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As for Jacqueline, she comes off like one of those overly frail, worrysome chefs who get themselves into trouble in the kitchen and then agonize over every detail of their dish. These types of chefs rarely last into the second month of a season and I’m thinking she’ll be the same way. She’s trying to make chicken liver mousse but omits the butter to make it “lighter,” then runs out of time and can’t strain the mousse before bringing to the convention center, where she finds it to be too grainy. Thus, she cooks it further so that it’ll smooth out. Lordy. This woman is too much drama.

As the diners enter, we see Padma, Gail, Eric Ripert and Tom come in from one of the entrances. They’ll be the judges this season. They go around, sampling the four dishes from each group, and frankly, it would be a waste of time for me to go over EVERY dish from EVERY group. Suffice to say that:

* Group 1 was weak, with only Kevin presenting a good dish (Pennsylvania lamb)
* Group 2 was not much better, with the judges only having kind words for Supa Fast Kenny’s black bean mole and cinnamon-coffee rubbed trout
* Group 3 was pretty good, with no bombs
* Group 4 was strong as well, with Hot Angelo easily the top in his group

For the most part, the winner of each group was obvious, and called before the judges, we have Kevin, Kenny, Hot Angelo and Alex from Group 3. Yup, four men on top. The ladies must be weak again. At least last season, we had Jen in the top four in the first challenge.

Anyhow, the four men get their feedback from the judges. Alex honored his mother with a great deconstructed borscht, which kept all the flavors of the original dish according to Tom. Kevin had a simple dish, but some complex flavors. Gail was worried that Kenny’s dish lacked editing, but upon trying it, found it very well balanced. Hot Angelo really brought out the chili and acid in his dish, and Eric Ripert liked the bacon foam.

So three of the four finalists in the Quickfire make it to the top in the Elimination Challenge, though it seems like only Kenny or Angelo could win this thing. I’m thinking Angelo wins here - and I’m right. Angelo is the first cheftestant to sweep the Quickfire and Elimination Challenge in the opening episode since Stefan did the same in Season 5.

Now the fun begins. Stephen, John, Jacqueline and Tim (fourth finalist from the Quickfire) get called before the judges as the weakest dishes in their respective groups. Stephen cut his ribeye steak way too thin and it was consequently overcooked. Eric Ripert compares them to chicken nuggets. Ouch.

Gail was absolutely flabbergasted that Jacqueline tried to serve a “low fat” chicken liver mousse. “It’s CHICKEN LIVER,” she tells Jacqueline, “I don’t think anyone’s looking for a low fat version.” Jacqueline says that she’s served this dish a hundred times before, but that this is the first time she’s made it without the recipe.

“Wait, you’ve served this a hundred times or made this a hundred times?” Tom asks pointedly.

“When I tasted it, I thought it was under seasoned,” she tries to explain before getting cut off by Tom again.

“That’s not what I asked you. Did you SERVE this a hundred times or MAKE this a hundred times?” he asks again.

“I made it,” she says quietly. She looks at him in total shame, “but it’s not memorized.”

Oh, lord.

John is criticized for not having enough maple syrup flavor in the dish (“All I taste is sugar, sugar, sugar,” Tom had commented earlier). He also gets knocked for using pre-made puff pastry. He tries to argue that the puff pastry was only the instrument for delivering his maple syrup Napoleon to the diners’ mouths, but Gail points out that with there only being three components to his dish, he’s discounting a third of what they ate.

As for the only Quickfire finalist to not have won his group, Tim faces criticism for keeping the thick skin on his rockfish, making it chewy when eaten. Frankly, I think the fact that he’s on the bottom of his group is due more to the fact that his group was strong than for any big failure on his part.

The person going home is almost certainly going to be Jacqueline or John. It’s a choice between a good idea with bad execution (Jacqueline) or a bad execution with pre-made ingredients (John). I think it’s obvious who’s going home.

Yup, our hippie, dreadlock John is packing his knives. It’s kind of a shame, really. He could have been a fun, kooky presence on the show. Alas, his dish let him down and he’ll leave before we get to know him.

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