Top Chef Just Desserts: Caketastrophes and Adorable Senior Citizens

Zac, twee little elf
Walks down the disco dust trail
What was with that cake?

I’m torn, my little Weinstocks.

I’ve liked Zac through most of the competition, and I’m sure I’ll continue to like him when he reappears for whatever weird iterations his inevitable reality tv career takes on next.

Last night, though.. . I didn’t like him. I didn’t like Morgan. I gave up on Yigit weeks ago. The only contestant I could stand last night was Danielle – and yes, I know she has no chance of winning, which may perversely play into why I like her so much, but I also don’t think she’s anywhere near as bad or inept as the other chefs keep insisting she is.

Anyway. Between Morgan being a ragey, crazy eyed, totally agro casual homophobe and Zac being his twee bitchy little self in his continued pursuit of the title of Gayest Bravo Reality Personality in the History of Bravo Reality Programming, Ever, and Yigit being. .. Yigit, there were a scant few things I enjoyed about the episode. Let’s count them:

1. Ben
2. Sylvia!!!
3. Danielle
4. Baseball Truffle
5. Cake
6. Hubert Keller
7. Sylvia!!!!!

So au revoir, Zac. I won’t miss you for awhile, but I’m sure that someday I’ll look back at one of the earlier episodes and go “aw, he was such a sweet little thing,” my mind having completely obliterated the fact that you morphed into a Mean Girl Douchebag as the competition rolled onward.

Let’s just do this.

Morning! Los Angeles! Top Chef Just Desserts Loft. Yigit has a bad feeling about the day because of the “bump in the road” he had last challenge. So he walks around the loft shaving to get over it. Between this and Seth’s kitchen shave and Danielle’s bathroom cereal, I’m beginning to think pastry chefs are secretly a bunch of disgustoids. Anyway, he says he really wants to win because there’s never been a chef from San Francisco or a gay chef who won. Which. . .I’m stunned, but he’s right on that. Seems so impossible. And yet. . .

Morgan, in the meantime, feels lonely, because he misses his friends and son. He thinks the other three are allied against him. Odd, since two challenges ago it was three against three, and one of his three is still here, and she hated “Team Go Diva” as much as he did, so you’d think it would be two against two. Anyway, he thinks they’re all selfish brats, so it’ll feel great to beat them.

Quickfire! They enter the kitchen to find a shitload of chocolate and Francois Payard, who is apparently Morgan’s old boss in addition to being a James Beard winner. Zac is “scared out of my pants” to cook for him.

Gail reminds them that this is the last round before the finale, and blah blah Godiva blah blah product placement. So their challenge is to tell their life story through a box of Godiva chocolates

WHAT.

I don’t know about this, people. I love the “life’s journey” challenge on Masters, but representing your life. . .in chocolate. . .it just sounds like.. . .

WHAT.

Ugh. I know, I know. I should ignore the ridiculousness of it. It’s corporate sponsored bullshit, I’ll get over it. Sigh. They have to make four chocolates that tell the story of four different moments in their lives. One must be their “golden moment,” the moment they cherish above all others. $5 says Morgan picks the birth of his son as his.

Oh, and the winning chef’s chocolate story will have a piece based on it and be sold in stores nationwide. They have two hours.

Food flurry. Zac is making each of his truffles represent a different person in his life. Yigit is worried because proper bon bon technique generally takes a couple of days, not a couple of hours. Morgan doesn’t want to disappoint his old boss, whom he worked for in Brazil, where he met his wife. He says the defining moment in his life was his marriage, which didn’t work out, so the truffle that represents that will be bittersweet.

One of Danielle’s bon bons is shaped like a baseball to represent her bond with her dad over their love of baseball. I like her more with every passing week. Morgan says his “golden moment” truffle is in honor of the birth of his son. Called it. His son’s name is Dorian Zen, which means “the golden gift of peace.” Funny – I thought it meant “my yuppie parents gave me an asshole name.” His truffle will incorporate green tea for the Zen aspect. Yigit is signifying the moment he fell in love with his boyfriend, with flavors based on the almond croissants they shared when they met.

Zac’s golden moment is about his parents and their 35th anniversary, and uses dark chocolate for his mom and pretzels for his dad. YUM. Danielle’s golden moment is when she started her business, which has had some challenges, so she’s making a “Rocky Road.” Zac thinks Danielle’s truffles are “ridiculous.” He doesn’t get her because she looks like a cartoon character “and that what she cooks like.” Then he caps it off with this bit of douchery: “Danielle, you can’t cook. You look like Marilyn Manson. Please go home.”

