Wedding Wars

It must be tough finding challenges for Top Chef Masters. A challenge that works well on Top Chef doesn't always cross over successfully to Masters. Restaurant Wars is not really a big deal to chefs who have opened and closed more restaurants than your normal 8th place Top Chef finisher. However one challenge that appears to strike fear into the hearts of chefs everywhere is Wedding Wars. The most fearsome aspect of Wedding Wars? Working on teams? Nope. Long hours? Nah. The Bridezilla? Just send in Obi Waxman to calm her. No, what they really fear is...

...The Cake!

Carrying over their teams from the Quickfire, the chefs have 12 hours over two days to make the Bride's food and cake and the Groom's food and cake for 150 guests. Let's meet the happy couple.

The Blue Team, having won the Quickfire, get to choose whose food they want to cook. They choose the more adventurous food of the Bride. The Teams now get 45 minutes to find out what foods their customer likes and despises. Right off the bat, the Red Team realizes that the Groom is Jewish so the Pork Dish repertoire is tossed out of the kitchen. Carmen is suddenly at a disadvantage. Over on the Bride's side a whole ocean of shellfish sleep safer in their shells as the Bride pronounces them persona non grata despite Rick's best efforts to have them make an appearance. Not only does she shoot down the shellfish, she also takes the lamb off the table but I don't think that suggestion sunk deep enough for one chef.

We've all seen this type of look before. It's a look that says "I can change your mind about lamb". It's a gutsy look. Let's see if she has the chutzpha to back it up. As for the dreaded cake, the Groom goes Carrot and the Bride wants Bananas Foster. Carrot cake is kinda pedestrian but Bananas Foster is an interesting request. A flambé of bananas and rum served over ice cream is not your usual wedding dessert choice. It pretty much guarantees someone gets to run a dessert station for the night, making the dish upon request. Could be disastrous.

Shopping?

Yawn.

Back at the kitchen, the six hours of prep work begins. It's tough, each chef has to prep two courses and think about the cake.

Which Susan does not want to do.




The Blue Team is looking tasty on hors d'oeuvres while the Red Team...

...looks a bit safe. I'm actually kinda stoked to see what sort of hors d'oeuveres these master chefs come up with. The usual offerings we get from the Top Chef contestants run to the sad and doughy side and we hate that. Prep time is also revelation time. We learn that Susur and Jody have never made their respective dessert assignments of carrot cake and bananas foster.

And I have no idea what Marcus is doing to this tenderloin?

Just a side bar here, it cracks me up to no end that Master Chefs use slap choppers. Do you know just how often Bravo uses a chef's knife graphic in it's Top Chef and Top Chef Masters advertising? What next?

This guy as a judge?

So prep is done for the night and the chefs toddle off to what I'm sure are swanky digs to rest up for the next day's activities.

Jonathan and Marcus start things off right by facing off in their own personal Grilling Wars.

I know Obi Waxman likes to listen to the ingredients to guide him onto the path of Culinary Enlightenment....

...but I'm fairly certain this cake is not saying it wants to look like Ass.

(yes, capital A, Ass) But he's not concerned because he has faith in Jody's Banana Foster which is a good thing because Jody is getting a little tense watching Susur and his Land of Many Desserts.

So it's the Blue Team's Ass Cake and Bananas Foster versus the Red Team's Carrot Cake, Croque-em-bouche, an Upside Down Raisin Pudding with Butterscotch Sauce, and a kids dessert with chocolate sauce. Jody has a right to be worried.

Time to start passing the hors d'oeuvres.

Just by sight and description, I'd have to say the Blue Team gets the edge here. I know the Red Team went all seafood but it seems lackluster and messy. I know Jonathan got called out for his offering being bigger than one bite but overall the flavors on both teams get high marks.

Now...there was a lot of food. Each team apparently did a salad and many sides but much of that food was not shown nor reviewed by the critics. So we'll give a fly by to the main dishes and scoot to dessert. The Blue team had Jody's Rack of Lamb with Rosemary, Farro and Autumn Vegetables, Jonathan's Roast Chicken with Tarragon Velouté and Cauliflower Puree, and Rick's Seafood Grill on Sweet and Sour Eggplant. On the Red Team we had Marcus's Roast Beef Tenderloin with Grilled Onion Ragout and Pomegranate Sauce, Tony's Flaming Ouzo Shrimp and his Au Gratin Potatoes. Not shown are Carmen's Grilled Corn Salsa or Tony's Pasta dish. The winners in all this food? Jody's lamb, Jonathan's chicken, and Tony's shrimp and au gratin potatoes.

BEHOLD

The CAKE in all it's Assy Glory. Time to submit this puppy to Cake Wrecks. It didn't help that it was dry. But that's OK because Obi Waxman was right.

Jody's newborn efforts at Bananas Foster blew all of Susur's desserts right off the table. Finally the wedding event is over.

The Blue Girls are just a bit giddy to be done.

I have to say that this was some of the best food for a Wedding Wars challenge I've ever seen. The Bride and Groom should be very happy to have had such wonderful food. Still someone has to go home. The critics overall seem happy but point out the obvious cake disaster. Yet despite that, Susur's dessert heavy contributions and Carmen's lone Corn Salsa dish make the Groom's food seem uneven. Did Jody risk too much by giving the Bride something she didn't want?

