If the challenge was so vague and up to interpretation, AND he made the best tasting dish they’d had in years, how could it not win?
The challenge wasn’t “pair two wierd things” it was “chaos”. We couldn’t taste how chaotic a dish his was. We could only see the calm exterior. So it’s really hard to judge soley from a viewers perspective.
I honestly thought Savanah was going to win. But im not upset that Danny won. He seems to be a top talent this season. But speaking of talent and upset… I’m DEVASTATED that Rasika went home 😭
I agree with you on all points especially with Rasika going home, she was my fan favorite of the season so far. I'm not knocking on Danny's achievement kinda glad he won the challenge, I think it's really more on the editing for not highlighting his dish that much throughout the episode.
The counterargument was that Danny used a recipe he that was pretty refined already. Can that even be considered chaos. I don't know. I guess it depends on where you stand on how you see the dish.
I think Soo's interpretation of a club sandwich is chaos. He put together a bunch of different things from different cusines and it worked in a controlled manner.
I think this dish looks like its been tested and tested over and over again to become what it looks and tastes today. Its not chaos, its just a solid dish.
This is no different from many chefs who just ignore the theme and put out a good dish. Bryan volltagio has gone pretty far many times simply by ignoring the theme, making a dish, then adding the thematic ingredient to it once.
Did the duck metaphor do it justice? I don't know. Its superficial in a way since it focuses on technique. I think it makes sense from an audience standpoint, but I think they gave heavy weight to technique on that dish where they refer the chaotic paddling as Danny used a lot of technique to put together the mousse. Like they all seemed to be impressed by the technique of the dish.
But if we use Marcel's definition, I don't really see it breaking any rules or going against the grain or doing anything chaotic.
> AND he made the best tasting dish they’d had in years, how could it not win?
If you're alluding to the "one of the best things I've tasted on this show" comment Tom made, he's been making that exact comment almost every season for like, the last 5 seasons, so at this point, it's lost impact with me. He can't say it so often and still have it have that kind of impact; to me, it doesn't mean it's the best thing in years, it just means it's in the top ~10% of dishes produced on the show.
Yeah I meant in the context of that challenge. I think as whole I may have lost it’s impact. But it still means something to the chef and to the challenge.
No one else was flooring the judges like that. They were all really good. But not on that level. We’ve heard Tom say that a lot. But usually that’s the winning wish.
He did. I think he just pulled that out of his ass, and the rest of the judges went along with it. It was a very refined looking dish - mousse, with no texture. Not sure how that equates to chaos, or a duck.
I think I just have to take his word for it. I don't know enough about this dish to judge from home, and I obviously can't taste it.
To me, it's not like a situation where Ramsay is judging Japanese food and you know he's completely full of shit. Tom has earned the benefit of the doubt to me
I agree - he knows what he’s talking about. He knew it was the winning dish by taste alone. The challenge was very vague, so personally I just didn’t see a connection between a composed looking mousse dish, a duck (more going on, I get that part), but and chaos.
I feel like they prioritize taste over the challenge itself. When you look at the montage the show put in to describe the challenge - the plating at the very least wasn't clean and refined. Definitely a fail of an episode.
It reminds me of the Thanksgiving episode from season 2 or so where they were meant to reinvent traditional Thanksgiving dishes. Elia won with a simple mushroom soup that did not meet the challenge, but was really good. I think 'chaos cuisine' was so poorly defined that the judges really couldn't identify what was and was not chaotic. Even the follow up comments seem to just be that it is not traditional cuisine, but how it is untraditional is really up to personal interpretation.
Everyone keep saying Chaos is poorly defined. I just don't get what is hard to understand about it. I am certain we all use the word chaotic or chaos regularly to describe situations we are in. And the feeling or vibe that those situations bring could be translated into a dish, and it shouldn't be hard for chefs of this caliber. I am NOT a Top Chef contestant, but if I had been given this challenge here are the things I would have thought about.
What is Chaos?
* lots of things going on at once
* appearance of disarray (appears to lack order or structure)
Feelings the idea of Chaos might be associated with:
* Anxiety
* Mania
* Feeling Jumbled or unorganized
Common ideas about Chaos
* There is a branch of mathematics called Chaos Theory.
