by Allison L. Nowacki and Bryan J. Polk

This week's episode of Food Network Star promises to be a sweet one, literally. The episode was all about candy and it got started with each contestant being told they will have to create a dish from some Hershey's brand chocolate for the Camera Challenge. They each had an hour to cook before they had to present the dish to the camera for a one-minute segment. Some really great dishes were cooked, like Jyll's Almond Joy Pieces and coconut encrusted shrimp for which she won the challenge. Other dishes didn't do that well with the judges, like Vic's chocolate dipped asparagus. Judge Bob Tuschman remarked that it tasted every bit as horrible as one would imagine.

As the contestants were waiting to hear what the Star Challenge would be, Duff Goldman and Robert Irvine enter the Food Star Kitchen. The two chefs let contestants know that they will be divided up into two teams of six members to cook a bunch of deserts to their liking for them and one hundred and fifty guests. Duff asked that his team create dishes that were colorful, yet sophisticated, while Robert required his team to create interesting flavor combinations. The members of each team were each responsible for a desert and the team then had to collaborate on two additional dishes. Both teams were given a budget of two thousand dollars had 6 hours to cook before the event. Jyll's advantage was that she got to choose what chef she would cook for as well as her team. Jyll chose Duff and for her team she picked every other female contestant except for Penny. Penny saw this as a personal slight, while Jyll stated that she was just trying to avoid drama, and Penny, as well as Chris, always seemed to equal drama.

While they cooked for the event it was apparent that Chris was trying to take charge for Chef Robert's team. Chris was very disorganized and messed up two attempts at making a chocolate ganache cake. When Chef Robert came in to see how well his team was cooking he quickly told Chris that he was not properly leading the kitchen and then appointed Justin B. to take charge. This, however, was not the end of Chris's woes, as he later dropped some scalding hot pie filling on his hand that required some burn cream.

In contrast to the high and disjointed energy in kitchen that Chef Robert's team was giving off, the contestants on Chef Duff's team were mostly rather relaxed. No one had really taken a leadership roll on their team and according to them it resulted in most things going just fine. Just fine except for Alicia who had been wracking her brain as she tried to remember the recipe she needed for the cupcakes she was making. As time proceeded Alicia got more and more frantic and we found out about other problems that occurred for their team. The first being that Susie had forgotten to by oil to cook her churros in and the second one was Mary Beth's cookies had all fused into one massive cookie due to the butter in the batter not being cold enough before it was placed in the oven.

At the event, it started to become clear that Alicia had indeed messed up her vanilla bean cupcakes with cookie dough centers, as several wound up half eaten in trash cans. Mary Beth's Grand Marnier milk shake with chocolate cookie crumbles, Susie's orange pancake with chocolate sauce and the team effort of the lemon cupcake pops were also singled out by the judges and event goers as having been the opposite of tasty. On the other hand Chef Robert's team seemed to please several of the event attendees with the whoopee pie created by Jeff and Vic's cream puff with lime filling and a chocolate tequila sauce. In the end it was pretty obvious who had won this competition.

At evaluation, we are told what we already expected, Chef Robert's team had won because they had created exceptional dishes and would all be exempt from elimination. The judges really commended Vic on his dish and warm personality as well as the team on the whole for their fennel and orange zest infused ice cream. On Chef Duff's team the three team members singled out for elimination are Mary Beth, Alicia and Susie. Mary Beth was told her milk shake was far too thin and that just by having looked at her you could tell she was defeated as she served it. Alicia got flack for the fact that her cupcakes weren't tasty and the lemon cupcake pops had been undercooked. After being told this Alicia starts to cry, as we've seen so many times before, to this the judges remind her that she often lets her nerves sabotage her. Finally Susie is told that she could be eliminated because her pancake was just too dense and even though she had a perky and fun demeanor at the event, that cannot over compensate for weak food. Ultimately it is Alicia who was eliminated from becoming a Food Network Star this episode. Impressively she took it like a champ and no tears were shed as she thanked the judges and gave some goodbye hugs to the other contestants.

Food Network Star airs Sunday at 9/8c on Food Network.

(Image courtesy of Food Network)

You can catch more of Allison and Bryan on their weekly reality show podcast at NotMakeFriends.com