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Grayson also enhances her level of difficulty by making sandwich bread on the premises. She wants to have the freshest ingredients possible and she also struggled with time yesterday. The fallout from this decision is that her line is the longest for most of the competition. She has been in the weeds for 24 hours and counting now, which has to be some sort of Top Chef record.

Out of the four contestants on the undercard for tonight’s prize fights, Grayson is also the first to serve the judges. She delivers a chicken salad sandwich with arugula, pickled red onion and feta watermelon salad with pumpkin seeds. It looks messy but delicious. The judges get hung up on the fact that she and Chris chose chicken salad sandwiches as their menu item. They also find the dish largely lacking. Guest Dana Corwin, who is dining with the judges but not judging herself, describes it as flavorless.

Chris is the next to present his dish to the judges. He provides a chicken salad sandwich with tofu “mayo”, red lettuce and watermelon fruit salad with pineapple ice. This appears to be the summer-iest of the dishes overall and the meal looks great on the plate. The judges quickly tear it apart, though. The bread he made yesterday is no longer fresh, which means that he was damaged by his ability to work ahead. Also, the pineapple ice is not blended well, making it a lot of ice and not much pineapple. Chris is probably in trouble for this dish if he gets to Judges Table, so it is imperative that he win the popularity vote. Based on comments from the guests, this appears possible.

Sarah’s semi-healthy dish is calabrese style turkey meatball & vegetable salad. The plating on this is quite good. Tom heaps lavish praise on the dish but then is quickly undercut by Dana Corwin. Her salad is lacking key ingredients or, if they are in there, they are not balanced properly with the stronger ingredients. From her expression, it is clear she despises the salad.

Lindsay creates a marvelous looking Mediterranean meatball, lemon yogurt, black-eyed peas & quinoa Greek salad. The meatball is cleverly stacked on the yogurt, which enhances the presentation of the plating. This is the type of plating we have come to expect from Paul and Ed thus far in the competition. Lindsay has stepped it up today. The judges are universal in their praise as well. She even gets a “Wow!” from Corwin, which qualifies as praise from Caesar at this point.

The main event of the day is the battle between Ed and Paul but alas, it’s a first round knockout. Paul has cleverly negated all of the fatty elements of his dish in creating turkey kalbi and eggplant with white peach kimchi. It looks great on the plate and the judges speak of it as if they have been served ambrosia. Paul appears to have beaten Lindsay, which would mean another $15,000 for him. If Paul owes you money, now is the time to ask for it.

Ed’s plating is an exercise in simplicity. He serves open face kalbi puree, pickled. The judges find the beef chewy, the bun to meat ratio is lacking and Padma delivers the ultimate smackdown. Hers is “hard and dry”. Not only has Ed entered Thunderdome and gotten destroyed, he seems to be in serious danger of going home tonight. In point of fact, the results for this meal seems as clear cut as we have seen this season. Lindsay and Paul are chasing the reward money, Grayson and Sarah seem to be top and bottom in name only (don’t make it dirty) and one of Chris or Paul is going home tonight.

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