Top Chef: Do you hear the douchebags sing?

Tattoos on his neck
Soggy corndogs on his plate
Bye, “Papa Souffle”

* So first: Apropos of nothing other than the fact that Rick Bayless is this weeks guest judge and ergo one of the challenges involves Mexican food: I have a lot of left over chipotle (though not as much as I should, having made the rookie mistake of reading “teaspoon” as “tablespoon”). Suggestions on what to do with it? And don’t say “make a pasta sauce that will scorch your esophagus, because that’s what I did with the part of the can I already used.

* Anywho. We open on morning at Chez Chef Chicago. Andrew snaps a towel at Spike, and they roughhouse. Ah, young douchebags in love.

* In another room, all the women sit around and talk about how hard it is to be a woman in the kitchen, making this episode virtually indistinguishable from every other episode of Top Chef, ever. The lesbians further talk about how rare it is to have two lesbians in the kitchen, making it clear that they have not seen a single episode of any season of Top Chef, ever. The douchebags continue roughhousing.

* Quickfire challenge. The guest judge today is Rick Bayless, the owner of Frontera Grill and Topalobampo, and apparently the guy who single handedly introduced Mexican food to the U.S. Which is odd, because given my background, I always assumed that feat was accomplished by—you know—the actual Mexicans who were here before us, not some dude from Chicago who looks kind of like a molestery science teacher (a resemblance not alleviated by the fact that he spends much of this episode wearing a purple shirt. Curse Bravo and their new unstealable pictures for not letting me steal that).

Their challenge is to reinvent the taco as fine dining. Right off the bat Eric is bugged by this, because he doesn’t like stealing the food of the people and serving it to the bourgeoise. He’s totally a revolutionary*, man. Also, his last name is “Hopfinger.” No wonder he’s so tough—he wouldn’t have survived childhood otherwise.

Manuel, also known as Chunk Jr., knows that the stakes are high for him because he’s Mexican. With the food of the people and the lesbians and the women and the Mexicans, this episode is all about oppression, man. To amp up his authenticity, he makes tacos with cactus.

Spike is keeping the taco “real,” which to him means keeping it street food instead of elevating it to fine dining. Not the challenge, douche. Andrew is making a duck and plantain taco. At least they’re real plantains. Eric is making his taco shell out of a giant jicama chip, which is intriguing.

The bottom tacos are Eric for his trainwreck plating; Lisa for her undercooked skirt steak (which Bayless can’t break off, just like my steak at Friday’s!); and Ryan for serving his taco in a paper wrapper. O. . .Kay. The top are Andrew for his flavor and presentation; Richard for his innovation; and Spike because the flavor satisfied Bayless’ soul. Can’t you see what you’ve done for him? oh, yeah! He is happy inside all - all of the time. Wo-oo-o-oo!

The winner is Richard, who gets immunity and the honor of having his dish stolen for the menu at Topolobampo. Better than Friday’s. Spike douchily whines about not winning because he thought Bayless described his food for the best.

* Note: from here on out, everything Spike does will be described as being done “douchily,” much like the Serial Drama girls describe everything Dr. Patrick Drake does as being done “hotly.” Why struggle for modifiers when there’s one that’s accurate in every situation?

* They then split into two teams. The Red Team is Zoi, Dale, Eric, Andrew, Spike, Ryan, and Zoi’s girlfriend, who has yet to distinguish herself sufficiently to earn her own name. The Blue Team is Rich, Stephanie, Nick, Antonia, Lisa, Mark, and Manuel. They’re taken to a neighborhood in Chicago, where their (product placement!) mealstogether.com elimination challenge is explained: they will cater a block party for 40 kids and 70 adults, but rather than shopping for the food, they’ll have to beg all their ingredients from the residents.

* I really would love to see them try this in my ‘hood. Doing this in a cute little ‘burb is no challenge; bring them down here where half the houses will give them organic produce and the other half will shoot at the crackers in the white coats while flinging empty 40’s at their head.

* The Red Team sends Ryan around to the houses, because he’s pretty and people won’t mind him stealing from them. Aw. These people have a suspicious amount of food on hand. Top Chef comes to my place, they’re getting a half eaten jar of Nutella and a single peach; these people have everything in bulk. It’s almost as though they knew something like this would happen.

* It's also important to note that as they're stealing, the chef's take the time to turn the labels toward the camera. So you know they're not just stealing Spicy Ranch Dressing and BBQ Sauce--no no. They're stealing (product placement!) Hidden Valley Spicy Ranch Dressing, and KC Masterpiece BBQ Sauce.

*Spike douchily goes to one house that has this total LDS-stocked-for-a-year pantry, and then douchily tells the Blue Team not to go there because they don’t have anything. The teams plan their menus: Blue Team is going upscale; Red Team is keeping it “For the People.” Of course it's the Red Team feeding the people. I’m sick of all this Commie propaganda interfering with my food porn.

* Bravo keeps showing commercials for the Make Me a Supermodel Reunion, a show I almost wish I’d watched now that I know it featured a “Bromance.”