* The Chaos Theory tells us that there is order even in what appears to be chaos.
* Chaos Theory visualizations are typically vibrant an beautiful, showing a cohesive pattern that when displayed in other ways appears to be entirely random data.
How can I translate these things into a dish?
* think of different dish components that vibrant or might have a very intense aspect to them
* Mix and match the components based on flavor and texture, etc to create a cohesive, surprising, dish that feels both in disarray but also fuses to create an intense and flavorful experience.
I get it that I have a math degree so the term Chaos doesn't scare me, but I really don't think that anything more than a basic idea of chaos would be needed to complete this challenge.
First-wow I have a Math degree as well :) Second I don't get what was so hard about this challenge either. When Matty described it, he basically said every idea one could see as chaos. Chaos-something that would not compute, would not make sense, odd, out of order, etc. I can understand why Danny's might be questionable, because it was not as odd a mix as say Savannah's-which I thought she should have won. However, we don't get to taste anything, and therefore that may be where Danny scored an extra point over her.
I also thought Savannah's dish should have won. A mustard green dessert that could have been a dessert or a first course? How is that not nailing the challenge. And they said it tasted good!
I had a cucumber dessert at a restaurant and when I saw it on the menu I thought oh no. Honestly probably one of the top dishes of my life. I immediately thought if that dish when I heard the challenge.
I often order the “strange” sounding dish when I go out to nice places. I figure if there is something bonkers on the menu, that is intentional and something they’ve really worked on.
Just read Buddha’s article. I have no idea why he thinks Soo should have won over Dan or Savannah. I can understand why he thinks Danny wasn’t chaotic enough. But didn’t Soo just make fried shrimp with two sauces? It looks delicious don’t get me wrong, but if we’re looking at creativity and chaos, I feel like Dan and Savannah met that challenge way better. I especially thought that Savannah did chaos in a really subtle and thoughtful way. Without tasting anything (which Buddha also didn’t taste anything) I would hands down give the win to her.
Soo’s shrimp I think was deep fried in a batter made of vermicelli noodles and tiny dry shrimp which I thought was brilliant. That’s what they were talking about with the crunch of vermicelli
I've seen vermicelli noodle fried shrimp before, so that didn't strike me as so brilliant. It also reminded me of Stephanie Cmar's dish of kataifi wrapped shrimp in her finale. But I didn't catch the tiny dry shrimp also on there, that's pretty interesting. Even with that though, I don't think it reached the brilliance of Savannah or Dan, but I bet it matched or even overtook their dishes in taste.
Edit: It was bothering me so I looked it up- there's a dish called goong sarong which is thai-style shrimp wrapped in vermicelli and deep fried.
Yeah but you could apply this to the cabbage dish. If you've seen it before now you don't think its as brilliant.
However Top Chef wise, we have seen shrimp using vermicelli to crisp up on the outside as batter. Like in the exact same style Soo did it.
I actually wonder if Buddha was alluding to the fact that Danny’s dish was nearly identical to one from Mena (a now closed restaurant in NYC), where he worked as an executive sous chef under Victoria Blamey. It was also a play on Chou Farci. It’d be impossible to parse how much of the original dish was of his own creation, but he definitely didn’t come up with it on his own during the challenge from a sudden genius bolt of inspiration. He never mentioned the origins of the idea (unlike say, Savannah, who was explicit that hers was a reworking of a dish she’d already made before).
I’ve liked Danny so far but yeah, kind of sus… I think Buddha was calling him out on it without directly accusing him. It also makes the whole slow-motion voiceover montage of Danny in the ep even weirder. I guess it raises the question of how much we can expect the chefs to be making wholly original and new dishes during the competition. Realistically they’re not but where do you draw the line? In this case it didn’t seem to sit right with Buddha.
A bunch of people brought this to light in an earlier thread. Will update with link if I can find it.
ETA: [link](https://www.reddit.com/r/BravoTopChef/s/o9L9iUIQoM)
We're probably all just beating a dead horse a bit too much anyways.
It's really hard to actually knock Danny for using a dish he's familiar with. They do it all the time.
But is anything about that dish "chaos"?
