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Not five minutes after getting off the ferry in NYC does the quickfire challenge begin. They are to peel 15 apples using nothing but a knife – the first nine are safe and the remaining eight chefs must go on to the next quickfire round in which they brunoise (finely chop) enough apples to make two cups. Remarkably, these two challenges do a fine job of weeding out the less experienced, less adept chefs and we are left with four chefs who, in a surprising turn of events, must avoid being the only chef in Top Chef history to get eliminated during the quickfire challenge portion of the episode (this NEVER happens).

The final four chefs (a 28-year-old executive chef named Radhika, a sous-chef from NYC named Leah, a baby-faced culinary student named Patrick and our cocky lady Lauren) each get 20 minutes to turn their apples into a scrumptious dish and avoid elimination. Right off the bat, both Lauren and Patrick (who know each other from culinary school) seem to aim for the least complicated option, each deciding to make an apple salad. Sure enough, they end up in the bottom two and good ole brassy Lauren becomes the first Top Chef contestant to not even make it to the elimination challenge ("I didn't even get to see the kitchen," she remarks sadly, as the ferry takes her back to LaGuardia).

As Lauren is shipped off, the elimination challenge begins. Each contestant will be assigned an iconic area in NYC that's known for a specific type of ethnic cuisine (Chinatown, Little Italy, Queens, etc.) and will compete head-to-head against another chef with dishes inspired by that area. Chefs that win the head-to-head competition will be eligible to win the challenge, those that lose the head-to-head will be in danger of elimination.

The chefs take off to their respective districts to get a firsthand experience with the area and to shop for ingredients. As this happens, I'm struck by how superficial the chefs are being with their areas of NYC. "I have Chinatown so I'll do Asian!" or "I have Little Italy so I'll do Italian!" No thought about the types of people that are there, the community feel of the area, the personality of the streets, etc.

Maybe I'm expecting too much, but I couldn't help but think that last year's runner up, the always imaginative Richard Blaise, would have come up with a dish that really encapsulated how one feels in the area that he'd been assigned as opposed to taking the area's ethnic background as a broad generalization by which to direct his dish. It's the difference between "Chinatown is Chinese and so I'll make a Chinese dish" and "Chinatown is Chinese and blends together elements from antiquity and modern so I'm going to do Crispy Duck in two ways: one with all classic cooking techniques and one as a deconstructed modern take, but both using the same ingredients."

But I digress. As the pairs scurry about, I challenge myself to identify which chefs that seem most in trouble. The ones that stand out are culinary student Patrick (who seems to be thinking to himself, "What is the most clichéd Chinese dish I can serve?"), 41-year old restaurant owner Ariane (who seems to have a self-esteem problem), San Diego native Richard (who thinks that a lamb slider is representative of Greek cuisine) and the pair of Gene and Alex who have no experience whatsoever with Indian cuisine and seem to be stumbling through their Indian grocery store in a confused, drunken reenactment of a scene from Dumb and Dumber.

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