Dick.

Fifteen minutes. Morgan can’t find a piping bag. Then he gives a crazy eyed interview about how Zac is hoarding piping bags, and drops about 90 eff bombs. Yigit’s truffles don’t mold correctly.

Already I pretty much hate everyone but Danielle in this episode.

Five minutes. Zac is using the blast freezer to speed up the contraction of the chocolate. Yigit’s strawberry ganache isn’t coming together. Time! Commercial.

Back. Gail and Payard begin tasting the truffles, starting with Zac’s his first represents his childhood, with a Peanut Butter & Wild Blueberry Milk Chocolate Bonbon. Next is a Rolled Truffle with Green Tea & Lemon, which represents his best friend who always throws her lemon into his tea at brunch (oooooooookay), and another friend is represented by a White Chocolate with Lemongrass, Lime & Ginger Filling. His “golden moment” is the Dark Chocolate Ganache with Pretzel & Feuilletine representing his parents’ 35th anniversary. Payard thinks the one representing his best friend is “too flat,” but the parents one is ‘very interesting.”

Danielle is next with her Coconut Ganache with Pineapple Jam, which is inspired by her family vacations to Hawaii. Next is her Milk Chocolate with Roasted Banana Filling inspired by her niece Hannah, and her dad/baseball inspired Milk Chocolate with Caramel Corn & Peanuts. Oh, I would eat the hell out of that. Her “golden moment” is the Almond & Marshmallow Milk Chocolate Nougat inspired by starting her business. There’s too much milk chocolate involved in this selection, but otherwise it sounds good. Payard likes the playfulness of the baseball truffle, and Gail says “it tastes like a baseball stadium. In a good way.”

Morgan is next, and presents his truffles, beginning with a Passion Fruit & Milk Chocolate Bonbon that represents his time in culinary school and discovering his passion for pastry. The Acai Rose Water Jelly on Top of a Bittersweet Ganache represents his marriage, which didn’t work out. The “golden moment” truffle is a Green Tea & White Chocolate Butter Ganache inspired by his son. Finally, his Mendiant with Rocher Filling represents Top Chef, because there are “two plates of pressure crushing my soul.” Yeesh. Danielle points out what a dumb thing that is to say given that Morgan wins ALL THE TIME. I guess the pressure of success is just grinding the hell out of him.

Finally we come to Yigit, who explains that he can only present three truffles because his strawberry ganache didn’t hold up. He presents his Milk & Dark Chocolate Ganache with Apricot Pate de Fruit, which represents moving from Turkey to America. His Coconut Milk & Chai Tea Bonbon represents his discovery of Buddhism. Finally, his “golden moment” is the Almond Praline & Caramelized Honey Ganache inspired by his boyfriend. Payard likes the boyfriend truffle. Morgan thinks Yigit’s falling apart.

Payard begins his response. Yigit can’t be judged because he didn’t finish. Zac’s was much more sweet and he “weesh to have stronger flavor behind.” Danielle’s flavors were interesting, and Morgan’s were nice looking, but the green tea was too sweet.

And the winner is. . .Morgan. Danielle is annoyed to have someone win who’s so “rrrr. Bah Humbug. Really?” As incoherent as that was, it was an exact quotation, and it makes perfect sense.

The chocolate that will be available in stores will be the Top Chef truffle. Danielle hopes they put a picture of Morgan’s grumpy face on the box.

Gail explains the elimination will have a special guest. And an adorable little old man who looks kind of like a turtle comes in. It’s Ben, Gail tells us. He and his wife are preparing to celebrate their 61st anniversary. What’s with the random anniversaries in this show? 128 years of the L.A. Times. 61 years of Ben’s marriage. Where are the nice round numbers, people?

Actually, I can kind of get behind the latter one. I pretty much feel like if you manage to both stay alive and stay married for more than fifty years, you get to celebrate the crap out of every anniversary – galas and vow renewals every year if you feel like it. So for the gala celebration Ben and his wife are having, each chef has to make an anniversary cake.

To give us some background on the couple, Ben tells us he met his wife at a beach party that he didn’t want to go to. She was wearing a bright yellow two piece bathing suit, and lured him into the surf (that minx!). They were married two years later. SO CUTE.

