For this week's challenge, each team gets an iconic food neighborhood of New York to visit, make a dish from, and conduct a tour of. Giada's team gets Little Italy, there's a surprise. Bobby's team gets Harlem, and Alton's team gets a Jewish part of the Lower East Side. No one gets Chinatown, really? Chinatown has basically taken over Little Italy, for heaven's sake!
(Byko: Yeah, no kidding! A friend of mine just came back from NYC and agreed that Chinatown was bigger than Little Italy. At least they did pick three areas that have natural culinary bents, even if neighboring-Gossip-Girl-land didn't immediately sound Jewish to me. And seriously, Alton, a southerner just doesn't sound right talking in Yiddish! Remember, just say no.)
Emily gets excited about matzah and the Willy Wonka Matzah Factory. Not sure how she's gonna work that into her updated 50's POV. She ends up making a matzah seder meatloaf, but she also is feeling carsick during her presentation. Justin wonders how he's going to work his rebel with a culinary cause POV with an iconic bagel derivative. He ends up making bagel chips and does well. Marti likes to talk more about herself than her pastrami, although she does rein in the rambling on the bus. She doesn't actually tell the group what she's done to make her sandwich, though. Judson is NOT excited about pickles, and his presentation falls VERY flat.
(Byko: Willy Wonka-esque? You CAN'T pull that term out if there are no oompa loompas, not that I necessarily want to think too hard about Jewish midg-, er, little people! On the pickle district: yeah, that could be a tough sell, but I like the sweet-and-sour approach that Judson is taking: it could definitely be memorable, especially with the bow tie. Justin, I agree a certain look, but am I the only one who thought his presentation was flat? Apparently so. Martie, great job: loved it! Emily, I feel so bad for you right now, and for me to say that really takes something! Judson, I couldn't agree with Justin more: all we needed was a "Can I get an amen for the pickle?!")
Michele does not find catfish as sexy as mussels, so we'll see what she does with them. Catfish sliders, apparently, with collards and a side of lying on the bus to say she loves catfish. Malcolm has a butcher shop. Eric has a bakery that specialized in danishes, and he makes a cheese turnover with espresso caramel. The sound of espresso caramel makes me wish I liked coffee! And of course we can't cover Harlem without chicken and waffles at Melba's! Unfortunately, Kara doesn't like waffles and then she's very awkward in her presentation. Nikki talks about Dinosaur BBQ and has a smooth but forgettable presentation and dish.
(Byko: Okay, sorry about the stereotyping here, but seriously, Nikki, I just don't see you and BBQ working well together; you just don't look like a BBQ girl to me. I love how the varied ethnic butcher shop has a guy with a REALLY thick New York accent. Eric, there are limits to how far to go in making things difficult for yourself: did you learn nothing from making your own ricotta last week? That's gonna knock you out one of these weeks. Kara, sorry girl, but you've got the toughest job because even I, Mr. I-don't-know-New-York, readily associate "chicken and waffles" and Harlem. Too bad Gladys Knight wasn't around to give inspiration! Michele, we KNOW you don't like catfish: you told us it's muddy already. PLEASE don't do that on the bus! Kara, PLEASE tell me you did some sort of twist on the chicken and waffles or you are GUARANTEED to fail! Malcolm, your authenticity truly exudes in your presentation: great! Michele, well, at least you made a good effort on the catfish. Nikki, I'll admit I was wrong: that was really better than I thought, and even though the judges didn't care for you and the audience didn't remember you, I loved how you described Dino BBQ; it really made me feel like I was there. Eric, I think you hit it out of the park, but on this show, doing that right from the beginning usually does NOT bode well! Kara, um, thanks for stopping by the booth.)
Ippy gets a place known for their eggplant parm, and he makes a derivative of pasta e fagioli. His presentation has the audience laughing and happy. Linkie gets a pastry shop specializing in cannolis, so let's see if she can avoid ruining another dessert. She gets feedback from Giada but decides to ignore it in favor of what she wants to do in the first place. That rarely ends well. She ends up presenting well and incorporating Giada's advice into the presentation much more than she incorporated it into her dish. Her cheesecake is better than cafeteria food, though, so that's a start. Martita gets a fish market known for littleneck clams and wants to make a ceviche. Josh gets a sausage shop and wants to try cooking his in wine or champagne. He makes a *very* simple sausage and pepper crostini and tells a story that goes on and on...and on...and on... Ivan makes an antipasto with fresh mozzarella that the judges find too simple.
