviously-wussy James Oseland.

Michael scores 4 + 3, with 3.5/4/4 from the critics for 18.5 total stars. Hubert Keller is next, passing through to the next round with 5 + 4 and 4.5/4/4 from the critics for 21.5. Art, jolly but probably doomed, scores 4 + 3, 2.5/3/2.5 for 15 stars, sending Michael on to the next round. Suzanne's score will be truly unfortunate if she's to lose to Art, and when she scores 4 + 3 and 2.5/2.5/2.5 totalling 14.5 stars, you see just how unfortunate her poor performance was.

Suzanne seemed like a strong contender but it's true that she displayed a poor sense of timing in the first round of the competition. This time, it really killed her chances. Art skates by with a shaky performance, and it's on to next week. Looks like the chefs will have to cater some absurd, 5th level vegan celebrity event that makes everyone sad. Good TV, folks!

Sorry Top Chef: Masters fans. There won't be a recap this week because I'm in the midst of the home-stretch toward my wedding this Saturday. Didn't even have time to watch this week's ep. I'll be back in two weeks, because I don't plan on recapping TC:M during my honeymoon.

I was right! Not looking at spoilers or pre-caps or anything, I pegged the short dude with the fu manchu-ish thing going on as a wizard. Close! Magician. And he was dispatched to the TC kitchen by Neil Patrick Harris. This is a very surreal concept for an episode of Top Chef. Better just take it from the top.

Chef No. 1: Douglas Rodriguez, Philadelphia. Runs a bunch of restaurants in a bunch of cities. Calls his style "tortilla-free Latin American cooking." He's won a Beard award, but I assume not for that ring-around-the-tub thing he's got going on on his face. His charity is AYUDA for the Arts.

Chef No. 2: Anita Lo, New York. Annisa Restaurant, among others. A Food & Wine Best New Chef (2001) and recent Michelin star recipient, Lo works the line a lot and seems like another cool chick in the kitchen. We've gotten a lot of those so far in this show. Her charity is the cancer support group, SHARE.

Chef No. 3: John Besh, New Orleans. Restaurant August and an Emeril-load of other joints around town. Another Beard award winner and Food & Wine Best New Chef (1999), he was also the runner-up to the manic Michael Symon in Food Network's The Next Iron Chef competition. His charity is the Katrina relief organization, the Make It Right Foundation.

Chef No. 4: Mark Peel, Los Angeles. Campanile. Peel worked under Wolfgang Puck (and that's saying something, because Lil Ahnold's a short dude) at Spago, and has won multiple Beard awards. He seems like he might be the most hardass of the four. His charity is Doctors Without Borders.

Maybe it was the gravitational pull of NPH, but this seemed to be the least food-heavy episode of TC:M so far. The Quickfire Challenge, Season 3's All-Star "Cook an egg with one hand tied behind your back" challenge, resulted in the lowest score for a QF yet.

In what has to be either the world's most unlikely coincidence or shameless premeditation by the producers, Chef Mark's father was born without an arm. Clearly, Lamarck's inheritance of acquired characteristics gives him an undue adv--you say that theory was debunked by Darwin? Hm. Well, he's still got an added appreciation for the difficulty.

Douglas makes a breakfast bread topped with egg and ham, which is challenging. Mark makes fresh duck egg pasta, which is absurdly challenging. Anita makes a soft scrambled egg served in an empty egg shell, which is so challenging that it takes a second hand (Mark's) to use the egg de-capper. This seems like cheating. But oh well, no one notices because Mark's too busy making the easiest dish of the four--slow-cooked egg over-easy--look like sculpting Michelangelo's David.

Judges Terry Reish, Monica May, and Gail Simmons (woo!) enjoy Mark's pasta even though he forgot the olive oil for his dressing (2.5 stars), and Douglas' corn cake ham and egg concoction gets 3 stars. Anita nails her dish (CHEATING DOESN'T PAY, KIDS), getting the maximum 5 stars. But the story of the challenge is that John, perhaps the celebuchef of this round, gets one half-star for his partially uncooked single serving of egg split between three judges.

For the Elimination Challenge, the chefs will cook for NPH and his "friends" at Magic Castle in Hollywood. To introduce the theme of the challenge, magician and mentalist Max Maven arrives to explain the similarities between magic and cooking. Through a series of interesting but short-shrifted card tricks, he assigns each of these similarities to the chefs as their respective guiding themes: Mystery (Mark), Surprise (John), Spectacle (Douglas) and Illusion (Anita). Pretty cool concept.

45 minutes of shopping with $250 ensue, and Mark decides to go en papillote (a term for cooking in parchment that I hadn't heard or seen before, and yet managed to spell correctly in my notes). Besh is going for surprise with a little spectacle thrown in, announcing his intent to use liquid nitrogen. Douglas selects some foie gras but reveals little else in keeping with the rule of not giving up secrets. Anita is faking a scallop (which seems like sexual slang, but I assure you is not).

If the challenge doesn't come down to Anita v. Mark, at this point in the episode I would have been surprised. Mark fantasizes about sabotaging all of Anita's dishes with salt, and explains the friendly coast-war engaged in by chefs from NY and LA. They've both got a clear killer instinct, and that ability to see nothing but your opponent and the task at hand pays off in this show.

