The chefs instead of going to the kitchen they go to Le Bernardin, one of only five restaurants in New York City with three Michelin stars and the head chef is none other than my sexy chef fantasy Eric Rupert! When they arrive they are greeted by Anthony Bourdain...?? Where's Padma? Why did she get the morning off? And where is Eric Rupert?? Sad. Next to Anthony is Justo Thomas the head fish butcher of Le Bernardin also important to note is that Le Bernardin is the top seafood restaurant in the country. Apparently Justo can butcher 1,000 lbs of fish in 6 hours. Damn he's fast! And when he shows the chefs how he butchers it he leaves no piece of meat on the bones. So of course the Quick Fire Challenge is to fillet 2 fish in perfect portions and without leaving much meat on the bones in 10 minutes. Some like Carla and Antonia struggle with the challenge and Fabio cuts himself between his thumb nail but he takes it like a man (unlike Jaime) and just works with it. Top four are Marcel, Mike, Dale and Richard so the second part of the challenge is to make a meal in 45 minutes with the fish scraps like the head, tail and rack. Dale wins the challenge and gets immunity. Bourdain asks the chefs to return to their kitchen.
Once back at the Top Chef Kitchen, Padma is there with bad ass sexy french chef Ludo (also part of the fantasy). Ludo as we know was in Top Chef Masters and was a bad ass chef (part of his appeal) cursing people out but then again how do we know, his french accent is so thick we needed subtitles (also part of his charm). We discover its Restaurant Wars and they have to do a Pop-Up Restaurant. Pop-Up Restaurants are restaurants that literally pop-up in random locations for a selected amount of time perhaps a day or two months and apparently Ludo does this on the west coast all the time so that's why he is the guest judge. Also importantly to note for the first time in Top Chef history the diners will be voting on the winning restaurant not the judges. Which is awesome because the chefs really get to cook for the customers and not the judges. Also importantly as the winner of the Quick Fire Challenge, Dale is one of the team leaders and he gets to pick the other team leader and smartly he picked Marcel because seriously who wants to work with Marcel (well other than Marcel!), no one.
Team Dale includes Richard, Tre, Fabio and Carla meanwhile Team Marcel includes Angelo, Antonia, Mike and Tiffany. Right off the bat Marcel has no control of his team, well because no one respects him! He has no idea how to adequately address his teammates without sounding like a douche. Meanwhile on Dale's team there is complete team harmony and they are bouncing ideas off each other without a problem. That night the restaurant is better conceptualized for Dale's team. They are opening Bodega (Deli in Dominican) and they are serving upscale bodega food. Marcel's team is not happening, Marcel is being an ass again and people are getting impatient eventually deciding things without his complete consent like the restaurant name Etch, instead of Medi how he had wanted (Medi because they are cooking Mediterranean food, wackish but so is Etch).
The day of, they have five hours to prep before the diners arrive. Again Bodega complete harmony everyone knows what they have to do no problem. Team Etch chaos, screaming blah. Marcel is such an ass he is telling Tiffany how she needs to boil and peel her eggs. I mean seriously a toddler is aware of the boiling process of eggs! Regardless, Tiffany is now behind and doesn't really have time to work front of the house until the very end. Bodega obviously picked Fabio to work front of the house especially if the diners are voting- smart move! Once service starts, Bodega all of a sudden gets stressed out and by that I mean Dale gets stressed out and starts cursing out the servers and Fabio has to go in there and calm him done. Dale man, unnecessary, you were able to control your short fuze by not punching Marcel in the face last episode I think the servers are the least of your worries. But other than that misstep Bodega has a pretty awesome service, food looked good and innovative, and Fabio did excellent in his charming ways directing the servers and schmoozing the diners by kissing the ladies on the hand as they were leaving (again, where the hell was I this summer?!??!!!). Meanwhile Etch, was having a horrible service, food was coming back because things were underdone, cold and late to send out food. Tiffany was also having a horrible time at the front of the house, the waiters had no idea where food was going because of the lack of direction. Equally as annoying was Tiffany's fake high pitch talk! She was talking to the diners in this valley girl kind of voice and was loud and laughing above all the diners. I was really put off- I want my black girl from Texas, where she at??? M!!
At the end of service Padma calls in Etch first to the Judges Table (Richard starts freaking out as per usual because he it notoriously known for being very suspicious about everything) and usually its the winning the team that goes in first and they sort of are smiling thinking they won but quickly turn those smiles into frowns when they discover they lost. The loss was so bad only 17/76 diners voted in favor of Etch, HORRIBLE!! As soon they were confronted, Marcel was getting all ghetto waving his arms in the air and stomping like a gorilla! Mike was getting guido on his ass too, it was beautiful.
I'd like to take this time to update you all on the bromance between Fabio and Richard. During the service Richard had asked Fabio what were the diners response to the food and Fabio responded well and Richard replies, "Don't lie to me." and Fabio sort of gestures to him 'like me' and says, "Richie, it's me'. Awww Richie, Fabio won't lie to you! Also during the waiting period while Etch was with the judges Richie looks at Fabio and says, "Ok man I need you to come talk to me now" and Fabio goes and sits on his lap and tries to comfort him. AWWWWWWW love! Then when they reveal that they in fact won, Fabio held Richard's head in his hands and looks at him like 'see baby I told you everything was going to be OK' AWWWWWWW LOVE!!! I can't wait to see the progression of this bromance. I'm a little jealous.
At judges table the team was praised by the judges and Richard wins the elimination and 10Gs(!). The losing team comes out and thankfully douche Marcel leaves. The Black Hammer has struck again!
Next week sneak peak was a little confusing, is it a godfather challenge???