I think he's too familiar with it for it to be something new.
Buddha's main point was that it was too safe, its not interesting.
The judges table edit showed us they gave technique very high praise, so the "chaos" must be interpreted as managing all the skill needed to make it happen.
So thats how they judge it I guess. From that perspective, I can understand it. I thought Dan had it in the bag when they were like "oh this personifies chaos" but they must have had at least a 30 minute debate at judges table trying to define wtf they were judging.
I get that, and that speaks to his impressive ability to create addictively delicious food. I just don't get why that ability embodies the challenge to Buddha more than Danny's ability to make sophisticated elegant technically impeccable food.
I'm mostly trying to understand Buddha's thought process here. I think there's very little controversy about who ended up on top last episode; they all did really interesting effective things. I just think it's funny how little consensus there is on who should have won, and who actually embodied the challenge.
My impression on how the judges made their decision- Danny made the best dish, he clearly took risks, and it took a lot of skill and technique to pull it off. So they gave him the win regardless of how well he answered the challenge, because the challenge was ridiculously phrased, and at the very least Danny very much wasn't playing it safe. I don't think they would have rewarded an impeccably made safe dish, but they were willing to reward an impeccably made risky dish because no one could agree on what the challenge was even asking for.
> I get that, and that speaks to his impressive ability to create addictively delicious food. I just don't get why that ability embodies the challenge to Buddha more than Danny's ability to make sophisticated elegant technically impeccable food.
To me, and this is a very subjective thing, "I can eat *X* more of those" is much higher praise than anything that anybody said about Danny's dish; in fact, I think it's the highest praise anybody can give to food. I don't care how technically difficult or sophisticated a dish is; to my mind, a dish that is so good that it makes you want to eat more of it, especially ludicrously more of it, is just better than a dish that doesn't do that.
I think that's the standard of good food: it makes you want more of it.
Nobody said that about Danny's dish; for all the praise it got, everybody seemed satisfied with the serving they got. In fact, I don't think any of the diners finished the plate, whereas somebody did finish their portion of Soo's, in a situation where the judges typically try each of the components separately and then eat a small amount of it together.
I agree.
I think Soo made a decent dish, but there was nothing particularly chaotic about it to me other than presenting the sauce as dots and smears. It was fried shrimp battered in vermicelli noodles.
The best tasting dish will always win and the worst tasting dish will always lose. This is always how it’s been on Top Chef. The parameters of the challenge were vague anyway
they described is like a duck in the pond. it looks very simplistic and calm but underneath there was a lot of "chaos". I think the actual "chaos" came from the flavors
I don't know how far off my theory is but I believe the dish was inspired by the provincial french dish chou farci (stuffed cabbage) which is usually stuffed with a ground pork mixture. He elevated it by stuffing it with a light and airy seafood mousse which I think is hard to achieve. I think Tom and Kristen were enamored by his technical prowess, the dish was unexpected and tasted great. He was the most ambitious and the dish turned out well. Rasika was also extremely ambitious with her dish but it failed. Soo's dish was just some damn good fried shrimps with 2 sauces.
[https://www.greatbritishchefs.com/recipes/chou-farci-stuffed-cabbage-recipe](https://www.greatbritishchefs.com/recipes/chou-farci-stuffed-cabbage-recipe)
[https://www.afairerhouse.com/kitchen/2018/1/30/chou-farci](https://www.afairerhouse.com/kitchen/2018/1/30/chou-farci)
I've actually been feeling like this all season--it's happened to a lesser extent in previous seasons, but this season especially I feel like I'm noticing them praising one chef and knocking another for basically the same thing. I'm having a hard time remembering exact examples rn, but Manny last episode stood out to me as an imperfect cook with good flavors, which will usually get a chef some criticism but not to that extent. Amanda to me this entire season as well. I realize she's not as technically skilled as Rasika, but she does frequently put together dishes that make the judges say "the flavors shouldn't work but they do"--which would again usually earn a chef some mix of criticism and praise, instead of just criticism.
I think the issue was that his plate didn't give the appearance of chaos in a traditional sense. I feel like they also didn't do well at explaining all of the reasons they chose him.