The chefs hit the kitchen, and start their two hours of prep. We learn about John's time in the Marines, and Douglas' childhood Julia Child fandom. We learn that Anita's mom had breast cancer (thus the charity), while Mark is shown hard at work, descaling fish. (somewhere, Richard Blais is saying "Oh! Descaling! Crap.") No time for chit-chat with Mark the Robo-chef.

And then in walks Colicchio. Oh, Tom Colicchio, you charmer you. He makes the rounds, albeit much chummier than normally. He talks with John about his plan to do tableside horseradish sorbet with the NO2, and with Anita about her faked puffed rice cereal "sand." It's shop talk with Mark, and almost nothing shown with Douglas. Tom notes that the Masters, unlike the usual chef aspirants, don't get bogged down and just go to work.

On the day of the challenge, the chefs arrive at the Magic Castle, which Anita compares to Hogwarts to the delight of my lovely viewing companion. Not much drama in the last hour. Anita's bowl is a little too big! Mark's afraid his snapper en papillote might suffer from 5 minutes of too much carryover heat! John's got to go for broke! And Douglas is trying to light his coconut bowls smeared with hot pink sterno gel on fire! Okay, that last one is a little dramatic.

It's dinner-time, and NPH and his "friends" (actor David Burtka is less BFF than simply BF, and it's odd that Bravo of all networks would shy away from noting this--thank you @alexinmadison for keeping me abreast of the H'wood dating scene) file into the Dante Room. There's no Jay Rayner this week; the lovely Gail Simmons will be judging in his stead. Two Ga(i/e)ls! So hard to take notes!

Mark's Mystery course starts off well, with Gael Greene audibly exclaiming off-camera, "what is it?" A little on-the-nose, there, Gael? It's Mark's tai snapper (spelled correctly, and I apologize for thinking so poorly of you, Bravo; you'd never misspell a food word) with garlic mashed potatoes and leeks and a lobster sauce. A scallion oil/pesto-ish thing and Dassai sake top off the dish. The sake's a good call, as it's NPH's favorite beverage. Everyone loves the aroma; not everyone loves the effort involved in getting into the still-mostly-sealed bags.

For his Surprise course, John asks for NPH to be his two-handed volunteer (again, not sex slang). NPH holds the bowl in which John makes his crème fraîche and horseradish sorbet, which is served with a bounty of salmon items: tartare with a frozen cauliflower blini; roe and cucumber salad topped with the sorbet; and poached-then-tempura-fried lobster wrapped in smoked salmon. Gael digs the playful element of the presentation, although get offa Douglas' Spectacle turf, I say. NPH thinks the sorbet was too cream-y. Sophomoric humor was seen in the background, trying not to say anything.

There's little fanfare or screen time, really, for Anita's Illusion course. She makes a braised daikon radish, hollowed out (to look like a seared scallop) and filled with steak tartare, topped with Kombu caviar. She set the bowl atop her rice cereal faux seascape, which by didn't in any way Snap™, Crackle™, or Pop™, but made an unnamed snappy, crackly, poppy noise nonetheless. A little shellfish broth was set off to the side. NPH's BF dooesn't care for the daikon, but NPH loves it.

With his hands shaking while lighting the stick lighter, Douglas serves his Spectacle course flambé. It features duck, four ways: breast served with oyster ceviche; empanada with foie gras and figs; breast with butternut squash pureé; and confit soup with coconut, cilantro, and a bunch of other stuff. (Side note: Bravo, could you slow down just a little with the on-screen info? Jeez.) An impressive spread, Douglas' product doesn't quite live up to the idea.

In the mid-break vignette, we learn why Jay Rayner wasn't judging; he was performing a magic act for the judges pre-meal! Okay, no, he wasn't, but that dude sure looked an awful lot like him. Anyway, a rabbit falls out of his head and then pees on Kelly Choi's décolletage. Awesome.

The chefs file in before the Critics' Table, knowing that Besh would have had to carry off a masterpiece to overcome the shame of his horrible QF performance, to say nothing of the bad score. Similarly, Douglas had to feel like he dropped the ball a little with his somewhat poor execution.

John says he wanted to use techniques for which he's not normally known, and the cold blini was one of those. It was a surprise, to be sure, but multiple judges agree--it was far too cold for the context. His poached and fried lobster, though, was perfectly cooked.

Gael calls Anita's presentation a surrealistic painting. Gail, on the other hand, calls it the steak tartare interior of the faux scallop gruesome and shocking in a great way. It won't be chasing off Richard Blais' banana scallops for most popular fake scallop any time soon, but while Gail missed the saltiness that the broth would have offered (had she used it), James Oseland thought it brought the dish together very well.

Douglas indeed cops to a failure of spectacular execution. Gail wins for line of the night: "Have you ever set fire to a coconut before?" Gael liked his ceviche, but the panoply of ingredients in Douglas' broth didn't shine forth for the judges.