Gail explains that the winner of this challenge will get $15,000 courtesy, natch, of Dawn. They’ll be judged on the look and flavor of their cake.

Shopping. They have 30 minutes and $300. Yigit is pissed off at himself for the quickfire. 13 minutes. Danielle thinks Morgan is overconfident, and that always being on the top might give him a long way to fall. She says she’s ok with people thinking she’s the underdog. Commercial.

Back! 10 hours to prep. They’ll also have two hours to finish up tomorrow. Zac says this is definitely not his challenge, and he’s incredibly nervous.

Gail enters and says they’re going to spend a little time with Ben and his wife. His wife is Sylvia Weinstock! Yay!!!!!! I love her!! I love her so much!!!! Zac reminds us that she’s the cake queen, so it’s a huge deal to make a cake for her.

They brainstorm with Sylvia and Ben, which would’ve been helpful before they went shopping, since part of the brainstorming includes finding out what flavors the couple likes, but whatever. All that’s important is that we get to see Sylvia and Ben’s adorable wedding picture, where Sylvia is wearing a chic grey dress and carrying pink flowers, and hear Sylvia say “sex is a wonderful thing.” Then we learn from Ben that after the beach party, they went back to her cousin’s apartment and made out under a piano. DAMN, that’s some moves, Ben! Anyway, they’re adorable, and I want to hug the crap out of them.

The chefs get back to work. Morgan is inspired by the “smoochin’ under the piano” and the pink flowers in Sylvia’s bouquet. He wants to see Danielle, Yigit, and himself in the finale because Zac is the most likely to throw someone under the bus. “Zac would turn your oven off, set your mise en place on fire, and stab you in the back.”

Danielle was inspired by Sylvia’s grey dress and pink bouquet, and is making a grey cake with pink flowers. Grey cake sounds like a risk. Zac is doing two cakes – one for Sylvia and one for Ben – bound together with Passion Fruit ice cream to represent their passion. Danielle is annoyed by Zac’s continual running to Yigit for advice.

Iuzzini thru! In the world’s most awkwardly cut and edited talking head, he talks about how daunting the challenge is. He thinks it’s great that Zac is going against his disco dust tendencies to do something that really represents the Weinstocks, and Morgan is proving that he learned from the previous Sylvia challenge. He thinks the combinations in Yigit’s cake might work against him. He thinks Danielle is trying to show that she belongs in the finale. Well, dur, Johnny. Isn’t that pretty much what everyone in the last challenge before the finale in every reality show is trying to do?

59 minutes. Zac gets his base assembled and realizes the cake isn’t what he intended. He frosts it in a smurfy blue color, which I don’t think is the best possible solution to his problem. And then Morgan hordes some piping bags to get back at the previous piping bag hording.

Yigit scrambles to bubble wrap his cakes. He feels good about the time left for assembly, but he’s concerned about texture. Morgan wraps his cart in plastic. Time!

Next day! They head to Ben and Sylvia’s friends’ house to assemble the cake with 2 hours to set up. Morgan finishes up his work in a matter of minutes. Yigit thinks his cake is way too simple. Zac’s cake. . .oh, dear. It looks horrible. So he pulls out the disco dust and white chocolate and turns it into a weird beach scene.

Time! The guests arrive, and the chefs start describing their cakes. Sylvia is wearing the best old lady couture ever – a loose fitting burgundy jacket with a sequined collar. I kind ofwant to get one for my great aunt for her birthday. If anyone knows who makes it, tip me off in the comments.

The judges start viewing the cakes, beginning with Morgan’s . It’s a simple white cake with an adorable piano on top. The top tier of the cake is Lemon Sponge & Raspberry Panna Cotta, while the bottom is Dark Chocolate Sponge with Ganache. We zoom in on the piano. It’s totally cute – filled with pink roses to represent Sylvia’s wedding bouquet and he’s got a little yellow bikini top draped over the bench. Adorbs –everyone should have a 61st anniversary cake that implies they were trampy back in the day. Johnny likes Morgan’s topper. Sylvia thinks the yellow cake has nice texture, and also likes the chocolate.


Danielle’s grey frosted Chocolate Cake with Sour Cherry Compote & Greek Yogurt Ice Cream is next. It has 3 large roses on top to represent their 3 daughters and 6 smaller ones to represent their grand kids. Hubert Keller thinks the “shocolate sponge” is moist, and Sylvia likes the filling but not the “battleship grey” color. Johnny says that 61 years of marriage could be like a battleship, and Sylvia says “THANK YOU!”

