by Gina Scarpa

 

The remaining nine chefs are ready for their next Quickfire challenge on Top Chef: Seattle and meet up with Padma in the kitchen. There, they find master bladesmith Bob Kramer, who makes custom knives that sell at $500 an INCH! It seems some culinary skills are about to be put to the test. In a three round relay race, teams of three must sharpen knives, peel potatoes, and break down two rabbits. The winner will receive a knife from Bob, which may not seem like a big prize, until you consider it's worth thousands of dollars. Oh, and if you cut yourself, you're out!

 

In the first round, the green team tries to get their knives inspected first but Brooke's isn't sharp enough to cut through the paper that Bob is testing them with. Orange tries next but John's knife isn't sharp enough either - and he's the one who asked for it to be inspected! He's able to recover and orange moves on, along with the slow and steady blue team. In round two, Josie accidentally nicks herself and leaves her orange team one chef down. The orange team ended up losing by just two potatoes to blue! Josh thinks he has the rabbit task in the bag, but Micah emerges as the winner.

 

It's hard to believe that we're in the tenth season of Top Chef and the show has compiled some of the most memorable moments we've seen over the years for this week's Elimination Challenge. Each chef grabs a Kindle Fire, watches their memorable moment, and then must create a dish inspired by it. Who could forget the beef carpaccio fight of season 4, or Carla's extreme reaction in season 8 when her chicken pot pie dish was named the best? My personal favorite was Fabio taking a shot at Jaimie in season 5: "All she does is cook scallops. This is Top Chef, not Top Scallop!"

 

The guest judges this week are Top Chef Masters alums Wylie Dufresne, Jonathan Waxman, and Chris Cosentino. Along with Padma and Tom, Wolfgang Puck is on hand as well. Josie, Stefan, and John are the first to present their dishes from the first three seasons. Jonathan feels that Josie's herb roasted chicken was something you could find in any standard restaurant. In summation, it wasn't exciting. It was clearly stated that these dishes had to be a healthy option but Chris can literally see the fat content, looking at Stefan's grilled cheese. Padma was not a fan at all of John's umami risotto and Wolfgang said it was both overcooked and undercooked. Who knew that was possible?

 

Sheldon's beef carpaccio went over well, but Wylie points out that the tofu on the dish has no flavor. Besides the fact that Lizzie's scallops were not fresh, Tom finds that they weren't even cooked nicely and Jonathan says she should've just owned up and said it wasn't good quality seafood. Wolfgang loves Josh's braised pork belly and perhaps the self proclaimed king of pork is starting to redeem himself a bit.

 

Brooke's salmon is plated beautifully in Padma's eyes, and Tom says each component was cooked very well. Kristen's chicken pot pie is light but has lots of flavor but Christ was missing some sauce (uh oh) in order to get the full effect. Micah finishes the service with duck breast and polenta which received mixed reviews from Tom and Wolfgang.

 

Josh, Brooke, and Kristen are hailed the best chefs of the evening, with Kristen winning another challenge. She is definitely starting to emerge as the one to beat... or at least, keep an eye on! Only John and Lizzie find themselves in the bottom, and John immediately starts making excuses for his subpar risotto. Lizzie admits wholeheartedly that her dish was horrible, but they'll get a chance to fight it out one last time before a decision is made.

 

Padma reveals that season 10's memorable moment was CJ's elimination over pickles. Both John and Lizzie make a burger to highlight the pickle and find themselves dead even when it comes to the side dish. That leaves the judges to turn their attention to the burger itself, and John is asked to pack his knives and go.  Can't you just feel the happy dance that Josh is doing on the inside?

 

 

Top Chef: Seattle airs Wednesdays at 10/9c on Bravo.

 

(Image courtesy of Bravo)

 

 

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