Top Chef Recap: Episode Four
Episode 4 Recap: Kat's Mustard Custard, Tristen's Duck Madeleine, Corwin's Jerk
I write these for a Top Chef fantasy league my wife Anna and I serve as co-commissioners. This was written for the participants, so IGNORE any mention of points. INSANE SPOILERS BELOW!
It’s hard body o’clock at the Top Chef residences. Shuai rips the row (arms, back and core). Lana executes a slow push up (arms, core). Vinny visualizes (brain), and Corwin shadow boxes (full body). Four chefs, sharpening the knives of their bodies. Corwin tells us he was a military brat, raised by soldiers. Will his proximity to the military come in handy today? Is his shadow boxing a form of fitness, is he throwing punches at a past trauma, or is each punch an attempt to get his arms further away from himself only to be disappointed when they return? Let’s see if the Quickfire gives us the answers to any of these questions.
The chefs enter the kitchen to see three game show podiums. Trivia. Michael Cera shows up. Superbad himself. Vinny talks about how formative Superbad was for him, and forces us to imagine a scenario in which he was chasing women around high school and it was all good fun and not terrifying for those poor women.
The high school memories continue as Vinny morphs into a sort of nerd villain during trivia. His team dominates, and he does some big clapping, throws up a double shaka and scoffs when Tristen tries the strategy of guessing anything in the universe after hearing half a question. Vinny and Cesar miss a high five too.
They are awarded 30 minutes to cook and Vinny goes with a crudo. And I can’t be alone in saying there may not be a more unexciting dish for television than a crudo. It’s boring, it’s a dish that is raw fish in some sort of nice broth. It’s a radio dish. Get KISS FM’s Kellie Rasberry, J-Si Chavez or Big Al Mack to describe a crudo to the audience, save the film cameras for a tartare or ceviche. Vinny’s on my team, but I am starting to get pretty sick of him. He’s book smart. He’s the kind of guy who never tries to play the saxophone after the band leader puts him at clarinet first to see if he can handle playing a reed based instrument. He’s no Rivers Cuomo or B.O.B., as he does not have the magic in him.
Kat might have the magic in her though. She is dealt a bad hand of cards and turns it into a delicious looking nutella puff sandwich thing. It’s the anti-crudo. It’s everything that Vinny wishes he could make. It’s the dreams he wishes he could dream instead of dreaming of electric sheep. That’s the magic. Kat doesn't win though, Corwin wins with a pretty nicely seared scallop. Don’t look now but Corwin is heating up.
Next up they draw knives and have to turn weird Canadian desserts into a dish. They have $100 dollars to spend at St. Lawrence market. A friend told me, “I find the lighting in there dim and unappetizing, and I miss recognizing the little aisle signs.” She brings up an important point. Could this have been where some of our chefs took their first wrong turns? Did the poorly lit shopping experience slowly drape a dull cloud over the mind of some chefs? Or maybe the little aisle signs confused the chefs into chasing false visions. Like the Sirens songs, luring chefs to mistakenly spend a moment on the beans aisle instead of the rice and pasta aisle. We didn’t see that happen if it did, but who knows what the ghouls at the St. Lawrence Market Film Office are making the editors cut.
After a quiet episode from Wells Fargo last week, I was excited to see the closeup of the Wells Fargo Active Cash® Credit Card. The chefs paid, then narrowly found their way out of the grocery Château d'If that is St. Lawrence market, into their Ultimate Driving Machines, and back home to the Rosemont Residences.
We meet with Henry who uses his quiet reflection camera time to call his business partner and former Top Chef HTX runner-up Evylen Garcia. They banter, she gives him advice on how to not win Top Chef blah blah. Then we go straight into an establishing shot of Toronto, sweeping out past some castle. Massimo and Lana run in, followed by a cool Tristen, who seems to have the best handle on his dish walking into the elimination cook.
The chefs get into it. Kat is making a savory custard. A mustard custard. More magic from her. Massimo and Cesar are both making a lamb dish. Paula’s braising pork belly. Tristen is making a version of a Guyanese Pepper Pot. Shaui’s making a weird meatball, Zubair is making duck. Kat is also making duck, but doing some pretty gnarly stuff to it. When asked her plan for the duck breast she says, “I’m going to peel the skin off, hit it with liquid nitrogen, pulverize it, then sous vide the actual breast.” Then she talks about her time as an actress, go-go dancer, burlesque performer and now a chef. She highlights that there’s all an element of performance. I’ll say it one last time and then I’ll move on… magic. But hang on that magic might be contagious as Tristen is making a duck fat madeleine. Both Tristen and Kat are doing some perverted stuff to a pair of random ducks.
While Tristen and Kat are going Christian Grey on their Anastasia Steele ducks, Zubair is doing the opposite. He’s not having the same fun as it’s cooking pretty uneven. Then we pop over to Henry who is r-e-l-a-x-e-d. He’s waiting on this and that and he feels very in control of the time. Lana makes gnocchi that looks like small little pieces of shit, Vinny makes a chocolate potato and adds gold flakes as a Superbad reference. Whatever. Meanwhile Cesar wins the battle of lambs over Massimo. Corwin makes a great looking jerk fried chicken, Tristen nails his pepperpot lamb and madeline.
We go back to an even more relaxed Henry who has switched out of his chef's jacket into a “life is good shirt” and has put on a whale sounds cassette that he bought from a Target kiosk in 2003. He makes a whole big deal about how he’s taking his time, but time counts down and the timer goes off and he realizes he forgot to put sauce on one of the plates. Just a total bonehead move. The plate goes to Gail, but it doesn’t even matter because his duck sucks anyways. Zubair’s is worse though.
Time for top dishes: It’s Kat, Tristen, and Corwin. Tristen wins it.
Bottom dishes: Shuai, Zubair, Henry. Zubair packs his knives.
Now we need to talk about Last Chance Kitchen. This is a pretty big deal. Zubair has to battle Bailey and Bailey wins. She’s coming back. She’s gotten stronger down there, more confident. We might see her next episode. Bailey makes BRETT’S BOARD this week. I don’t like doing it, but she earned it.