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

Jonathan has a lemongrass mojito plus a pork tenderloin and avocado butter. According to Gael, the pork is perfectly cooked, though one of the Housewives admits that she doesn’t like pork very much at all.

Mark has a ginger dingle paired with a mussel custard and kaffir lime. Gael loves the texture of the custard but one of the Housewives doesn’t like the ginger in the kish. “Isn’t there ginger in the cocktail?” asks Kelly, trying to guide the Housewife into understanding the point of the ginger in the dish. The Housewife expresses surprise when she concludes that there IS ginger in the drink.

Rick has a beautiful dish of cream biscuit and berry shortcake to pair with a frozen fruit cocktail (whose color is described by a chef as “puréed birthday cake”). All the girls think it’s fabulous.

Much to the disappointment of Graham, his dish is served next, taking the girls from dessert to raw fish. He presents a crudo of black cod with edamame with a Corriander Mule cocktail. One of the girls doesn’t even know how to pronounce edamame. The onion is strong but the pairing is nice.

Finally, we have the Frenchie Ludo, who has a nutmeg apple mojito to go with his roasted pork chop with rosemary. Gael says that the almonds and ginger is too much. The girls don’t like the pairing of the sweet pork and the mojito. Ludo complains that the girls don’t know what they’re talking about.

In a total surprise, five of the chefs tied with four stars each, while one chef got a perfect score of five stars. I thought that Rick would be the winner, but it turns out to be Jonathan. Smart man. He decided to go simple and it worked out well for him.

The Elimination Challenge is similarly straightforward: take a traditional pub dish and make it into an upscale dish that they’d be proud to serve in their own restaurants. There’s a bunch of dishes to choose from (fish and chips, toad in a hole, etc.) and as the winner, Jonathan gets to choose first. He picks Shepherd’s Pie. The rest of the chefs argue about which one they want, leading to bickering between Ludo and Rick over who gets fish and chips.

Ludo is adamant that Rick should not get fish and chips, as he’s known as being a great seafood chef. “He needs to cook something that is uncomfortable to him!” he explodes in his interview. In the end, he decides not to put up a huge fuss and lets Rick take fish and chips.

The chefs head to Whole Foods to shop for ingredients. Ludo is still pissed off. When Wylie thinks that he’s having trouble reading the English labels, he tells Ludo that a bag of carrots says “carrots.” Ludo retorts “yeah, why don’t you take some carrots home tonight and enjoy yourself?” Wow, this show is all of a sudden Homo-Erotic Chef Masters.

Continued:       1       2       3       4