Sorry for the delay! Usually I drink a pot of espresso and frantically write these before leaving for work. Yesterday I overslept and just ran out the door.
Anyway, it's wake up time in the Real World House. There's some voice-overing about how close everyone has become, illustrated by some shots of them all looking very sleepy. It's kind of cute. Stay tuned, because at some point there's also quite a shot of Tre in bed, with his very muscular arms languidly draped over his head. Tre, can I feed you some grapes?
Lights, camera, action! We're on the set of the movie "Mean Streets: Local Tough Makes Good, Grows a Heart"
Cue, our hero: Joey starts talking about how he "can't do nothing to get out of this little jam I'm in...caught up in all the emotions..." but then resolves, "Bring it on! I'm the grey horse right now." Does he say grey? Isn't it "dark horse?" Did I mishear?
We also have some inspiring words from Hung about how he's "always going to try (my) hardest."
Honestly, everyone seems very sincere this episode! Your misanthropic blogger is going to have a problem with this if it continues for an entire hour.
The Quickfire Challenge:
Our guest judge this week is Maria Frumkin, an experienced pastry chef and the owner of some restaurant in Miami.
The challenge is to make a delicious offering...from frozen pie dough! Hung gasps with horror. Dale, the lead on last week's pastry tragedy, says, "My immediate response was, %*@ you!"
Maria, our guest judge, needlessly elaborates "You'll have to use your talent and your creativity to come up with something tasty from these frozen pie crusts."
The chefs will have ninety minutes for this, which is a long quickfire. Padma says, "We expect a miracle...especially after last weeks pastry debacle." Dale stares daggers at Padma.
Hung decides on banana (cream?) pie! He talks about how much he loves bananas and chocolate and peanuts. See, he's 11. I, too, am 11. In fact, I might just make a chocolate creme pie for a dinner party I'm having this weekend.
Dale is "jacked out of his mind" and making a "free-form" (that handy marketing of "sloppy" as free-form! Color this copywriter impressed) tart, one with salmon baked in I think, and then a strawberry one for dessert.
Joey reveals that "what nobody knows is that I have some pastry experience...I didn't want to put myself out there last time...somebody might sabotage me." I actually don't hate Joey for this. It's probably true that if he had boasted of pastry experience and decided to be on the pineapple dessert team, he would have gone down for it.
Howie, as usual is one sweat bead away from being shut down by the board of health.
He says that "Tarts are a cook's dessert." Pastry chefs, is this true? I would say that just because some of the best tarts are simple it doesn't mean it's beneath pastry chefs? Any pastry chefs reading this that would like to weigh in?
Hung has made his banana cream pie but is worried because it doesn't seem to be freezing in the freezer fast enough. He looks like a mad scientist. He's clearly stressed.
As usual, I am stunned and worried to find that I can actually relate to our resident villian. Mere weeks ago, I tried to make an ice cream cake. With home-made ice cream and home-made cake! I made French ice cream with carefully tempered egg yolks! Bought mint and steeped it to make my own home-made mint ice cream! Used a thousand eggs on an old-fashioned vanilla cake! What I found was that you just can't rush the freezing process, no matter how many times you curse or stare at the freezer balefully. I actually served, to quite a large party, a runny pile of un-frozen cream. Humiliating!
Hung's pie is also runny..."it's okay, okay" he croons to the tart, like it's a baby, as he puts some strawberries along the border of the pie-slice, to prevent it from running.
Tre is playing it safe with an apple tart tatin with fennel, which he says he makes at his restaurant.
During the judging, Joey says to Maria and Padma "'I'm not a pastry chef and know very little about desserts".
WHAT A LIAR!
He has prepared a trio of tarts...which he says is like "an orgasm in your mouth." He has the good sense to say this to the camera, not to Padma and Maria, who I'm sure would have spit the food out. So it's the viewers who are left to deal with the searing visual imagery of Joey making an orgasm for your mouth.
Worst of the Quickfire:
Lia's chorizo artichoke pie "didn't marry well together" Dale's salmon pie with saffron "saffron was overwhelming" Hung's chocolate creme pie "I believe you had enough time (to freeze it)."
This seems like a silly reason to put Hung in the bottom three.
Best of the Quickfire
Tre's apple/fennel tart "simple, elegant" Sarah M's goat cheese tart "very nice...cheese tart was exceptional"
Joey is the winner. Maria, not knowing that the Joe the Liar actually has a PAST in tarts, says, "You have a future in tarts." HA!
Now Joey has immunity!
I can't help but feel the producers have a hand in this. Joey, unfortunately, is what might be called "good TV" on these shows. I'm not going to lie. I do find the Joey/Howie show kind of amusing. AND YET! He shouldn't be carried through if he isn't that good. I think better, more professional, but less amusing chefs may have gone home. This little dramatic arc (with the 'grey horse' speech) feels a little forced.
The Elimination Challenge:
The chefs will be cooking lunch for the cast and crew of a telenova filming in Miami. I also refuse to name this telenova (like the gin that shall not be named) because apparently it's some promotional tie-in between Bravo and their 'sister channel' and I'm sick of all of this product placement/branding/promotion.