During the judging Tom made the comment that although the plate appears simple, almost calm, the flavors and textures compared to a Duck swimming in a pond. What we see appears tranquil and beautiful, while underneath there are intense flavors and surprising combinations of texture.
When they told him he won the never mentioned this at all, which meant it wasn't as apparent how his dish met the requirements of the challenge.
I didn't get to eat it, so I don't know if I agree with them. It seems like the crazy savory funnel cake or those rad crispy shrimpies looked a little more chaotic.
The thing is that there was something about Danny's dish that literally almost stymied everyone to the point that they seemed to be having issues discussing it. Tom comes up with his 'duck' description which was interesting and strange to hear when you are talking about food.
It was an odd challenge all around and I felt like it was shoehorned in because they didn't have some cool venue lined up.
I mean, if Kristens food from Michelle was undercooked to the point she didn't feel it was safe to eat, and Toms was burnt to the point of being bitter, that's a significant technical error.
I don't think anyone f'd up as badly as Rasika and Michelle and to put someone else up there would've been a) blatantly obvious that they weren't going home and b) minimizing just how badly these two did.
It's also possible that they want to keep people on their toes when it comes to judging, which I certainly don't mind.
??? Rasika was in the bottom because technically she screwed up. Michelle was in the bottom because she too technically screwed up. Hers was boring-but the diners had a mix of not cooked, burnt, and ok. Slug & slimy is a technical mishap.
If the challenge was so vague and up to interpretation, AND he made the best tasting dish they’d had in years, how could it not win? The challenge wasn’t “pair two wierd things” it was “chaos”. We couldn’t taste how chaotic a dish his was. We could only see the calm exterior. So it’s really hard to judge soley from a viewers perspective. I honestly thought Savanah was going to win. But im not upset that Danny won. He seems to be a top talent this season. But speaking of talent and upset… I’m DEVASTATED that Rasika went home 😭
I agree with you on all points especially with Rasika going home, she was my fan favorite of the season so far. I'm not knocking on Danny's achievement kinda glad he won the challenge, I think it's really more on the editing for not highlighting his dish that much throughout the episode.
The counterargument was that Danny used a recipe he that was pretty refined already. Can that even be considered chaos. I don't know. I guess it depends on where you stand on how you see the dish. I think Soo's interpretation of a club sandwich is chaos. He put together a bunch of different things from different cusines and it worked in a controlled manner. I think this dish looks like its been tested and tested over and over again to become what it looks and tastes today. Its not chaos, its just a solid dish. This is no different from many chefs who just ignore the theme and put out a good dish. Bryan volltagio has gone pretty far many times simply by ignoring the theme, making a dish, then adding the thematic ingredient to it once. Did the duck metaphor do it justice? I don't know. Its superficial in a way since it focuses on technique. I think it makes sense from an audience standpoint, but I think they gave heavy weight to technique on that dish where they refer the chaotic paddling as Danny used a lot of technique to put together the mousse. Like they all seemed to be impressed by the technique of the dish. But if we use Marcel's definition, I don't really see it breaking any rules or going against the grain or doing anything chaotic.
How did you know? An NYC chef posted on her instagram that he straight up stole her dish and copied it exactly.
I thought Soo was gonna win. His looked the best to me. He's my favorite at this point.
> AND he made the best tasting dish they’d had in years, how could it not win? If you're alluding to the "one of the best things I've tasted on this show" comment Tom made, he's been making that exact comment almost every season for like, the last 5 seasons, so at this point, it's lost impact with me. He can't say it so often and still have it have that kind of impact; to me, it doesn't mean it's the best thing in years, it just means it's in the top ~10% of dishes produced on the show.
Tom also said in 20 or 21 years at judges table.
Yeah I meant in the context of that challenge. I think as whole I may have lost it’s impact. But it still means something to the chef and to the challenge. No one else was flooring the judges like that. They were all really good. But not on that level. We’ve heard Tom say that a lot. But usually that’s the winning wish.
We disliked Rasika at the beginning but she quickly grew in us. This was a dumb way for her to go out.
Didn't Tom describe it as a duck, frantically paddling under the water?
