Top Chef Episode 3 recap

For the third installment of their hit series, Top Chef, Bravo wanted to take the competition up a notch by bringing in some very discerning judges: a group of forty 10-year olds. The theme of the whole episode seemed to be to make unappealing food appealing, both visually and taste-wise, to a group of picky eaters, hence the name of the episode: Nasty Delights.

The quickfire challenge, which awards immunity from elimination, at the beginning of the show dealt with octopus. Given a whole octopus, the chefs had 60-minutes to make it look and taste good - a difficult feat on any day, but compounded by the fact that some people had never really dealt with the ingredient before.  Braising seemed to be the cooking method of choice and the guest judge, Laurent Manrique of San Francisco's Aqua restaurant, had a difficult time judging. In fact, there were four dishes that he liked, but Tiffani's traditionally prepared octopus dish, brimming with Mediterranean flavors, was what won her the challenge.

After the quickfire challenge, the players were divided up into two teams, forced to work together. The ingredient was monkfish and they had to prepare a lunch using it for 40 kids. The Blue team had Leanne, Brian, Dave, Harold and Tiffani, while the Red team got Stephen, Candice, Miguel, Cynthia and Lisa. Cynthia quit the show because of family problems soon after the challenge was announced and Andrea, the natural foods chef who was voted off last week, was brought back in to replace her. The chefs fought and cooked like crazy, with the Red team having a lot of friction between Stephen and the other team members. Still, the Reds enjoyed the advantage of having Lisa, a woman with two small children, on their team to help determine what kids liked. The Blue team seemingly had no clue what kids liked to eat and tried to go for healthier food. And admirable choice, but not one that won them the competition. The Red team's menu of fried mini-"Monkey Dogs", potato chips, fruit kebabs and red and blue colored yogurt dipping sauce was a huge hit with the kids, even though they didn't seem to love Stephen's explanation of what a "gaufrette" was. The Blue team's menu had baked, cereal-crusted monkfish bites, cheesy tater tots, maple-glazed carrots and strawberry applesauce. They kids liked most of the blue team's food, but thought that the carrots were over-cooked and didn't really care for the applesauce.

In the judging, the Blue team fell apart. They had no leader to guide them, Brian offered no apologies for his carrots and Tiffani, who became irate and condescending towards the kids (who had "no palates"), was probably only saved from elimination by her immunity. Brian was eliminated in the end.

Next week, the Top Chef will undoubtedly feature more drama than this episode, since it looks as though a lot of the chefs will haven taste and presentation problems with their dishes. Stay tuned!

In case you missed them:
Episode 1 recap
Episode 2 recap
Episode 3 recap
Episode 4 recap
Episode 5 recap
Episode 6 recap
Episode 7 recap
Episode 8 recap
Episode 9 recap
Reunion show recap
Finale part 1 recap