(Byko: So I think Giada is giving more and better tips to her teammates than Bobby or Alton are. I wonder how that's going to play out through the rest of the competition. It's definitely clear that Linkie really has a self-confidence issue, though the fact that she didn't realize that she can use ricotta with cream cheese for her dessert is another problem altogether. Yvan's dish definitely looks WAY too simple: good to see that Bob agrees. Ippy definitely looks like a very solid contender for a while, which I'm happy to see, though that could just be because of my penchant for Hawaii. Josh, um, where are you going with your storytelling? And how the heck does it relate to your food? Better than the first time we met him? Um, if that's better, GET OFF MY TELEVISION! Martita was solid: I wonder if the judges will tend to show any favoritism because of their supposed strong desire to have a Mexican cuisine personality arise. Linkie was good: not great, but that's a starting point.)
Giada's team wins and is safe. Kara loses for Bobby's team and Judson loses for Alton's team despite Emily's presentation flopping from sickness. Their producer challenge is to make the most memorable potato dish they can. Kara makes a lovely twist on twice-baked potatoes. Judson makes a salmon dish with potatoes and sounds very fake...I think he's going home. Each coach is given a chance to advocate for their player; I don't remember if that happened last week or not. Bobby emphasizes Kara's genuineness, knowing how much the selection committee hates it when people are fake. And yet, they send Kara home. Really?!? Wow. We'll see if Judson can redeem himself next week.
(Byko: Yeah, no surprise that Team Giada won, and Kara and Pastor Judson go up for elimination. Potatoes: well, there are more boring ingredients out there...like celery. When Judson started talking about using the potato as a crust for the salmon, I expected it to be in some form other than as a plain slice like it appeared he was cooking it. Then again, Kara's mashed potatoes didn't sound like anything exciting, at least from how Bobby was talking. It's really cool to see the differences between Bobby's style of mentoring and Alton's; I think I like Alton's style a bit more, even though it's less personal. Maybe I just expect a Food Network Star coach to be kind of a hard-ass. Kara's reaction makes the rest of this seem anti-climactic, though; to quote Gordon, "What a shame." Kara's presentation isn't bad, but Bob's comment seems spot-on to me: I'm just not seeing the twist she keeps talking about. I can't say Judson's presentation excites me at all, and once again, Bob's observation is on target: adding the mascarpone cheese seems to be too much when making the potato the star. Honestly, I won't be too disappointed to see either of them go home at this point; whoever survives this week probably won't be around long without a big makeover. Kara's facial expression, though, really says it all; even as Bobby's talking, she just doesn't look confident at all. Interesting comment: "which one is the better gamble?" They're not expecting to see either one around long. I kind of agree with their decision: Kara's potential peak is probably lower than Judson's. Besides, could they really knock Alton's team down to three people against two teams of five right at the start? Giada, next week, you'd better make sure your team wins, or your worst is going home!)
Sunday, May 20, 2012
Sunday, May 13, 2012
Food Network Star - 5/13/12
Sorry we dropped off on Worst Cooks in America, but we're back with a new season of Food Network Star. And we start the new season with a format change! Bobby, Giada, and Alton are each taking a team of five contestants, thus adding the drama of trying to doing better for their idols as well as for themselves. During the tryouts, people are actually auditioning to be on each person's team rather than just to be on the show, with a completely separate pool of contestants auditioning for each team. To add to the fun, we go back to audience voting to determine the winner.
We're meeting the contestants on each team, and when we meet Martita, Dave's first reaction is to say, "Don't you dare say 'stilettos in the kitchen!' Because she just seems like she would." Dave also thinks that Emily sounds like a recipe for disaster as she says, "I take classic 50's dishes and make them rad." Justin gets asked if his parental consent form was signed, and Dave thinks he looks like he was plucked from the set of Twilight.
Sweet, we get Robert Irvine to introduce the first task! Instead of the Dinner Impossible track, we take the Restaurant Impossible task: open a restaurant overnight with $5000. We find out that Twilight Boy is from Maryland. He's making a salad with "Maryland-style croutons"...crab cakes disguised as croutons. I do like that the coaches of each team are involved in the discussion process, giving feedback to help them learn sooner rather than later. Giada's team is looking at having dumpling soup with dashi broth and key lime pie on the same menu...not sure how that's gonna go over. I'm worried about whether Eric can make his lasagna including pasta from scratch AND fresh ricotta from scratch for 150 people in six hours. And Emily is making bourbon-peanut butter pie on a pork crust (bacon), making up the recipe as she goes along. It's been nice knowin' ya, Emily. Yvan forgot to buy the eggs that Josh NEEDS for his dumplings. So now he's improvising by grinding nori and making fried nori dumplings.
Nikki is making a "roasted corn salad, like you would find at any backyard barbeque." Dave wonders if something from a backyard bbq is really going to impress the judge, but my reaction had been, "I want to go to her cookouts, we don't have that at mine!" (And any of my real life friends who want to rectify that are more than welcome to!!) Eric's milk is not getting hot enough to make his ricotta. His thing is hand-crafted foods, but he realizes that may be his downfall. Ya think?!? It seems like it MIGHT be done now, but we will see.
