Top Chef Just Desserts: Whoa Whoa, I Gotta Go Back To School. . .Again

Resentment Cookies
Not a good bake sale item
Heather C. goes home

Good morning, armadillos. How are you? I’m feeling a little leisurely this morning – I have a dentist appointment at 10, so I’ve pushed my usual schedule back an hour. It’s nice. It’s like my own personal daylight savings time, except not criminally stupid as you know I believe daylight savings time to be.

Anyway. Last night’s episode of Just Desserts? The first one that rang a bit hollow for me. I will always forgive it for introducing me to Sylvia Weinstock, who is apparently some sort of Cake Wizard/Old Navy Lady doppelganger that I want to adopt as my own. She can sit in my La-Z-Boy recliner from the ‘50’s and cat sit while I’m at work all day, and then when I get home, she’ll tell me wry but gentle little anecdotes about what the cat did that day, and we’ll laugh and eat cake. It’ll be awesome.

But the whole Glee Club vs. Pep Squad thing just felt like a forced and embarrassing way to try and capitalize off of the popularity of Glee. And since Glee itself was forced and embarrassing this week (let's all have nitrous induced hallucinations about Britney Spears instead of a plot!). . .well, it’s poor timing at best.

And I can’t make myself care too much that Heather C. is gone. I wanted to root for her because she’s a) a local girl, and b) the first chef to appear on Top Chef whose food I’ve eaten prior to seeing them on the show. But she never came across as having much personality. Plus, she had that mystery bandage lurking just below her bangs for the first three episodes. Plus, I keep remembering that insufficiently Nutella-y Nutella ice cream I had at Hook. Making something insufficiently Nutella-y is a capital offense in my book.

But I hate the way she went out. I hate when people go out for things they didn’t want to do in the first place, and got pressed into doing by their teammates.

Let’s do this, ‘kay?

Morning! Los Angeles. Top Chef Just Desserts Loft. Crazy Eyes Morgan is styling his hair with just water, because that’s how straight guys style their hair, and Seth is doing old school calisthenics like my grandpa and vowing to win all the challenges. Eric and Zac lament the loss of Tim, but Eric is also celebrating how well he did. This almost tricks me into thinking he’s doomed.

Quickfire! Gail and a tiny, tiny old woman greet them. It’s Sylvia Weinstock, who is apparently some sort of wedding cake genius. She’s adorable, so whatever. She tells them it’s a pleasure to be with them today, and talks about starting off in the cake business by making the cake for 3 of Henry VIII’s weddings.

Get it? Because she’s old.

Anyway, their quickfire challenge is to make a wedding cake. . .something that normally takes days or weeks. They’ll have an hour and a half. Zac wonders if Gail’s been snorting buttercream because “that’s not rational.”

They’ll be provided with the base sheetcake, but it’s up to them to fill it and decorate it. Eric is jazzed. The winner gets immunity.

Wedding Cake Flurry! One and a half hours to make the fillings and frosting and stuff and decorate. “Just another day at the office,” Zac quips. Heather C. has been thinking a lot about wedding cakes lately, because she just got engaged. Various people weigh in on the merits of fondant (blech) and buttercream (blech).

(yeah, I don’t like fondant, and buttercream is my least favorite form of frosting. If I ever get married, I will be a perfectly rational bride to almost everyone involved, but a total nightmare for the baker)

Seth says he knows he can’t make a wedding cake, so he’s just going to make “something delicious” – he’s cutting a wedding cake into a tiny plate sized portion and calling it an engagement cake. Erika, on the other hand, has been decorating wedding cakes since she was twelve. She tells her mixer/batter “I love you, I love you, I love you.” Heather H. made her own wedding cake.

40 minutes! Zac talks about the need for wedding cakes to be structurally sound. Crazy eyes Morgan cleans his work station. Eric hasn’t made enough buttercream for his gigantic cake, but realizes everyone else is in the same boat. Malika’s cake is not working – the frosting keeps softening so she’s taking it in and out of the blast freezer.

Gail enters and gives them a five minute warning. Commercial!

Back! 4:38! Everyone says things like ‘crazy” and “insane.” Eric wins the overstating the obvious award by pointing out that time is the biggest issue. Malika’s second layer is completely off center, so she pulls it off and the cake comes apart at the middle. This is where crazy eyes Morgan yells at her “hey, shaky! I see you shakin’ the shit out of this table.” Good for Malika, she has balls and calls him out for being a dick, telling him to call her by her name.


Time! Heather H. looks around the room and sees a lot of hideous wedding cakes –Eric’s is “grocery store style,” Danielle’s is green, and Erika’s is more homey than professional. Malika cries about having her second quickfire disaster.