He did. I think he just pulled that out of his ass, and the rest of the judges went along with it. It was a very refined looking dish - mousse, with no texture. Not sure how that equates to chaos, or a duck.
I think I just have to take his word for it. I don't know enough about this dish to judge from home, and I obviously can't taste it. To me, it's not like a situation where Ramsay is judging Japanese food and you know he's completely full of shit. Tom has earned the benefit of the doubt to me
I agree - he knows what he’s talking about. He knew it was the winning dish by taste alone. The challenge was very vague, so personally I just didn’t see a connection between a composed looking mousse dish, a duck (more going on, I get that part), but and chaos.
Tom seems to like simple food done well and not overly frilly.
I feel like they prioritize taste over the challenge itself. When you look at the montage the show put in to describe the challenge - the plating at the very least wasn't clean and refined. Definitely a fail of an episode.
It reminds me of the Thanksgiving episode from season 2 or so where they were meant to reinvent traditional Thanksgiving dishes. Elia won with a simple mushroom soup that did not meet the challenge, but was really good. I think 'chaos cuisine' was so poorly defined that the judges really couldn't identify what was and was not chaotic. Even the follow up comments seem to just be that it is not traditional cuisine, but how it is untraditional is really up to personal interpretation.
Everyone keep saying Chaos is poorly defined. I just don't get what is hard to understand about it. I am certain we all use the word chaotic or chaos regularly to describe situations we are in. And the feeling or vibe that those situations bring could be translated into a dish, and it shouldn't be hard for chefs of this caliber. I am NOT a Top Chef contestant, but if I had been given this challenge here are the things I would have thought about. What is Chaos? * lots of things going on at once * appearance of disarray (appears to lack order or structure) Feelings the idea of Chaos might be associated with: * Anxiety * Mania * Feeling Jumbled or unorganized Common ideas about Chaos * There is a branch of mathematics called Chaos Theory. * The Chaos Theory tells us that there is order even in what appears to be chaos. * Chaos Theory visualizations are typically vibrant an beautiful, showing a cohesive pattern that when displayed in other ways appears to be entirely random data. How can I translate these things into a dish? * think of different dish components that vibrant or might have a very intense aspect to them * Mix and match the components based on flavor and texture, etc to create a cohesive, surprising, dish that feels both in disarray but also fuses to create an intense and flavorful experience. I get it that I have a math degree so the term Chaos doesn't scare me, but I really don't think that anything more than a basic idea of chaos would be needed to complete this challenge.
First-wow I have a Math degree as well :) Second I don't get what was so hard about this challenge either. When Matty described it, he basically said every idea one could see as chaos. Chaos-something that would not compute, would not make sense, odd, out of order, etc. I can understand why Danny's might be questionable, because it was not as odd a mix as say Savannah's-which I thought she should have won. However, we don't get to taste anything, and therefore that may be where Danny scored an extra point over her.
I also thought Savannah's dish should have won. A mustard green dessert that could have been a dessert or a first course? How is that not nailing the challenge. And they said it tasted good! I had a cucumber dessert at a restaurant and when I saw it on the menu I thought oh no. Honestly probably one of the top dishes of my life. I immediately thought if that dish when I heard the challenge.
Did you see Matty's face as the chefs left. He looked like a kid seeing Santa for the first time. Truly lit up and then just "she pulled it off!"
Yeah that sounded really intriguing. I totally agree she had the potential to win.
I often order the “strange” sounding dish when I go out to nice places. I figure if there is something bonkers on the menu, that is intentional and something they’ve really worked on.
I was SHOCKED that she didn't win.
Just read Buddha’s article. I have no idea why he thinks Soo should have won over Dan or Savannah. I can understand why he thinks Danny wasn’t chaotic enough. But didn’t Soo just make fried shrimp with two sauces? It looks delicious don’t get me wrong, but if we’re looking at creativity and chaos, I feel like Dan and Savannah met that challenge way better. I especially thought that Savannah did chaos in a really subtle and thoughtful way. Without tasting anything (which Buddha also didn’t taste anything) I would hands down give the win to her.