NO! The Blue Team survives and moves on to the next Challenge. The winner overall?

That's right, Big Risk, Big Rewards Jody Adams. It's an amazing contrast between the two teams because the Groom's team gave him exactly what he wanted just not in the most exciting or the more finely executed way. Carmen in particular finds herself the Anti-Jody. Because her background is spicy and porky she just couldn't find a way to make a dish that made her mark. The critics seem to think she didn't work as hard as the rest of the team which I don't believe it's just that she chose to submit to the wishes of her client. In the end, she takes one for the team and is sent packing.

Next up: The Simpsons?

Top Chef Masters - Where Oh Where has my Little Stew Gone?

When we last left our Master Chefs they had just completed the not so difficult task of making their version of grilled cheese sandwiches. I don't think anyone broke a sweat. Let's hope the Elimination Challenge is a little tougher.

Hmmm, make a Soul Food birthday dinner for Mekhi and 125 of his friends. I'm think Mekhi must have a new gig on NBC. Soul Food is an interesting choice for Master Chefs to try and tackle. Do you go classic soul food, mac and cheese, collards, ham hocks, and fried okra? Or do they upscale soul food? What about adapting their own cooking style to a soul food dish? Could be very interesting. However they will be serving crowds of people at stations so it's not like we're going to see some exciting new take on soul food like we might had we been serving a dinner party of 12.

The chefs go shopping at Whole Foods and frankly after 6 seasons of Top Chef and 1 of Top Chefs Masters, the shopping shtick gets pretty old. Some chefs try to be funny by going up a down escalator.

Not so funny. Others are unintentionally funny when they look like they are pushing around a giant Costco cart.

Very funny.

During the one hour prep time we get a little peek into the souls of our Master Chefs. Marcus, who was born in Ethiopia and raised in Sweden seems to be upscaling classic soul food.

Carmen seems to be bringing her style to soul food and my ears immediately perk up at the mention of a yucca bacon mash dish.

Marry me! Yes, yes, I know her heart is filled with George Clooney but damn, look at sweet pile of bacon.

David is definitely putting his spin on soul food.

Now I know what you're thinking, that I should be all over this dish because of the crab but here's the thing, I'm thinking the crab is going to get seriously lost in this dish.

Marry me. C'mon, it's shrimp, it's grits pimped out like mac and cheese, with okra and tomato jam. What's not to love?

Thierry appears to have gone completely off the reservation.

With their prep work done for the night, I give you two screen grabs which are causing me a bit of consternation.

As you can see in the first photo Carmen is packing what looks like the hot stew part of her dish into this aluminum pan. In the second you can see an aluminum pan sitting on the shelf where it was waiting to be packed away to travel. Somewhere in her packing Carmen left this tray behind. She only discovers this the next day during the beginning of her two and a half hour prep. She's faced with a difficult decision. Serve without the stew or go back and get it at the Top Chef Master kitchen. She bites the bullet and gets back into the Pimpmobile.

Now, 16 miles in most places is no big deal. 16 miles in LA traffic is a soul devourer. Carmen's black cloud of abysmal luck continues.

Back at the hotel kitchen the remaining chefs hustle to prepare their dishes. Some even hustle to help Carmen in her absence. Monica kicks in the lion's share of help along with Thierry and David. Marcus, on the other hand, decides that competition above all else shall be served. No knife does he lift in support of his fellow chef. Even worse is Marcus's advice to Monica that she should have spent more time on her own dish. The one thing I really enjoyed about the first season of Top Chef Masters was the camaraderie and fellowship between the competitors. Marcus's egotistical pride? Not so much but we will see if Marcus's actions will eventually bite him further down the line.

Carmen finally catches up to her stew. But here's my question, has this pan been sitting out of the refrigerator all night???? With pork sausage? Did the good production assistants put it in the fridge for the night and then when Carmen got close, took it out and put it back on the shelves? Or do they really want us to believe that Carmen is going to serve stew that's been sitting out all night?

Back at the hotel kitchen, the good intentions of Monica and company burn the dreams of a yucca bacon mash into a smoldering crispy mess. Carmen may get back in time but for what?

Finally after an hour and a half, Carmen makes it back only to face the decision to serve just her stew or pull out of the competition.

She decides to stick with it. Not only does she stick with it but never once during service does she complain or explain why she has so little food even when her station sign describes the yucca mash that's not there.

It all certainly looks good but is it soulful enough for the Mekhi, his guests and the judges? David's dish, like his Quickfire, has a little too much going on. Editing the elements could have helped. Monica's dish claims Gail Simmon's award for most soulful but will her undercooked grits keep her out of the top two? Marcus gets raves for his chicken, his mac and cheese but most of all his collards. Thierry also gets dinged for his crowded flavors. Carmen finally gets to admit to her mistake and explain the simplicity of her dish. She does get a little dinged for using store bought sausage instead of making her own.

The chefs await their fate in the luxurious Stew Room.

Despite all her troubles, her cut finger, her forgotten food, her burned yucca and store bought sausages, Carmen gathers the most stars for her simple stew. Marcus, who comes in second, might keep that in mind as they both advance to the Champions Round. As for Monica?

Don't shed too many tears, you may have lost the competition but you gained much admiration for your big-hearted generosity. There are much more important things in life than the title of Top Chef.

When Life Gives You Lemons