Oh. How. I. Love. Her.

They move onto Zac’s insane beachscape cake, which has a Top Tier of Dark Chocolate & Fresh Raspberry, and a Bottom Tier of Lemon Sponge & Raspberry Jam. He thinks his flavors are good but visually a “caketastrophe.” Sylvia thinks “it’s not elegant enough,” and would be “a great Bar Mitzvah cake.” Payard thinks the cocoa powder in the chocolate cake is almost burned, but the lemon sponge is good.

Finally they get Yigit’s yellow cake with a cute pair of Sylvia style glasses on it. The Top Tier is Almond Cake with Chocolate Mousse, while the bottom is Sponge Cake with Lemon Cream, which cuts unevenly. Johnny likes the crème fraiche sorbet, but Hubert thinks his pate de fruits is too tough. Sylvia likens it to “a woman who wears all her jewelry. Don’t do it.”

SQUEE.

Danielle feels really confident in what she did that night. Zac knows he didn’t do the best job, but still thinks he deserves to be in the top 3, but Morgan doesn’t. Seriously? The dude won almost every freaking challenge, you weird little elf. If he doesn’t “deserve” to be in the finale, then who in the bluedilly fuck does?

Commercial.

Fakeback. It’s about rituals. Morgan talks about always being the last person to leave the loft and close the door.

Really back. In the pudding room, Morgan makes an analogy about how the competition is like climbing. One last sports analogy to remind us all that he’s a straight guy. They toast “to survival.”

Judges’ Table. Gail reminds them of the challenge and the rewards. They begin with Danielle. Keller thought it was very imaginative to have the piano keys on it. Payard thought the cake was moist and the flavors were good together. Iuzzini remarks that grey is an unappetizing color.

Moving to Yigit, Iuzzini tells him he overthought his cake and made it too complicated, but praises his flavored buttercream. Payard says his cake was the most elegant. Gail calls him out on the pate de fruits again, because the texture forced a separation in the cake.

Payard liked the simplicity of Morgan’s idea, but thinks the panna cotta needed more acidity. Keller thinks the chocolate cake was a little dry. Iuzzini says the shell border on his cake was uneven.

Zac admits to having struggled on the challenge. Keller says all the layers helped the cake stay moist. Iuzzini says the cake didn’t represent the Weinstocks now, and it should’ve been more mature. Zac then talks about how excited he is to be here, and how it upsets him that Morgan wins a lot of money and “couldn’t care less.”

The irrelevance of this all upsets me so much. If I had to judge one of these things and someone started to pull that "who wants it more" shit, I would go OFF.

Morgan says “it’s not part of my character to jump up and down and flail and sing showtunes,” and that he’d rather remain calm than “freak out like a little girl.” Zac goes bug eyed at that. Who can blame him?

They return to the pudding room. Zac says “it’s personality, it’s not personal.” That’s so bullshitty. What could possibly be more personal than your personality? Hey, it's nothing personal -- I just think you're a horrible human being! Love you!

Deliberation. The judges start with Zac’s over the top cake and Morgan’s restrained one. Danielle’s was grey but delicious. Yigit’s was much too complicated inside, but beautiful outside. Commercial.

Back. Iuzzini says they’ve all done a tremendous job in the competition, but unfortunately only 3 can go to the finals.

Payard announces the winner of the challenge. .. .Danielle! Yay!!!!! She’s the only one I like anymore. She pogo bounces up and down and hugs Morgan. She’s in the finale, and she’s got $15,000 “courtesy of Dawn Hand Renewal”. She hugs everyone, and heads back to the pudding room to wait.

So it’s between the three guys. Morgan played it too safe. Zac put too much of himself into Sylvia and Ben’s cake (thatswhatshesaid). Yigit has yet to master the art of restraint.


Gail tells. . .Zac that his dessert didn’t measure up. He admits to having made “a cakewreck,” but he’s still bagging on how “rubbery” Morgan’s cake was. He says he’s invigorated as a chef, and is ready to go out and kick some ass.

Next. Uh-oh! I’m bustin out all the stops. Danielle’s an idiot. I’m Phoenix rising from the ashes*. The sorbet is really icy. It’s quite impressive. One of you is the first winner of Top Chef Just Desserts.