Gail and the world’s cutest little old lady begin tasting with Heather C., who has made a White Cake with Vanilla Simple Syrup & Nutella Buttercream. Gail asks her who’s doing her wedding cake, and Heather jokes “it might be me, but I’m being advised against that.” Sylvia Weinstock nods sagely. “Go get your nails done, it’s your day off,” she tells Heather. I don’t know if that’s a veiled critique or just really good advice. . .


. . .but anyway, they move on to Eric, who has made a Pistachio Buttercream & Apricot Brandy Filling. Zac’s is a Toasted Meringue, Fruit of the Forest Jam with Dark Chocolate Ganache that looks kind of “Night on Bald Mountain” in a way—it’s neat looking, but it doesn’t say “wedding” to me.

Malika is waiting, and her cake starts falling apart on the table. She feels like she’s “not loving cooking” on the show.

Sylvia Weinstock and Gail move to Erika’s Mocha Explosion with Kahlúa Buttercream, followed by Danielle’s Cream Cheese Lemon Filling with Strawberries & Pistachios.

Seth explains his Engagement Cake: Caramel Chocolate Mousse with Orange, Marsala, Absinthe & Honey. I hope he gets dinged for not following instructions. Gail asks him why he didn’t even try. He says he knew he was going to be in the bottom 3, so he figured he’d have fun with it. “It was a wedding competition. You shoulda made an effort,” Sylvia scolds him. Ok, we officially love her. I want her to be the judge every week – she can replace Daily Candy Girl, since I’m still not clear on her qualifications.

OR: Better still – a spin off where she and Gael Greene’s Hat go on a road trip together in a classic car, eating great food and having zany adventures. It’s like Thelma & Louise, only with better accessories and a senior citizen’s discount.

Next up is Yigit’s Passion Fruit, Vanilla & Lime Soaked Cake with a Vanilla Orange Diplomat Cream. Sylvia says it’s “nice and light.” They move on to Heather H.’s Lemon & Orange Zest Buttercream, which Sylvia says is “summery.” Morgan makes an Italian Cream Cake with Coconut, Rum Syrup & Toasted Pecans (the Bravo interns inexplicably have it as Italian Ice Cream Cake, which it’s clearly not) which he says is a favorite “down in the South.”

And then there’s Malika, who cries as they look at her cake which has fallen all over the place. She apologizes for not being able to complete her Coconut Custard Infused with Cardamom and Vanilla. Sylvia comfortingly tells us that she’ll learn from this, which is always positive.

Sylvia’s least favorite cakes were Seth’s non-cake. “When something challenges you, don’t back off,” she warns him. Malika’s was quite delicious but didn’t work out. Sylvia tells her not to take it so seriously -- “It’s not death. It’s only a cake.” She also didn’t like Eric’s cake.

The top 3 were Erika’s which had nice detail work; Morgan’s which was clean and fresh; and Heather H’s which was “feminine and elegant.” But the winner is. . .Erika! Yay! Heather H. and Crazy Eyes Morgan look sour. Heather H. snipes that “aesthetically” Eirka’s is not the kind of cake she’d go for.


Elimination challenge! They’re divided into teams by drawing “cookies” from the cookie jar. The teams are “Glee” (Danielle, Seth, Zac, Yigit, and Heather C) and “Pep” (Eric, Erika, Crazy Eyes Morgan, Heather H., and Malika). Danielle is worried about the Glee team, since everyone on their team had an altercation with Seth last challenge. Commercial.

Back! Gail says they’ve invited special guests to help explain the elimination challenge. So some not terribly talented Glee club kids come in singing a tone-deaf a capella song about Top Chef. I thought nothing could make me the words “Glee Club” more than this week’s weaksauce episode of Glee, but this just about does it.

Then the pep squad comes in and does a cheer about Top Chef. The Pep Squad has the scariest mascot ever – he’s like a low budge version of Steely McBeam, but wearing Richard Gere’s costume from An Officer and a Gentleman. I may have nightmares about him.

Gail tells them that both groups are from Santa Monica High School, and that the “Mariners” (pep squad) are hoping to go to cheer camp this summer, while the “Rainbow Riders” (Glee Club) have an opportunity to perform in NYC.

Of course the Glee Club is called the Rainbow Riders. Of course. Because they don’t torment Glee kids enough about being “gay” to begin with, you have to go and saddle them with a name like Rainbow Riders just to seal the deal.

Their challenge is that they’ll be having a bake sale to raise money for their squads. Heather H. is excited because she was a geek in High School, and went to band camp. They’ll have 3 hours to bake today, and 30 minutes to prep. They’ll each be responsible for one baked item; the teams will sell 490 tickets at $1 a piece, and the winning team is the one that makes the most money. The winning team will also receive $5000.

