So last night was part one of the two part finale, yeah!! We get to see all four chefs arriving in Puerto Rico. Now let me tell you that as I watched I had two little “spoilers” in my head. I had read something yesterday, one person said they read a spoiler that said Antonia wins it all, and the second person said, well, I head that Anotina leaves before Lisa, and I thought there is no way, there is nothing Antonia could do so wrong to leave before Lisa, so I had these two thoughts in my head while I watched, and the only reason i mentioned them is because I will prove them in the remainder of the post.
Richard, Stpehanie and Antonia, oh yeah and Lisa, and yes it still irkes me to include her in this lineup. I still wonder if Tom had not be gone on that one challenge, if Lisa wouldn’t have went home instead of Dale, that is how it should have been. Oh yeah, and the call in question, who deserves to go home, 91% called in for LISA. I rest my case.
So the Quickfire, to make a classic Puerto Rican dish for a famous Puerto Rican chef, and no I have no idea how to spell what they were making or what they really were. When Padma was talking about them, I was thinking like fritters, but when they started making things and then serving them, I was a little confused. They had to use Plantains, which are not exactly like bananas, but look like them, in both of two things they had to make. Richard ended up in the bottom, the raw planatain did not go over well with the chef, and Antonia was in the bottom, on one dish she only had a planatain jam on it and none inside the dish. Lisa was liked, excuse me, I was floored. And Stephanie was liked, and in the end, Stephanie takes the QuickFire win!! YEAH! Her reward, we learn the next day, is to assign the sous chefs that will be helping everyone, now she could have pulled a Spike and assigned people who didn’t get along well together, but she didn’t, she picked people she thought would work well together, good girl! That’s the way to play it.
So they all go to a street party that night and the next day learn that they each will have a whole pig to use to make dishes for a party and the president or governor or someone important, sorry I didn’t catch what they said, at their mansion, with alot of people from the area. So the helpers are Dale, Niki, Andrew and Spike and Stephanie gets first pick and choses dale for herself, she says she’s knows Dale for about ten years and they work well together. Then she pairs Richard with Spike and Antonia with Niki, that leave Andrew with Lisa, who said when he walked out that it probably would not be good to work with him since Andrew still thinks Lisa threw him under the bus, which she probably did.
Throughout the cooking in this small kitchen, we never see dale get angry or mad, he cooks and is a big help to Stephanie, although at the end of the first day, when everone is rushing to try to find room in these little refridgators to put everything, the pork belly that they fixed first for her is left out overnight, big set back but they handle it and make the best with the other meats they have, Dale is upset over leaveing the meat out and says he will never forgive himself if she goes home. You know, I think we actually got to see more of the real Dale last night. I still like him alot!! And you know, everyone said only Dale complained about Lisa, well, we get Richard complaining about her negative attitude in the kitchen today.
So judges table….yep I am skipping the food, I am sorry, but I was so tired after VBS last night that I have no idea, but for a few things what all they cooked last night, I know it was pork and I know who did well and who didn’t, but I am short on details today. Sorry. Richard and Stephanie are called to the judges table first, so we know they are the tops. Even missing the pork belly, Stephanie still ends up on top, and let me just say that no where during the talk with the judges do you ever hear her mention anything about the pork belly! Classly lady! The judges loved both tables but in the end, they gave the win to Richard, who was a little shocked, and then when Padma told him he got a special prize, a new Camray, he was completely blown away, he had no idea! I didn’t either! Man they must have gotten some good sponsers this year!!
So Antonia and Lisa head to judges table and Lisa does that double chin, arms crossed, I’m mad at the world pose or stanch that she always does and defends her food, the pork felt as more of an afterthought than the main ingredient, the sauce and garnishement got more attention from her. Antonia, well, she went for rustic and put all her dishes on one plate, no, everything mixed together and you couldn’t tell which was what and then the other biggie, where pigeon peas were undercooked.
In the end, Antonia was packing her knives. WHAT?!?!? If you have told me before the show that this would happen I would never have believed it, wait, someone did tell me that before the show and I didn’t believe it. I thought there was nothing Antonia could do that would be bad enough to get her sent home. Of course, they come back into the room to tell Richard and Stephanie that she was leaving and they are visably shaken at this and shocked, and she walks out and they are still sitting there with this deer in the headlights kinda look, when Lisa calls them out for not congratulating her….what? That is what Stephanie said, she just looked at Lisa and said what? or sorry, congrats…like she was still in shock, well you know what did you expect. Then we get a PI of Richard and he says, you want a congrats, you got the bronze medal, woo-hoo! Well, we can tell that Richard doesn’t think Lisa is a threat. All I can say is that girl better be going home ASAP on the next show or I will scream! She has no business being there and I would hate to see the other two have a bad day and her win! That would make me ill!!
So….until next week…..keep cooking!
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