* Prep time. The Blue Team is making Paella; slaw; BBQ pulled pork; bean salad; inside out cookies; Sexy Drink; Fruit Cobbler; and Mac & Cheese. The Red Team is making sliders; corn dogs; pork skewers; sangria; Waldorf salad; pasta salad; taco salad; and s’mores. Zoi hates that she’s making pasta salad since it was someone else’s idea. Oooh, foreshadowing.

* Colicchio comes through the kitchen and asks what makes the Sexy Drink sexy. It lets you whip it if it misbehaves? No. Actually the answer is “lavender” which is not so much sexy as “sleepy.” Trust the insomniac, kittens.

* They go to the block party, where Eric’s corn dogs are soggy. Insert predictable impotence joke here. On the other team, Nikis’ Mac & Cheese is dry.

* The judges for this round are introduced, and perhaps the best thing about this episode is that it reminds me how much I love Ted Allen. They go around to the tables and hear about the food. Spike douchily explains their s’more in a douchey French accent.

(I then paused the TV for a moment to figure out why I find Spike so gross and douchey, when he’s Greek, and I normally find Greek men attractive. Then I realize that the only Greek man I really find attractive is Nikolas Cassadine, and that he’s not really Greek—both because the Cassadines are actually Russian aristocrats who fled to Greece during the Revolution, and because the actor who plays him is Native American. But regardless: to alleviate the utter douchtasticness of Spike, I’m giving you this picture of Tyler Christopher as Nikolas Cassadine. None of the food in this episode makes me want to nom nom nom, so we have to have something tasty).

* Reactions from the crowd: they love the Red Team’s shishkabobs; hate the Blue Team’s paella; like the Red Team’s sliders; hate the Red Team’s soggy corn dogs; and like the Blue Team’s dessert. This makes it seem like the Red Team has the edge, but if we know anything after 4 seasons of Top Chef it’s that the reaction of the crowd never matters. The power is with the judges, not the people.

The Red Team obviously hasn’t learned this lesson, because they start playing basketball and partying with the residents. They’re the team of the people, man! The Blue Team stands around being uptight, and probably oppressing people.

* Back at Judge’s Table, the Blue Team gets called in first. The Red Team is hilariously baffled, and someone tries to relax them all by saying “we don’t know why they got called in first.” Um. . .what about the fact that the winners always get called in first? Could that be a hint? A tiny one?

*The judges try to fake the Blue Team and the viewers out by complaining about their food. The mac & cheese was a brick and the paella was apparently more like a rice pilaf than a paella. But still—they come out with the win, though the judges are careful to point out that it’s by a small margin. Stephanie wins for being behind the dessert, giving her the 2nd win in 3 elimination challenges. I told you; this girl is one to watch. They go back to the hold area and celebrate; Mark adorably makes an impromptu digeridoo out of some piping or something.

* The Red Team goes before the judges and immediately starts mouthing off. They all think they kicked the Blue Team’s ass, and Tom awesomely tells them that they were wrong. D’oh. The corndogs were soggy, as was the Waldorf salad, and the pasta salad was bland.

* Tom accuses them of dumbing down their cooking and condescending to the residents. Spike douchily tries to continue the “cooking for the people” theme of the episode. Corndogs para todos! Don’t cry for us, Richmond Avenue! Ted shoots Spike down, and Spike douchily keeps talking. He regrets that he has but one life to give for his sliders! All of your s'mores are belong to Spike! More judge smack talk. I swear, it was almost worth the douchegasm of this episode just to see Colicchio and Ted serve some truth to these c-buckets at the end of the hour. For this, Tom and Ted get my second nom nom nom of the evening.

* Andrew says he ain’t goin’ no where; it’s his house. Shut up, you fucking fame whore.

* In the end, Eric is told to Pack His Knives and Go because his limp dick corndogs totally bummed everyone out. Hugs from the rest of the chefs, and Niki calls him “Papa Souffle,” which I stole for my Haiku. Given the quasi-political theme of this episode, I can only assume that this is a Papa Doc reference, and now wish I’d called his corndogs the Corndogs Macoute.

* So the final lessons of the episode: The Blue Team of Democracy and Dessert Won-Tons will always triumph over the Red Team of Communism and Corndogs; shut the fuck up, Spike and Andrew; Ted and Tom are love; Rick Bayless singlehandedly introduced Mexican food to America; and fictional Greeks who are actually Russian Aristocrats played by Native Americans are way hotter than real Greeks who are actually douchebags played by Spike.

* Next week on Top Chef: Andrew acts like a leprechaun, proving once again that he’s there for the cameras, and not for Flav. Oops—wrong show. Maybe. . .

*Sidebar: once upon a time, my MA program made shirts where we said all the things grad students were (overworked, underpaid, etc.) and one of the things we decided we were was revolutionary. Except it got misspelled on the shirts as “revoluntionary.” I suggested that we run with this and hold a fund raising lunch and call it a “Revoluncheon,” and promo it with the slogan “you say you want a revoluncheon?” I was quickly shot down. Bastards.