3 hours! Time to prep. Team Glee plans to be accessible enough for the bake sale, but refined enough for the judges. Zac talks about how their team is perfect for Glee, because they’re a bunch of misfits – in his estimation, Seth is the jock, he’s the theatre geek, Yigit is the “artsy kid,” Danielle is the “Valley Girl,” and Heather C. is the girl who “just got broken up with, like over and over and over again.” That sounds more like a weird Breakfast Club remake than a Glee Club, but whatever.

Over on the Pep Squad team, they’re planning to “stay back from our very pastry chef ideas,” and focus on the bake sale. Malika is trying to boost her own confidence.

Glee plans out their menu: Seth wants to do financier cakes, which he tells us were developed in the financial district in Paris so that business men could eat them on the go and not get crumbs on their suits. Here’s an idea, genius – make it, call it an individual cake or a single serving cake, and you don’t look like a pretentious asshole who thinks he’s above the bake sale challenge.

Anyway, Zac plans strawberry shortcake; Yigit’s doing chocolate cream with marshmallow bits. Heather C. wants to do whoopee pies, but Daniele pressures her to do a cookie since Yigit is already doing a marshmallow item. I hate this. I hate when this happens. This is not a multicourse dinner – it is not going to matter if they have two chocolate/marshmallow items. There is not this need for menu synergy. And it just reminds me of the concession stand episode of Top Chef DC, and I don’t want anything to remind me of Top Chef DC, ever. Anyway, Heather gets pushed into doing a peanut butter cookie, and says she’s a team player because she was an athlete in high school.

They get down to business. Erika talks about how she used to sell cookies to her teachers in school, and is doing a family recipe for a chocolate chip walnut cookie.

Eric is fretting that Heather C. has taken all the peanut butter. Eric tells her not to feel badly, but Crazy Eyes Morgan responds by saying “it’s fuckin’ sabotage time? Well, I can do that,” and steals all the butter. This seems to be not so much effective sabotage, since the Glee team got their ingredients settled at their stations prior to starting.

Then they talk about peanut butter for another 40 minutes. No joke – peanut butter is such a central figure in this episode that I start typing it as Peanut Butter, as though it’s a proper noun. Heather C. takes the leftover Peanut Butter to Eric. Morgan still won’t let them have butter (not that any of them ask). There’s not enough Peanut Butter for Eric, so he decides to do half Peanut Butter, half Nutella.

Seth talks to himself or the camera or someone about how there’s not time to brown butter for his financiers. He feels misunderstood by his teammates, and blah blah blah. He then puts coffee extract into his financiers instead of vanilla. Danielle points out that most kids won’t know what a financier is anyway.


Iuzzini thru! Eric tells Johnny about the Peanut Butter smackdown, and about the Nutella substitution. Iuzzini likes this idea (so do I – I’m totally going to make those at some point), but thinks Zac’s shortcakes are “a little ambitious for a bake sale.” He tells Malika to keep her focus. Malika talks about how tough her year’s been with her restaurant closing and her impending divorce and all.

5 minutes! Heather C. worries that her cookies are too simple. Time! Yigit thinks that having more elevated items will work to their team’s advantage.

Desserts Loft! Malika is thinking about what cooking means to her and what it means to her in this competition. She tells Erika and Heather H. that she’s thinking of leaving. Seth tells Crazy Eyes Morgan that he can put together flavors in his head that no one could think of. Crazy eyes Morgan tells us that he likes Seth, but thinks Seth is in a tough place in his life right now.

Next Day! Set up time! 30 minutes. There’s not a lot to say about this – they go through the procedure of how the patrons buy tickets and then turn them in in exchange for desserts that can either be boxed or eaten. There’s a lot of footage of them setting up in the school’s auditorium or cafeteria or whatever. My elementary school had a “Cafetorium.” I transferred there out of Montessori school in third grade, and immediately got freaked out by public school and its obviously low standards and weird made up words. Time. Commercial!


Back! The Cafetorium or wherever it is that they’re serving is flooded with children. We see a lot of footage of children eating. Malika talks about it being another day and how she’s in a positive mindset. There’s a lot of annoying cheering, and then the Rainbow Riders come in singing their atonal Top Chef song again.

I just want to beat all of these kids. I'm sorry, but I do. Seth apparently feels the same way, because the mere presence of children turns him into a cuss bomb.

The judges enter. I slightly love Daily Candy Girl’s dress, but not as much as I love Sylvia Weinstock.

They eat the gold team’s first: Erika’s Chocolate Chip Walnut Cookie; Eric’s Peanut Butter Krispy Bar; Morgan’s Vanilla Bean & Milk Chocolate Cupcake, which has already sold out; Malika’s Toffee Fudge Brownie; and Heather H’s Butter Cookie with Chocolate & Dulce de Leche Cream.

The judges love Erika’s cookie. Gail thinks the krispie treats have nice texture and lightness. They seem happy with Malika’s brownie.

