There is a place where the episode ends
And before the show begins
And there the chefs grow soft and white,
And there Jen's face burns crimson bright,
And there the brothers prep for their fight
To ballotine a thing.

Eli fights for Blaise, the Huck to his Tom Sawyer,
absurd, abstract and color blind, just like Indigo Montoya.
For Kev it's honor; for Jen it's pride
For Mike it's stabbing his brother in the side
But for all the chefs there's no nook to hide
Except in the place where the episode ends.

A chicken inside a duck tucked inside a pheasant
A tranny mess, fucked in a dress, triple stuffed protein ain't pleasant.
Jen triumphed though Eli snorted
Mike harumphed but Jen retorted
Kev and Bry were kind and all transported
To the place where the episode ends.

Lamb or salmon, two garnishes and no room for excuses.
[Technical perfection is, after all, the point of all Bocuses.]
Padma, clad in black and white,
Sent the chefs to stew the night
chew their cud and think what's right
to cook in the the place where the episode ends.

And lo, what an expert panel sat, chaired by Thomas Keller
D. Boulud and T Collicks and lotsa other fellas
And how they ate and dissected
Deconstructed and resurrected
Offered harsh critique and invective
In the place where the episode ends.

So the team served their protein on a mirrored platter
Flaws reflected and fillets thin. Some fillets were fatter.
Kev's was simple but Eli's lamb raw
Jen's salmon fishy, Mike's caught in the caw
Thomas Keller liked not what he saw
In the place where the episode ends.

Would any hack it in real competition, one shudders to think.
In a world gone wrong, the nation on the brink,
would you trust Mike's bouche to amuse?
or Eli's fusion not to confuse
or Jen's nerves not to torpedo her rouxs
In the place where the episode ends.

En fin, it was infant Eli whose head he had to lose
And crying he left blubbering "J'accuse!"
But all's fair in love and war and in the Bocuse
In the place where the episode ends.

[Apologies and deep gratitude to Shel Silverstein and Mike Byhoff.]

The fasten seat belt sign chimed off and Nigella Lawson, though tired from her Stansted to Vegas direct, lept from her seat. Anticipation, Satyricon lust, anxiety, hope warred in the ample playground of her bosom. Her nipple twitched in anticipation like a runner at the starting blocks. "Will Padma recognize me?" she wondered, grabbing madly at her Blackberry, "Will I recognize her?" The two food porn actresses would be meeting for the first time since they shared a night of wild Sapphic passion at the Food and Wine Classic in Aspen last year. There, on a blanket of pine needles, Nigella had found herself in the circle of Padma's love. And though time and distance had cooled the warmth of that moment, Nigella hoped they could rekindle that spark and that in the hotter climes of Las Vegas, it could flame to contagion.

The whip-p0or-whill mourned the sun as it rose over the Top Chef complex. Inside, six chefs remained, a bunch of culinary Koreshians: Kevin the Redeemer, Eli the Pissant Devil, Jennifer the Dirty Angel, Mike the Mephistopheles, Bryan the CFO of The Afterlife and Robin The Insidious Echo. The chefs rose and entered into the intestines of the Venetian, a hotel that has recreated Italy but without the history, the Vespa fumes, the marble and the art. In a service kitchen, a phone rings. For the Quickfire, they must cook Padma breakfast. She's above them, in a bathrobe, glowing.

In a bathrobe, glowing, Padma wants breakfast. She has company, glowing and breakfast-wanting too. Things went well when Nigella cleared customs. Padma had had a rough week, nay, a rough year, but had buffed her skin to an Indian summer and had sugared her crotch to depilated perfection. Her landing strip was ready. Her breast too heaved with excitement and anticipation and also, since she had just taken a monster hit from Tom Colicchio's dragon bong, coughing. A speck of spittle, like a diamond froth, flecked her lips like in a Marilyn Minter photograph. As soon as Nigella and Padma beheld each other they held each other, one folding into the other like dough to dough. Later, they made love, watched The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 ("This is the most unrealistic movie I've ever seen," said Padma, "and not in a good way either.") and then went back to their twin beds and slept in their bathrobes. They were hungry for eggs.

Eli, fat baby, who doesn't eat breakfast because he's usually up so late at night playing Scrabble with his Mom at the home he shares with his parents, won. His recipe, a morning play on a Reuben sandwich, will be featured in a Top Chef cookbook. "Cool," he said, over and over. "That's cool, Eli," said Kevin and it was clear he did not think either Eli or his recipe were cool. "Cool,' said Eli, in response.

