New at BOP: Review: Matrix Resurrections Movie Review: Moonfall Movie Reviews: Scream The #1 Movie in America November Forecast The Many Saints of Newark October Forecast New Trivia Question All site updates Share & Save   Tweet Print this column

As for the pork dishes, the judges find that the pesto completely overwhelms the delicate flavors in the ravioli and sausage. Tom also doesn't like the fact that the pork loin has been stripped off of the bone. "If you have the meat on the bone, why would you take it off?" he questions.

The desserts are coming out next and I have my fingers crossed that the Lamb team's dessert is so good that they cannot have had the worst dishes and that someone from the Pork team will go home.

Nope. While Carla's nectaraine and strawberry tart is delicious, the summer berry trifle from the Lamb team and the crème brulé from the Pork team are both failures. Sigh. It looks like my favorite chef will be going home.

As we guessed, the Chicken team is on top and they tell a beaming Carla that her tart was their favorite dessert. After a surprisingly short discussion with the judges about their dish (with little praise for any other chef), the judges announce that they've ALL won this challenge. Hrmmm. Reminds me of that quote from The Incredibles when the mom tells Dash, "Everyone's special, honey," to which he replies, "Which means no one is."

Who's on the bottom? The two other teams. Scary times, indeed.

"Both your teams did very poorly in this challenge," says Padma to open things up..unleashing a tidal wave of criticism.

Tom wants to know who removed the bone from the pork loin (Jeff) and questions why they would do that when cooking meat on the bone adds flavor. Toby criticizes the strong use of petso on the ravioli. Tom accuses Radhika of not contributing enough to the team.

"I wasn't standing still for three hours," Radhika retorts, contending that she helped out with a number of elements to the dish.

Then, to paraphrase Daniel Day-Lewis, there will be blood...because the judges turn their attention to the lamb team.

"Why did you roll out and pound out the lamb?" guest judge, Dan Barber (acclaimed chef for using fresh, seasonal, healthy ingredients) wants to know.

"We wanted to tenderize it," explains Ariane.

"But baby lamb is already tender," Dan says.

*silence*

"Why was Ariane the only one dealing with the lamb?" Padma wants to know.

"There were limited responsibilities because Ariane took the lamb," Leah sputters in a bad attempt to say, "We let Ariane do everything so she should go home since it was bad."

Tom, meanwhile, has a big problem with the butchering of the lamb. He calls it "amateurish" and says that the rolling and tying of the lamb was horrible – to which Ariane admits that she doesn't have a lot of experience and Leah has to admit that she helped out with something that turned out to be badly done. Hosea is not immune to this criticism because he admits that he has a lot of experience butchering lamb but didn't do anything to help Ariane out.

"That was brutal," Hosea says when they re-enter the Stew Room. Hosea, you ain't seen nothing yet, cause now they're gonna discuss everything that went wrong and decide who goes home.

Continued:       1       2       3       4       5