Top Chef Seattle: Episode 2 finally brings the contestants to the Emerald City. This was the first time for all the contestants to see each other and size up the competition. The first Quickfire Challenge was judged by three previous Top Chef competitors, which include: Chris Jacobsen, Josie Smith-Malave and Stefan Richter. For the Quickfire Challenge the contestants are divided into five groups of three, and they must create a dish that features local shellfish. The least-liked dish was a razor clam chowder that was created by Danyele, Eliza and Josh. The judges said the chowder was under-seasoned. The winning dish belonged to the team of John, Sheldon and Kuniko. They created a geoduck-apple sashimi. The winning team drew knives for immunity in the Elimination Challenge, and John won the draw.
The big surprise of the episode was the announcement that the former contestants Chris, Josie and Stefan were now joining the competition with the other contestants. This, of course, did not go over well with the other chefs. They all feel that the three former contestants already had their chance to win Top Chef, and feel that they have an unfair advantage since they have already been on the show. So we'll see how these three fair this time.
The chefs remain in their groups of three for the Elimination Challenge. The contestants must use regional ingredients to cook a dinner for Seattle icon James Beard Award Winner and Restaurateur, Tom Douglas. I just knew Top Chef couldn't come to Seattle without having Tom Douglas in at least one episode. I love Tom Douglas, and all of his great Seattle restaurants. The Elimination Challenge included another Seattle icon, the Space Needle! It's fitting that the producers went with the Needle as the location for the first Elimination Challenge, since it is the most recognizable landmark in Seattle.
The contestants cooked their dishes at the Space Needle kitchen at the Sky City restaurant at the top of the Needle. The contestants were given 47 minutes to prepare their dishes, as that is the amount of time it takes the rotating restaurant to make one full rotation. The judges for the Elimination Challenge were Padma, Tom Colicchio, Emeril Lagasse, Gail Simmons and Tom Douglas.
The winning group of the Elimination Challenge was John, Kuniko and Sheldon. They prepared a cod poached in chili oil with dashi and spot prawn shabu shabu. The individual winner of the group was Kuniko. The bottom two groups consisted of CJ, Stefan, Josie, Brooke, Bart and Jeffrey. Jeffrey was selected as the chef to go home for his overcooked fish. I was sad to see Jeffrey go. he was one of the contestants that I really liked. I would rather have seen Stefan go home. His arrogance bothers me.
Next week is the Thanksgiving episode! Come back to check out my rundown of the episode.
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