On the last Top Chef 5 NY Radika was eliminated due to her lack of personality during her restaurant war while Leah stayed. Yes I’m still on the Leah-must-go kick and I’ll be ranting about it throughout this entire recap. The morning after Carla was glad to still be in the game and wanted to kick it up while Leah reveals that alcohol caused her and Hosea to kiss. She seems to want to be there more then usual but I won’t give in! When entering the Quick Fire kitchen Padma stood with Scott Conant who was the guest judge for the round. The theme for the challenge was “Super Bowl dinner” where the players randomly chose squares to decide a food group and ingredient. All had differing food groups while Padma revealed all would be using Quaker Oats and no immunity would be given up but an advantage for the elimination challenge was for grabs. Some went crazy, putting their oats on random things like shrimp while others kept it pretty safe. After all the tasting was done Scott chose Leah, Jeff and Fabio as the bottom three dishes. Carla, Jamie and Stefan were chosen as the top dishes with Stefan winning his fifth challenge back to back.
After the challenge Padma led the chefs into the storage room where they got their Chef jerseys. Back in the kitchen football helmets were scattered around and Padma let the opposition into the room. Seven past season All Stars entered the kitchen Andrew from season 4, Josie from season 2, Andrea from season 1, Spike from season 4, Camille from season 3, Nikki from 4 and Miguel from 1 returned to take on the new chefs. Each from the current season would compete against one of the All Stars in a theme based upon one of the NFL teams. Stefan got to choose his partner and Stefan picked himself to compete against Andrea. The others then had to choose which team they would cook for. The teams then ended up as Jeff/Josie, Hosea/Miguel, Leah/Nikki, Jamie/Camille, Carla/Andrew and Fabio/Spike. Things were a bit bleak for the “home team” as anyone who lost their head to head against an All Star would be up for elimination. That means EVERYONE could go to judges table a loser which is not a good thing.
After choosing teams Jamie freaked out as she had no clue what to do with her San Francisco ingredients. Its her home town but she just didn’t know what to do with it. Jeff obviously chose Miami since he’s from there but Josie also had some connection as she played for a women’s football team and also grew up in Miami. Hosea was against Miguel and he felt his dish was being too safe, so Hosea wanted to be more creative with things. Carla felt a connection with the south and decided to go with gumbo while Andrew basically told all of them to bring it: saying he’ll “pee on them” if the suck. Leah was up against Nikki, who is a New Yorker. Things aren’t looking too good for Leah now are they?
Following their night of prepping everyone woke up nervous but ready to tackle the past seasons. Fabio revealed that he’s there to support his sick mother while Carla meditated to get herself “centered”. At the Culinary Institute of Education previously eliminated players sat in the stands to watch their friends cook. Points were scored based upon the judge’s and fan’s taste test. Leah was up first as she cooked against Nikki. They only had twenty minutes to cook and Leah thought she had it in the bag. Padma chose Leah while Toby chose Nikki. Scott also chose Leah, along with Tom which gave her seven points. That gave Leah the win, and safety (dammit) but we shall move on. Miguel and Hosea were next and had a few words of banter during their cook off. Padma, Toby and Tom all chose Hosea which gave him safety as well. The love birds remain to love another day, how sad. Going out to cook Carla was a bit nervous while Andrew was pretty good, pumping up the viewers. All four judges ended up picking Carla over Andrew while only one of the fans chose hers. She’s still safe though!
Stefan was next up against doubly sent home Andrea. Things were pretty even during the cooking but Andrea got points from Padma and Toby while Stefan got points from Tom and Scott. The fans broke the tie by all voting for Andrea though, making Stefan the first one possibly going home. Others were happy to see Stefan knocked down a peg and it made the rest really nervous. Jamie went out next and cooked against Camille. Jamie wasn’t feeling comfortable with her ingredients but things panned out ok as the fans broke the tie, giving Jamie the win and safety. Jeff was up against Josie next, one of the better chefs from Season 2. They were both doing the same dish and Josie’s being more authentic gave her the total points; sending Jeff to elimination along with Stefan. Fabio was up last and had to pull out a win to give the Season 5ers the overall win. He pulled out his charm once again and was worried about overcooking his venison. It seemed the two dishes were close as Padma chose Spike, Toby chose Fabio and Scott chose Spike. That left Tom who also chose Spike, sending Fabio to the elimination but saving the day by getting a field goal and making Season 5 the overall winners against the All Stars.
Back in the waiting room those who were safe were happy to be as the three up for elimination were good chefs. As the winners went to Judges Table it was pretty much up in the air as to who would win. The judges didn’t give much input to their dishes during the cook off but now its to hear. Carla had some good comments about her craw fish and was pumped she was finally getting recognition. Hosea’s dish had some nice comments from guest judge Scott while Jamie’s dish was praised by Tom. He didn’t vote for her during the challenge but considered it one of the better dishes of the nice. Leah didn’t have much said about her dish other then it being a “good, simple dish”. In the end Carla was chosen as the winner for the night which granted her two tickets to the Super Bowl. It’s a great time for her to finally win something considering how expensive those tickets are!
With the winners back the three losers for the night headed to the Judges Table. Fabio was critiqued first and told the judges that his meat was rare, Tom didn’t believe it. Fabio then got into a bit of a fight with guest judge Scott after calling him out, saying his dish made sense. Stefan was next and it was his first time up for elimination. Tom and Scott wanted more flavor and depth being that it was from Texas and Stefan was, for the first time, somewhat speechless. Jeff claimed that the plates being plastic caused him to lose and doing more dishes also hurt him. The judges felt it wasn’t those aspects but rather the flavor of Josie’s dish was just much better then Jeff’s. Now that the judges were left alone it still was really up in the air as who was going home. All three had negative aspects to their dishes but Jeff’s was the worst as he was told to pack his knives and go. That left the Euro-twins in the game, probably making a few even more worried then before as they’ve been pretty tough competition so far.
Source: RealityRehash.com
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