by Allison L. Nowacki and Bryan J. Polk

 

The start of this week's Food Network Star involves one dish everyone loves. Pizza! In the Camera Challenge, the contestants need to create a signature pizza in one hour and then present their pizza with a personal story to the camera in one minute. The winner of this challenge will get their pizza featured in Food Network Magazine and in a Food Network Star first the loser will immediately be sent packing.

 

Overall, most of the pizzas were delicious and the only real criticism came in regards to their on camera persona. The winner of the pizza Camera Challenge is Penny with her Middle Eastern inspired pizza and new culinary point of view she calls Middle Eastern mom. Vic, Juba and Justin B are on the chopping block to go home. Vic has a complete brain freeze but his new culinary point of view, Momma showed me right, may be the start of a hit concept. Juba is once again very scattered in front of the camera and just couldn't pull his words together. Justin B loses his train of thought and cannot recover from his initial fail. It is decided that Juba is the weakest of the three and is sent home while remaining in high spirits.

 

Their Star Challenge for this week is to take a restaurant quality meal and turn it into something that could easily be made in the home in forty five minutes. There is a red wine braised short rib dish with a parsnip puree (a time consuming endeavor), an abalone with caviar beurre blanc dish (an expensive recipe), and a sweet soy glazed pork belly dish with scallion pancake (a technically challenging dish).

 

Since Penny won the camera challenge, she gets to decide who will be cooking each meal. She must separate the contestants into three teams that will be cooking head to head against each other. The winner of each team will be safe and the loser of each team will automatically be up for elimination. When the first team enters the kitchen, they are greeted by a firing squad of Food Network All Stars including The Neelys, Anne Burrell, Scott Conant, as well as the usual judges. They will be watching each team cook and ask the contestants some questions about their cooking process during the forty five minutes. They want to make sure that each contestant has the ability to cook, talk, and entertain all at the same time as these are fundamental traits of any Food Network Star.

 

First in the kitchen is the time consuming team of Penny, Mary Beth, Susie, and Katy. Penny is very vocal that putting herself on this team is a strategic move since she believes that she can easily take down Katy and spare herself from the chopping block. It is actually Mary Beth who shines and really comes out of her shell as not only a great cook but a great personality that if honed will go far in this competition. When it comes time for Whitney, Jeff, Jyll, Justin D and Alicia to cook their technically challenging dish things get off to a good start with Justin D cracking jokes but things quickly go sour when he is questioned on his idea of blanching his pancake fried meatballs. Jeff is dripping sweat everywhere and Susie is looking lost.

 

After leaving the kitchen, Alicia starts to cry again, for the second episode in a row, solidifying herself as this season's water works. Things don't go any better for Orchid, Justin B, Vic and Chris cooking the expensive recipe as Chris is being flashy for no reason and Orchid is using canned oysters. Orchid is public enemy number one this week and is specifically placed on this team by Penny to hopefully have her falter and be up for elimination. Penny sees Orchid as her biggest competition as she is an early on judge favorite.

 

With the Star Challenge over, all the contestants have to face evaluation. In the pork belly group, Justin D and Jyll receive some high praise, but the winner in their category ends up being Whitney for her biscuits and gravy with glazed bacon. This leaves Alicia as the first contestant up for elimination. Next for evaluation is the group that cooked the short ribs. Mary Beth is the obvious winner here, overcoming her label of being mediocre, with Katy in the bottom due to her scattered dish and scattered culinary point of view.

 

Finally, the judges are presented with the contestants in the abalone group. The judges admit that there is not real stand out here at all, but ultimately Justin B made the best dish and is declared the winner with Chris potentially going home because of all the pointless show boating and being unable to correctly answer cooking questions while in the Star Challenge. The contestant leaving this episode is Katy who is honored to be a part of the Food Network Star experience and left with her head held high and her beautiful smile still in place.

 

 

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

 

(Image courtesy of Food Network)

 

 

You can catch more of Allison and Bryan on their weekly podcast at notmakefriends.com