TC Spamalot

hang in there little buddy….

During last night’s Top Chef, I seriously had no idea who was going home. It could have been anyone.

But first … LOOOOVED the quickfire challenge. The chefs got $10 and 10 minutes to buy something from one designated aisle at the market. I feel this all the time, when the kids are firing 50.3 million questions at me and I’m under the gun to be somewhere else in 5 minutes, I sometimes make a crazy grab for something for dinner that night. It’s only when I get home that I realize that I have to somehow work pickled beets into the meal.

Casey and Hung were the extremes: she went with an ultra-safe and boring pudding parfait while he went for psychadelic cereal wonderland. The best part was that he was actually pissed that they didn’t go kookoo for his cocoa puffs, literally scoffing at their lack of vision for his freakishly unappetizing egg and cereal mess. CJ could’ve been a contender, had he not mixed up his salts and sugars. I was ecstatic that Brian turned his back on the canned seafood and went for SPAM. It was a brilliant move, surprising and strangely appetizing. Maybe he was channeling our local SPAM master.

And Howie. Oh, Howie.

Didn’t it seem that everyone was a little slap-happy that morning? More on that….

So Brian wins and nominates himself as head honcho. Good for him. They’re told that they have to cater a fashonista party for Esteban Cortazar. Note Padma’s look of excitement and everyone else’s look of “meh”. But who cares who the little dude is, they have to throw together a fabulous party for $350. On a boat.

Menu is planned, ingredient choices are made, the team seems to be getting along, yada yada yada. Hello, did someone forget to light the fire … under the chefs?

Truth is, their menu was boring (which was the main complaint of the judges) and they spread themselves too thin. They could have each done a singular WOW dish instead of a few average dishes. All this was said by the judges, of course. The funny thing to me is how shocked the judges seemed by the performances of the final seven.

To me, it was quite evident from the quickfire challenge that the “cast” is a little crispy. While we, as viewers, had a break from Top Chef last week with a re-run, the kids are on it 24-7. It’s every day for them, and they weren’t allowed to bring cell phones or make contact in any way with the people in their real lives. Is it any wonder that they’re all a little fried?

It’s a marathon, not a sprint. Did Hung use up all his ideas in the first few days? Can the little speedster make it to the finish line? Howie couldn’t. Tired of working to figure out what the judges want, he’d had enough of trying to be something he wasn’t: namely, anything other than an old-school kitchen curmudgeon.

Only time will tell who is best suited for the bright lights and big demands of celebrity chefdom, who in the end will be able to dig the deepest and pull out a brilliant menu and a final win. It’s anybody’s game now.