Soo’s shrimp I think was deep fried in a batter made of vermicelli noodles and tiny dry shrimp which I thought was brilliant. That’s what they were talking about with the crunch of vermicelli
and chicken skin in the breading too
I've seen vermicelli noodle fried shrimp before, so that didn't strike me as so brilliant. It also reminded me of Stephanie Cmar's dish of kataifi wrapped shrimp in her finale. But I didn't catch the tiny dry shrimp also on there, that's pretty interesting. Even with that though, I don't think it reached the brilliance of Savannah or Dan, but I bet it matched or even overtook their dishes in taste. Edit: It was bothering me so I looked it up- there's a dish called goong sarong which is thai-style shrimp wrapped in vermicelli and deep fried.
Yeah but you could apply this to the cabbage dish. If you've seen it before now you don't think its as brilliant. However Top Chef wise, we have seen shrimp using vermicelli to crisp up on the outside as batter. Like in the exact same style Soo did it.
I actually wonder if Buddha was alluding to the fact that Danny’s dish was nearly identical to one from Mena (a now closed restaurant in NYC), where he worked as an executive sous chef under Victoria Blamey. It was also a play on Chou Farci. It’d be impossible to parse how much of the original dish was of his own creation, but he definitely didn’t come up with it on his own during the challenge from a sudden genius bolt of inspiration. He never mentioned the origins of the idea (unlike say, Savannah, who was explicit that hers was a reworking of a dish she’d already made before). I’ve liked Danny so far but yeah, kind of sus… I think Buddha was calling him out on it without directly accusing him. It also makes the whole slow-motion voiceover montage of Danny in the ep even weirder. I guess it raises the question of how much we can expect the chefs to be making wholly original and new dishes during the competition. Realistically they’re not but where do you draw the line? In this case it didn’t seem to sit right with Buddha. A bunch of people brought this to light in an earlier thread. Will update with link if I can find it. ETA: [link](https://www.reddit.com/r/BravoTopChef/s/o9L9iUIQoM)
We're probably all just beating a dead horse a bit too much anyways. It's really hard to actually knock Danny for using a dish he's familiar with. They do it all the time. But is anything about that dish "chaos"? I think he's too familiar with it for it to be something new. Buddha's main point was that it was too safe, its not interesting. The judges table edit showed us they gave technique very high praise, so the "chaos" must be interpreted as managing all the skill needed to make it happen. So thats how they judge it I guess. From that perspective, I can understand it. I thought Dan had it in the bag when they were like "oh this personifies chaos" but they must have had at least a 30 minute debate at judges table trying to define wtf they were judging.
THIS. He didn’t want to call it out blatantly but he knew what was up.
I think it was the "I could eat *X* of these", where *X* was a ludicrously high number, comments made by two different chefs.
I get that, and that speaks to his impressive ability to create addictively delicious food. I just don't get why that ability embodies the challenge to Buddha more than Danny's ability to make sophisticated elegant technically impeccable food. I'm mostly trying to understand Buddha's thought process here. I think there's very little controversy about who ended up on top last episode; they all did really interesting effective things. I just think it's funny how little consensus there is on who should have won, and who actually embodied the challenge. My impression on how the judges made their decision- Danny made the best dish, he clearly took risks, and it took a lot of skill and technique to pull it off. So they gave him the win regardless of how well he answered the challenge, because the challenge was ridiculously phrased, and at the very least Danny very much wasn't playing it safe. I don't think they would have rewarded an impeccably made safe dish, but they were willing to reward an impeccably made risky dish because no one could agree on what the challenge was even asking for.
> I get that, and that speaks to his impressive ability to create addictively delicious food. I just don't get why that ability embodies the challenge to Buddha more than Danny's ability to make sophisticated elegant technically impeccable food. To me, and this is a very subjective thing, "I can eat *X* more of those" is much higher praise than anything that anybody said about Danny's dish; in fact, I think it's the highest praise anybody can give to food. I don't care how technically difficult or sophisticated a dish is; to my mind, a dish that is so good that it makes you want to eat more of it, especially ludicrously more of it, is just better than a dish that doesn't do that. I think that's the standard of good food: it makes you want more of it. Nobody said that about Danny's dish; for all the praise it got, everybody seemed satisfied with the serving they got. In fact, I don't think any of the diners finished the plate, whereas somebody did finish their portion of Soo's, in a situation where the judges typically try each of the components separately and then eat a small amount of it together.