Now time for the Green Team: Zac’s Strawberry Shortcake with Rainbow Sugar; Heather C’s Peanut Butter Cookie; Yigit’s Chocolate Caramel Pudding with Ginger, Hazelnut Crumble & Marshmallows; Daniele’s Coconut Cupcake with Salted Caramel Buttercream; and Seth’s Mocha Financier with Orange Creamcicle Sauce.


The judges find Zac’s shortcake a little dense. Yigit’s pudding is “super gingery” according to Daily Candy Girl. Seth didn’t give us a bake sale item – it’s “not a kids' dessert” according to Sylvia Weinstock. She also likes the icing on Daniele’s cupcake, but thinks the cake is dry. Heather H.’s peanut butter cookies are “maybe too simple” according to Daily Candy Girl.

Gail heads to the front of the cafetorium to announce that the results are in, and it’s very close – only $10 separates the teams. Glee Club raised $240, which if you can do math, means you know that Pep raised $250.

It’s been awhile since I went to High School, but I don’t think that’s the kind of change that gets you to cheer camp. Or New York. I’m pretty sure my 1993 High School Choir tour from Arizona to San Diego, by bus, cost more than that – and that was just for me, not the whole choir.

Anyway. Psyched to have earned enough to buy them one lunch off the dollar menu at McDonalds as they hitchhike to cheer camp, the Pep Squad, inevitably, does another cheer.

Gail announces that because this was a total set up by the reality show to exploit their young dreams, they’re adding another 0 to both amounts (still doesn’t seem like enough for the whole team. . .) and they’ll be donating $5000 to Santa Monica High School. Commercial.

Fakeback! Crazy Eyes Morgan does splits and the she-chefs talk about how all the high school girls love him. This is because they’re too young to have learned to recognize the signs of crazed abusive stalkeriness yet.

Really back. Stew --oops, I mean Pudding room. Seth talks about how much he hates the room.


In the Judges’ table room, we see the Gold/Pep team. Gail says there are three contenders for winner – Eric’s which, according to Iuzzini is a mature take on the rice krispie treat. Malika’s brownie – which she credits Eric with the recipe for, but elevated by adding the toffee – is another favorite. And Sylvia wants the recipe for Erika’s cookie.

Sylvia wants to pick all five of them for the winner, but the winner is. . .Eric! Yay! I like him. He doesn’t quite believe it happened, and wants to prove that what he does as a baker is valid.


After celebrating Eric’s win, the Green/Glee team heads into judges’ table. Gail reminds them that they were the losing team.

Danielle says that working as a team “went better than expected,” and that four of them worked together and Seth made a non-bake sale dessert and didn’t interact with the kids. Zac takes the flip side and says he thanks Seth for doing the prep work on their desserts . Yigit takes the center path, saying that “what happened today and what happened yesterday are two different things.”

Heather C. brings up the fact that she felt forced into making her boring cookie. Everyone then piles on about how supportive they’ve been of her (except for that time they made her make a boring cookie).

The judges cut this snipe fest off and get down to judging in earnest, beginning with Seth. Johnny Iuzzini tells him to get it out of his mind that it’s his role to educate people – his financier was perfect, but wrong for a bake sale. Sylvia Weinstock says Heather’s cookie was good but ordinary. Johnny Iuzzini found Danielle’s cake dry.

Sylvia thought Zac’s dessert was delicious, but not easy to eat. Iuzzini says his biscuits were not tender. Gail tells Yigit that his pudding was too gingery. Iuzzini points out that his dessert sold the least of anyone on the team.
Stew room. Yigit calls Heather C. “selfish” for defending herself.

Deliberation. Yigit may’ve wanted to teach kids about ginger, but he went overboard. Zac’s biscuits weren’t tender. Daily Candy Girl gets in her slurry line about Heather – “You could TASTE the resentment …in her COOKIE.” It still sounds sexual to me. Seth’s financier was out of place at the bake sale, but Iuzzini gives him credit for always stretching.

Danielle needs to work on the formula for her cupcake. But more interestingly, in the stew room, Danielle calls Seth a piece of shit and yells at him for the way he treats everyone in the competition. And then there’s more yelling and he says his food was delicious and her shit sucked and blah blah blah commercial.

Back! Yigit’s pudding was “way too aggressive for kids.” Zac’s was “not appropriate for a bake sale,” and his biscuit was off. Danielle’s cake was dry. Heather’s cookie was “ordinary and not inspired.” And Seth cooked for himself, not his clientele.

Gail tells. . . .Heather that her dessert didn’t measure up, and she should pack her tools and go. She says she should’ve stayed true to herself and done what she wanted to do. She doesn’t think it’s fair that she’s going home.


Next time! Flaming! Oh Jesus! I don’t care if I alienate everyone around me! It’s really scary! Weak Sauce! Lord Jesus Almighty. I don’t think he has the maturity level to handle the amount of pressure.. .