Anyway.
The chefs will have 30 minutes to shop and three hours to cook. Three hours is longer than usual.
Lia comments that she doesn't have a lot of experience making Latin food. I really like Lia. She has real professional experience and also seems like a very cool, professional and mellow woman who isn't prone to scenes. This means, of course, she isn't long for this show.
Lia has not experience making latin food...although she has plenty of making it. She decides to do a smoked rainbow trout.
Joey says that he's all happy about the "hot Latino women" which he makes sound very creepy, and then he says a sentence that really explains it all: " I'm going to kick it up a notch." Aha! An Emeril disciple?
But then he actually says a very nice quote about Howie's food and Howie being talented, although he does say that Howie, who is making pork, should branch out beyond pork. I agree with Joey on this.
Casey, who is from Texas, has a bit of knowledge (and it sounds like a love for) Latino food. She wants to do something with mole, which is different in every region. I didn't know that! Anyway she's going to put some coffee and molasses flavor in there.
Sarah N. is making a cerviche with avocado and making her own tortillas, but buys backup tortillas in case.
I've barely mentioned Malarkey! I'll just say that he's actually very cute sans hat. Also, he's wearing a hat that doesn't irritate me that much.
Howie, sounding like an evil mastermind, says of the long cooking time: "three hours is just enough time to execue my plan." For world domination!
Which of course means that Tom enters and informs the chefs that lunch has been pushed up and they'll only have an hour and a half to get ready instead of three. "Sorry about that," says Tom, sounding not sorry at all.
Howie thinks it "sucks" which I agree with! So now some chef who happened to plan something that has to be be cooked longer has to scramble to come up with a new recipe? Another case of the wrong person possibly being sent home, just because the PRODUCERS -- says I -- decided to lie about the cooking time to create dramatic tension.
There are shots of Howie cursing and slamming pots and Hung dangerously running around the kitchen with a knife. Tre, every cool, comments: "people have different ways of dealing with pressure," and graciously leaves it at that.
Casey's rice boils over and Howie very nicely helps her get it out of the pot as soon as possible. Unfortunately, she realizes that her rice is mush. Uh oh. At the telemundo set, Casey nicely writes Howie's menu for him since he says his handwriting is horrrible. Aw! Teamwork! This really is a nice group of chefs.
GAIL SIMMONS IS BACK! She looks gorgeous. She's glowing! Was she on vacation? Did she just get married? Is she in love with Tom? She seems very happy to be back.
Hung has gone the classic route, making chicken and rice. He insists on speaking Spanish to everyone that comes by. He says, "They're loving it!"
Sarah N. is serving her scallop and shrimp cerviche with avocado. Tre has made jumbo prawns with lobster and mango, and Howie has made pork shoulder with a sour orange/red onion mixture on top, which I admit looks tasty.
Joey, who has immunity since he won the quickfire, has made a bean stew with lobster and shrimp. Howie, who the producers have clearly put next to Joey, says, "It's just delicious! It blew me away!" He comments that he was eating it all day, which they illustrate with a little montage of him eating.
Lia has made a smoked rainbow trout with a poblano charred corn polenta base. She gets a lot of flack for it being bland and how it isn't Latino enough, but I think she was being creative at least.
Tom is wearing a white jacket and looking rather Miami VIce.
Sarah M. has made vegetarian chiles relleno with her own, homemade fresh queso blanco (she has a background in cheese making). People are really, really loving this dish. Howie's braised pork gets good reviews, but the judges don't seem to go nuts over it or anything.
Hung's Rice and Chicken is getting not good reviews at all. Apparently the rice was dry. The least favorite, from the audience, seems to be Sarah N.'s scallop shrimp cerviche with avocado. They also dislike the polenta cake from Lia and Casey's molasses/coffee/mole chicken.
Joey: "there isn't anybody's dish that could top mine."
Judging!
Gale says that Howie's was fantastic. The judges call in the top two, which are Howie and Joey.
WHAT? Please. This just feels so staged.
They didn't even call in a third? Sarah M's chile relleno got rave reviews, and she doesn't even make the top three? I really see a producer's hand in this. And I don't like it!
Joey says that "back home" he has a couple of Spanish guys in his kitchen and this is one of the dish he makes. Does he say Spanish or Latino? He dedicates this dish to the guys back home. Snooze.
Joey and Howie are then ALL OVER each other complimenting each other on the dishes. Snooze, and, ew.
Howie is proclaimed the winner. WHAT! Howie has now won two challenges!
Howie and Joey come back to the chef's holding pen and announce Howie's win, to lukewarm applause. Howie has won a bottle of wine, which he dramatically dedicates to Joey. People clap, like, so what.
Probably because they'd prefer the clones to stop the orating and get to the point; namely, which three chefs have to go before the judges?! Actually make that four!
Losers: Lia, Sarah N, Casey and Hung.
I actually have no idea who is going home.
And....we have Lia going home.
"I'm going to keep on cooking," she says. "I love being in a kitchen, I love food, I love feeding people, it's fun."