Each team has to present to the potential customers about their restaurants, and Alton's team goes first. Cristie is WAY too rehearsed. Marti's presentation is GOOD. Justin comes across as...odd. Bobby's team isn't especially memorable one way or another. Giada's team starts with Josh saying in a cutaway that he wants to make sure his team is memorable. Cue Dave and me cringing on the couch! Actually, the only thing he did was jump around as the team entered...his presentation was flat and rehearsed, which made a weird dichotomy.
Josh's plating is taking a while, as he tries to make sure his dumplings aren't soggy. Martita is then in the dining room trying to appease hungry customers. The black bean and cabbage soup from the southern restaurant is solid enough to stand on its own, and customers do not seem thrilled. When Martita is presenting, not only does she get starstruck, but from the looks on the faces of the judges, they don't think her dish sounds good. Alton thinks Linkie's key lime pie tastes "cafeteria"...damn!
As she presents her corn salad, Nikki manages to take 3 sentences to say nothing. "My passion is food." Yeah, and that other kid thought he was walking into Next Twilight Star. (Thank you, Dave, for that gem!) Michelle has twice described her mussels as "sexy." Susie asks her why she uses that word, and Michelle refrains from saying, "Because I'm not allowed to call them 'delicious'" and instead says that having them with a glass of wine makes her want to go back home and... Michelle turns bright red while Bob says that the show just lost its G rating! Eric's lasagna actually did come out right...he's a lucky man! Kara already seems to have a lot of the natural presentation skills. She reminds me a lot of Kelsey from several seasons ago.
I've loved Marti so far...right up until she wasn't able to articulate a culinary POV. Come on, woman, you've seen this show, you have GOT to know what your POV is!! We're wishing we could do a screen shot of Susie's incredulous face at the point where we paused it to write this, because it is priceless! Susie and Giada are blushing like schoolgirls over Justin and making him feel like he's 14 again and a girl winked at him. And Dave uses his favorite sign (since I've been teaching him some sign language)..."awkward!" Justin does do a good job of working into his presentation Alton's comment about his very red lips, showing some good ability to think on the fly. Cristie's "soup" does NOT go over well. It's too thick to even be a Rachael Ray "stoup," seriously! Also, Cristie is pissed about people being on the couch instead of being healthy...that message doesn't go over well unless you make it fun, honey. The pork and peanut butter pie turned out to be good, as was Emily's presentation, and Dave says that he is man enough to admit that he was wrong about her.
Before the evaluation room, each contestant gets individual feedback from their coach about presentation and food. Team Bobby wins the challenge, probably mostly based on Michelle's sexy mussels. Josh is up for elimination from Giada's team first because of his somersault and then because of his soup. Cristie is up for elimination from Alton's team, and we think she's going home tonight.
Oh, another new twist: Cristie and Josh have one final opportunity to redeem themselves with a one on one challenge to make a Mother's Day dish in 30 minutes and then present it. Frittata for Josh versus healthy Scotch eggs for Cristie. Josh points out that rock and roll guys don't really do brunch, since they're usually sleeping through brunch. Cristie has trouble thinking of a story until she remembers that her brother returned from deployment in Iraq on Mother's Day. Josh screws up his first presentation and then is given a second chance...which he then blows by saying that we should thank our moms for giving us one of their eggs. Dave points out that the people coming to this from other types of entertainment generally do NOT do well on this show. He actually is given a THIRD chance...good thing for him that this is a recorded presentation! Cristie and Josh are getting to sit in the "pitch room" with the coaches and judges to see each other's presentations and the tasting. Cristie tries to call her Scotch egg an omelet and then calls it the opposite of an omelet without saying why...it was confusing. And we still think she's going home. The judges sound like they want to send Josh home, but that turns out to be creative editing as they do send Cristie home. And another health nut bites the dust.
Till next week, food fans!
We're meeting the contestants on each team, and when we meet Martita, Dave's first reaction is to say, "Don't you dare say 'stilettos in the kitchen!' Because she just seems like she would." Dave also thinks that Emily sounds like a recipe for disaster as she says, "I take classic 50's dishes and make them rad." Justin gets asked if his parental consent form was signed, and Dave thinks he looks like he was plucked from the set of Twilight.
