Top Chef: Carne!

January 23, 2019 9:14 AM - Season 16, Episode 7

Lena Waithe surprises the chefs, by challenging them to make their best version of the trademark Kentucky dish, the Hot Brown. Then super-chef Nancy Silverton brings her internationally renowned friend, butcher Dario Cecchini to break down a whole cow for the chefs to utilize along with locally-sourced Kentucky ingredients.
posted by Anonymous (5 comments total)

I like episodes where everyone does well or everyone does poorly. It becomes less about figuring out who to throw under the bus and more about cooking.
posted by tofu_crouton at 11:07 AM on January 23, 2019

I think this week proved that Brian is a much better cook in theory than he is in practice, at least in the context of this competition. The choice to go with spinalis is a very meat-nerdy one, but man, you gotta cook it good.

I had the chance to go to Eddie's restaurant the day after this episode, even chat with him briefly, and that was a fucking transcendent meal. I'll leave it at this: I'm not surprised he's getting something of the same edit (and audience reaction, clearly) as his mentor Nick. (Also a super nice, easygoing if understated dude in person.) If he goes far, he's clearly going to get the same sort of "undeserved!" cries of protest. Those folks, who aren't eating the food, get big ol' eyerolls from me.
posted by supercres at 3:23 PM on January 23, 2019 [2 favorites]

I felt bad for Eddie when Padma kept asking why he didn't look happy, so I was glad he actually relaxed enough to smile on his own. Once the shopping issue was over it was much more obvious he is one of the best in this crew. I am also glad that Justin won the Hot Brown challenge!

I love episodes where all the chefs do well, but when they all do poorly it's a bummer. When they all seem to misinterpret the challenge like this I have to wonder if the producers explained things properly. Or maybe they are just tired out by this point and this is what happens.

Brian is fun but the last few episodes it has seemed like he was getting in over his head. So I didn't mind him leaving.
posted by Emmy Rae at 5:44 AM on January 24, 2019 [1 favorite]

(Also a super nice, easygoing if understated dude in person.)

Except when he's shouting so loudly in the middle of service that you can hear him in the dining room.

But yeah Eddie seems at least a lot better, definitely don't think I've been getting the impression he's a poor cook.
posted by Carillon at 12:42 PM on January 28, 2019

This may be a dumb question but are there cooking competitions that happen around the country for this level of cooking?

In Canada there is - the Canadian Culinary Championships. They start out as city-specific competitions amongst a handful of local chefs, then the winners of those go off to an annual competition to compete for the Gold Medal Plate. I assume that there is likely something similar in the US?
posted by urbanlenny at 5:50 PM on July 18, 2019