TOP CHEF PHOTOCAP: Big Easy, Big Suckage

Nooooooo!!!!

Apologies for the slight delay in getting my Top Chef finale photocap up. I had a minor bottleneck of work to do, and quite honestly, it’s all for the best because I needed that time to mourn the tragic death of Carla’s run at the title. I’m not usually one to hate on Top Chef, but this was seriously the most disappointing finale EVER. I knew as soon as Carla got paired with Casey (the self-proclaimed “hot chef” of season three), she’d be in trouble. Casey, if you remember, has a kind of toxic presence in the kitchen. I believe all of her friends went home on her season (hence the feeling that she’d been thrown under the “guilt blanket,” whatever that is). To be fair, Carla’s big problem has always been a lack of confidence in herself, which has often led her down the wrong path. She ultimately has to be held responsible if she decides to use Casey’s HORRIBLE suggestions. Still… why, Casey, WHY??? Since the finale aired, there’s actually been some back and forth, mostly from Casey, who has spewed nothing but venom towards Carla and the producers, and while I suppose her ranting was supposed to exonerate her from any wrongdoing, it just makes me kind of hate her.

Meanwhile, I can’t say that I was totally surprised by the Hosea “The Brillo Pad” Rosenberg taking the title. The producers could not have tipped their hand more obviously if they had tried. For the past seven or eight weeks, episodes have begun with Hosea adamantly informing us that “Stefan is my main competition! I have to beat him!” This would then be followed by Stefan shrugging and saying in his rapid-fire staccato patois, “It is nothing. It means nothing to me. There is no competition.” Surely the producers were gearing us up for some sort of showdown, and since there really was never any major confrontation between the two at any point, the logical inference would have to be that the two would be squaring off in the finals. And given that, Stefan was being made out to be such a bad guy and such a frontrunner that it was clear (to me at least) that Hosea was going to slide in as what the producers were hoping would be a likable, All-American underdog hero. Eh.
Anyway, I could toot my own clairvoyant skills for hours, but I’ll spare you. The point is that I found the finale predictable and bland, much like the winner himself. Of course, having never had any of the chefs’ food, I admit that I’m not truly qualified to say whether or not any one person deserved to win. However, as a mere spectator, Hosea’s food never inspired me, allured me, or intrigued me. Meanwhile, Stefan, Carla, and Fabio (who wuz robbed!) all had put out dishes over the course of the season that I had most certainly wanted to dig into. And on that basis, I’d have preferred either of them to Hosea. Oh well. The good news is now we get to see Hosea’s gawky grin and stupid goatee reappear on Bravo for years to come. Yay.
Actually, there really was some good news with this finale. A) We got a second joyous week of Gail, who I love (just in case some of you think I hate her — the bit is an act, people. A fictional dynamic between her and Padma!). And B) Padma laid the smack down on Toby Young, who after endorsing Stefan’s dessert, was met with this steely response from the hostess: “It was pedestrian at best.” Ohhh snap! At least we can always rely on the judges to keep things fun.
Onto the photocap…

“I look like a twat in this picture. So what? Who cares? That’s life.”

“Hey Carla, mind if I WRECK everything?”

Padma: “Unfortunately my dear friend Gail Simmons couldn’t be here for this photo as she heard a truck of beignets had overturned on Bourbon Street, bless her heart.”

Fabio: “Well a-done, Hosea. This is eight a-hundred years of congratulatory experience right a-here.”

It’s called Top Chef, not Top Cloud of Liquid Nitrogen.

“Oh hello there. My dear friend Gail Simmons will be joining us shortly. She’s presently occupied with a Bobbing-For-Crayfish competition, bless her heart.”

“Congratulations, Hosea. Maybe next time we’ll steal all the premium ingredients from YOU and give YOU the worst sous-chef. Hahaha… just kidding. But seriously…”

“And remember the time when Gail ate that sausage off the floor? HAHAHAHAHA!!!”

“We really found it to be pedestrian at best; although, for the record, my dear friend Gail Simmons did say she could eat it all night. Then again, you could make ice cream out of old pencil erasers and she’d still eat that.”

Padma: “Oh dear. It looks like Gail just got in from Mardi Gras. Is she eating her beads? Someone should tell her they’re not candy.”

“I scrub all my dishes with my chin!”