Sweet, we get Robert Irvine to introduce the first task! Instead of the Dinner Impossible track, we take the Restaurant Impossible task: open a restaurant overnight with $5000. We find out that Twilight Boy is from Maryland. He's making a salad with "Maryland-style croutons"...crab cakes disguised as croutons. I do like that the coaches of each team are involved in the discussion process, giving feedback to help them learn sooner rather than later. Giada's team is looking at having dumpling soup with dashi broth and key lime pie on the same menu...not sure how that's gonna go over. I'm worried about whether Eric can make his lasagna including pasta from scratch AND fresh ricotta from scratch for 150 people in six hours. And Emily is making bourbon-peanut butter pie on a pork crust (bacon), making up the recipe as she goes along. It's been nice knowin' ya, Emily. Yvan forgot to buy the eggs that Josh NEEDS for his dumplings. So now he's improvising by grinding nori and making fried nori dumplings.
Nikki is making a "roasted corn salad, like you would find at any backyard barbeque." Dave wonders if something from a backyard bbq is really going to impress the judge, but my reaction had been, "I want to go to her cookouts, we don't have that at mine!" (And any of my real life friends who want to rectify that are more than welcome to!!) Eric's milk is not getting hot enough to make his ricotta. His thing is hand-crafted foods, but he realizes that may be his downfall. Ya think?!? It seems like it MIGHT be done now, but we will see.
Each team has to present to the potential customers about their restaurants, and Alton's team goes first. Cristie is WAY too rehearsed. Marti's presentation is GOOD. Justin comes across as...odd. Bobby's team isn't especially memorable one way or another. Giada's team starts with Josh saying in a cutaway that he wants to make sure his team is memorable. Cue Dave and me cringing on the couch! Actually, the only thing he did was jump around as the team entered...his presentation was flat and rehearsed, which made a weird dichotomy.
Josh's plating is taking a while, as he tries to make sure his dumplings aren't soggy. Martita is then in the dining room trying to appease hungry customers. The black bean and cabbage soup from the southern restaurant is solid enough to stand on its own, and customers do not seem thrilled. When Martita is presenting, not only does she get starstruck, but from the looks on the faces of the judges, they don't think her dish sounds good. Alton thinks Linkie's key lime pie tastes "cafeteria"...damn!
As she presents her corn salad, Nikki manages to take 3 sentences to say nothing. "My passion is food." Yeah, and that other kid thought he was walking into Next Twilight Star. (Thank you, Dave, for that gem!) Michelle has twice described her mussels as "sexy." Susie asks her why she uses that word, and Michelle refrains from saying, "Because I'm not allowed to call them 'delicious'" and instead says that having them with a glass of wine makes her want to go back home and... Michelle turns bright red while Bob says that the show just lost its G rating! Eric's lasagna actually did come out right...he's a lucky man! Kara already seems to have a lot of the natural presentation skills. She reminds me a lot of Kelsey from several seasons ago.
I've loved Marti so far...right up until she wasn't able to articulate a culinary POV. Come on, woman, you've seen this show, you have GOT to know what your POV is!! We're wishing we could do a screen shot of Susie's incredulous face at the point where we paused it to write this, because it is priceless! Susie and Giada are blushing like schoolgirls over Justin and making him feel like he's 14 again and a girl winked at him. And Dave uses his favorite sign (since I've been teaching him some sign language)..."awkward!" Justin does do a good job of working into his presentation Alton's comment about his very red lips, showing some good ability to think on the fly. Cristie's "soup" does NOT go over well. It's too thick to even be a Rachael Ray "stoup," seriously! Also, Cristie is pissed about people being on the couch instead of being healthy...that message doesn't go over well unless you make it fun, honey. The pork and peanut butter pie turned out to be good, as was Emily's presentation, and Dave says that he is man enough to admit that he was wrong about her.
Before the evaluation room, each contestant gets individual feedback from their coach about presentation and food. Team Bobby wins the challenge, probably mostly based on Michelle's sexy mussels. Josh is up for elimination from Giada's team first because of his somersault and then because of his soup. Cristie is up for elimination from Alton's team, and we think she's going home tonight.
Oh, another new twist: Cristie and Josh have one final opportunity to redeem themselves with a one on one challenge to make a Mother's Day dish in 30 minutes and then present it. Frittata for Josh versus healthy Scotch eggs for Cristie. Josh points out that rock and roll guys don't really do brunch, since they're usually sleeping through brunch. Cristie has trouble thinking of a story until she remembers that her brother returned from deployment in Iraq on Mother's Day. Josh screws up his first presentation and then is given a second chance...which he then blows by saying that we should thank our moms for giving us one of their eggs. Dave points out that the people coming to this from other types of entertainment generally do NOT do well on this show. He actually is given a THIRD chance...good thing for him that this is a recorded presentation! Cristie and Josh are getting to sit in the "pitch room" with the coaches and judges to see each other's presentations and the tasting. Cristie tries to call her Scotch egg an omelet and then calls it the opposite of an omelet without saying why...it was confusing. And we still think she's going home. The judges sound like they want to send Josh home, but that turns out to be creative editing as they do send Cristie home. And another health nut bites the dust.
Till next week, food fans!
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