As he didn't check his dish before serving it--thus maintaining the mystery--Mark gets points for carrying off the theme exceptionally well. That the leeks were tender and the fish was well-cooked, only serves to increase the judges' praise for Mark's magic bag (really not sexual slang). James notes that the dish was a deviation from Mark's normal Mediterranean style, but in a good way. Gail absolutely dug the inclusion of the sake, which makes me wonder why she went out of her way to include Mark's sake in her evaluation, but abstained from trying Anita's broth. Whatever.

John Besh gets his scores first, to make things as un-anti-climactic as possible. 2.5 from the diners, plus a set of 3's from the judges, gives him a paltry 12 stars. That's not winning anything. Mark gets 4 from the diners, and 4.5/4/3.5 (boo James Oseland) from the judges for a total of 18.5 stars. Decent!

Douglas is up next, and he gets 3 stars from the diners but only 2.5/2.5/2 from the judges. 13 stars is not good. This isn't the most exemplary week of Top Chef: Masters cookery we've seen, to be sure. But then Anita's scores come out, and with a diner 4.5 and 4.5/4/4.5 from the judges, her 22.5 stars blow the rest of the lineup away. With one exception (Rick Bayless), the Quickfire winner has taken the Elimination Challenge every week. Anita says she's kind of mortified that she'll have to do this again, and Mark is left humbled by the talent of other chefs. This show is so nice.

Maybe not next week, when the chefs are forced to cater a 100-person event SOLO.

I know TIME can be a little conservative sometimes. The whole Matthew Cooper/Valerie Plame thing was kind of the exception that proves the rule, to a certain extent. So I don't expect them to be Newsweek. Newsweek's Newsweek, and TIME is TIME.

But what I didn't expect is for TIME to publish a cover story on the allegedly sorry state of the institution of marriage, and to call it "our most sacred institution" ON THE COVER. Thanks, guys, but let's leave that to GOP.com. How about just being journalists?

No, author Caitlin Flanagan--who, I'm relieved to discover, is no stranger to controversy--goes that far and farther. She writes, "There is no other single force causing as much measurable hardship and human misery in this country as the collapse of marriage." People without health care, education, or affordable housing might beg to differ if they weren't busy begging for those other things right now.

She begins the article by relating a scene wherein she remarks to her father at the dinner table that it's amazing he and his wife (her mother) have been married for fifty years and he's never cheated on her. (It's all a build-up to a very lame payoff, the punchline delivered by Dear Old Dad: "I can't drive.")

Who says to his or her father, "I can't believe you haven't cheated on Mom yet!"? Who does this?

I don't want to come across as a firebrand for marriage just because I'm about to buy membership in that club in a few days. But please. Marriage is fine. Fascination with Jon and Kate + 8 doesn't equal an "ambivalence" toward marriage. It indicates the same thing as our fascination with the O.J. Simpson trial, the Michael Jackson memorial, and Winona Ryder getting caugh shoplifting: modern Americans like to see trainwrecks, scandal, ceremony, and comeuppance. We're gawkers. It ain't good, but it ain't a mystery.

The whole article is an absurdist take on love, family, and romance, and it's no better highlighted than by this little factoid: not once does Flanagan mention "gay marriage." Not once. So while pointing out Jonathan Edwards and Mark Sanford as symptoms of a disease rather than the disease itself, she conveniently leaves out the scores of couples across the nation, yearning for the right to be legally recognized as families.

No, instead Flanagan flogs us with "man and wife," "man and wife," "man and wife." Fertility, Cialis, procreation, and the failing of the heterosexual male to keep it in his own yard. Not only shamefully one-sided and misrepresentative, but BORING AS FUCK.

Do better, TIME.

Today, I was awoken by almost getting barfed on by a pug. Yay for carpet cleanser! But the incident had the blessing-in-disguise quality of getting me out of bed at 6:45 AM. (yes, there is a 6:45 in the morning now, Lt. Kaffee.) Time to hit the Farmers' Market for a little Independence Day produce shopping!

There are things I always look to buy at the Market. Usually cheese. Grabbed some Hook's 5-Year Cheddar, and some Brunkow Morel and Onion Jack. I also picked up some "orphans," little pieces left from the slicing of bigger wheels, at Fromagination; a cheese called Dante that just spoke to me, and a sliver of Sarvecchio Parmesan. Incidentally, it looks like those two cheeses are pretty similar. Looks like it's time for a Taste-Off.

Anyway, I'm also trying to buy more of my produce at the Farmers' Market, since it usually looks so shitty at the grocery store. Today, I took a leap and bought some stuff I've never cooked at home. Swiss chard and garlic scapes found their way in with the familiar crimini mushrooms, fingerling potatoes and green onions. Man, garlic scapes look creepy. Like alien tendrils from Independence Day, appropriately enough.

Tart cherries and raspberries for a really good price rounded out the basket, as well as a bottle of New Glarus Crack'd Wheat from Fromagination. I've got no earthly clue what I'm going to do with some of that stuff, but it sure smells great and feels good to have in the house. The fact that I wore my out-of-shape self out riding my bike to the Market is adding to that sense of well-being.

Happy Independence Day!