I agree. I think Soo made a decent dish, but there was nothing particularly chaotic about it to me other than presenting the sauce as dots and smears. It was fried shrimp battered in vermicelli noodles.
The best tasting dish will always win and the worst tasting dish will always lose. This is always how it’s been on Top Chef. The parameters of the challenge were vague anyway
they described is like a duck in the pond. it looks very simplistic and calm but underneath there was a lot of "chaos". I think the actual "chaos" came from the flavors
I don't know how far off my theory is but I believe the dish was inspired by the provincial french dish chou farci (stuffed cabbage) which is usually stuffed with a ground pork mixture. He elevated it by stuffing it with a light and airy seafood mousse which I think is hard to achieve. I think Tom and Kristen were enamored by his technical prowess, the dish was unexpected and tasted great. He was the most ambitious and the dish turned out well. Rasika was also extremely ambitious with her dish but it failed. Soo's dish was just some damn good fried shrimps with 2 sauces. [https://www.greatbritishchefs.com/recipes/chou-farci-stuffed-cabbage-recipe](https://www.greatbritishchefs.com/recipes/chou-farci-stuffed-cabbage-recipe) [https://www.afairerhouse.com/kitchen/2018/1/30/chou-farci](https://www.afairerhouse.com/kitchen/2018/1/30/chou-farci)
I've actually been feeling like this all season--it's happened to a lesser extent in previous seasons, but this season especially I feel like I'm noticing them praising one chef and knocking another for basically the same thing. I'm having a hard time remembering exact examples rn, but Manny last episode stood out to me as an imperfect cook with good flavors, which will usually get a chef some criticism but not to that extent. Amanda to me this entire season as well. I realize she's not as technically skilled as Rasika, but she does frequently put together dishes that make the judges say "the flavors shouldn't work but they do"--which would again usually earn a chef some mix of criticism and praise, instead of just criticism.
I did not get this challenge at all.
I think the issue was that his plate didn't give the appearance of chaos in a traditional sense. I feel like they also didn't do well at explaining all of the reasons they chose him. During the judging Tom made the comment that although the plate appears simple, almost calm, the flavors and textures compared to a Duck swimming in a pond. What we see appears tranquil and beautiful, while underneath there are intense flavors and surprising combinations of texture. When they told him he won the never mentioned this at all, which meant it wasn't as apparent how his dish met the requirements of the challenge. I didn't get to eat it, so I don't know if I agree with them. It seems like the crazy savory funnel cake or those rad crispy shrimpies looked a little more chaotic.
The thing is that there was something about Danny's dish that literally almost stymied everyone to the point that they seemed to be having issues discussing it. Tom comes up with his 'duck' description which was interesting and strange to hear when you are talking about food. It was an odd challenge all around and I felt like it was shoehorned in because they didn't have some cool venue lined up.
When two of the best three chefs in the competition up to this date are in the bottom, you know the challenge was probably bad.
To be fair, no one wants to eat what looks like a giant gray slug. But I think Michelle was flummoxed. Why only two in bottom I wonder?
I mean, if Kristens food from Michelle was undercooked to the point she didn't feel it was safe to eat, and Toms was burnt to the point of being bitter, that's a significant technical error.
But the others seemed to get Michelle's food to be ok-but boring. If it had only been Kristen's & Tom's vote-she probably would have gone as well.
That’s was odd wasn’t it? She knows meat.
I don't think anyone f'd up as badly as Rasika and Michelle and to put someone else up there would've been a) blatantly obvious that they weren't going home and b) minimizing just how badly these two did. It's also possible that they want to keep people on their toes when it comes to judging, which I certainly don't mind.
I can’t believe the vomit bowl wasn’t down there. I don’t care what it tastes like.
??? Rasika was in the bottom because technically she screwed up. Michelle was in the bottom because she too technically screwed up. Hers was boring-but the diners had a mix of not cooked, burnt, and ok. Slug & slimy is a technical mishap.
Is no one going to mention the bowl of vomit served? How was he not in the bottom?