Doing a grave disservice to Las Vegas casinos, the contestants were then sent to be "inspired" by Las Vegas casinos. Eli attends the saddest Circus in the world, Circus Circus. A concession stand sold achos. Fake fare unfair games, manned by real carnies, preyed like leopards on the fat, the slow, the sick, the fannypacked hasbeen and neverwere calves suckling from the teat of capitalism and getting only thin sour milk. Eli correctly noted, "There's no circus at Circus Circus," and headed to a nearby brothel in Ely, NV, to pay $200 for a halfie. Robin went to the Bellagio and got her mind blown by the color there. "I'm an artist," she unhelpfully and incorrectly explains. Mike went to New York New York, home of fake September 11th and began to build a tenuous connection between firefighters and chicken wings. Bryan soberly assessed a shark tank somewhere. Jennifer gots to get completely hammered watching a wizard and wandered aimlessly across a never-ending pattern of carpet vines. Kevin fondled a dolphin. [Kevin: See The Cove and fondle dolphins no more.]

After their breakfasts, Padma felt gassy and Nigella felt jetlagged. Worse, the night of passion had left smoldering ashes. Worse still, it was by the light of their watch fire in the night, that each saw looming over the other the cast of characters and the accumulated responsibility that throttled their love. Padma worried that Nigella couldn't be the mother she wanted for her child. Nigella worried they could not make up for distance and the distance between their years. They knew their love was a fragile Chihuly flower, a suspended iridescent air bubble racing to the water's surface where it would burst to oblivion. Whether she saw its disappearance as freedom or as death was a secret neither Nigella nor Padma wanted the other to know.

Things were tense at the judge's table. Toby Young, like a child acting out during his parents' divorce, tried to break the ice by making some horrendous jokes. No one paid attention. NIgella tried to concentrate but it was all she could do to not break into tears. Her love was intact and at the same time irretrievable, like a memory beyond the grasp of recall or an insect in amber. For her part Padma, caught in a crossfire of emotion, sank into a slo-mo catatonia. The chefs stood in front of her close but far like in a tilt-shift photo, their words mere sounds and their food dead to a tongue once so passionately entangled. Toby Young, a tattler twat, prattled on, prawn-faced and shrimp-souled, a sad malignant skin tag on television, a twit melanoma given a platform, made even more profane by the love and beauty so close to him passing unheeded and uncaught like waves of a deeper frequency to which he will never be attuned.

It was either Sadcircusfatboy Eli, who tried to make soup from white chocolate and cashew nuts, or Cancertalkbot Robin, who made Nerf Panna Cotta, that would be going home. That much was clear. I had hoped it would be both. It was only Robin, who cried and didn't once bring up cancer. [She had cancer.] Her passing was less gleeful than I had hoped. It was more of an execution than a crime of passion. I won't miss her; no one will. She was no good. But neither is Eli and I am sure his parents miss him. Eli, you should go home. Your mother misses you.

The human soul is a stupid thing. Nigella and Padma held hands on the way to the airport. They weren't trying to recapture something they never had had anyway but merely grasp what was left. Hope trumps memory and the heart wisdom. Winsome and weeping, the two women, cocooned in the back seat of a Suburban packed with their baggage, cut through the Vegas traffic. They were deaf to the horns, deaf to reason, deaf to anything but each other. They were in an air bubble hurtling to the surface. Padma sighed and nestled into the nape of Nigella's neck. "We'll always have Vegas," she whispered. Nigella just laughed, looked out at the Strip where the neon lights, shining in the hot sun, futily glowed and awaited the night.

Thank you to Bruce and Mikey Byhoff and hero intern Yoni Lotan for the video.

If dreams were lightning, thunder were desire, my old house would have burnt down a last night around ten. Strange but not a stranger, Top Chef Las Vegas has entered into its golden dotage, the blossom before the burn. Padma's letting it all hang out and dammit if last night wasn't one of the most satisfying episodes of the season. Come on guys, let's head to the N Resort.

The Quickfire challenge was only okay: contestants were forced to cook a television dinner based on a show decided upon by the editors of T.V. Guide, which, apparently, has editors. Only two salient detail warrant mention: Mike Isabella—a font of bullshit, an oasis of crap, the Trevi Fountain of excreta, the Hanging Gardens of Assless Chaps—has never seen Seinfeld. Apparently he was too busy watching CSPAN and reading Kafka. No, he wasn't. Statistically, a recent study shows, he was most likely to be sitting on his couch, masturbating to cfnm porn in thirty second clips because he is afraid his mom would see if he paid for it. And he did this for years. Also, Padma Lakshmi likes onesies. No shame there. The lady simply can't be bothered with a skirt and a top. In this way, she's like Mick Jagger in Cocksucker Blues. That's not the only way she's like Mick Jagger in Cocksucker Blues, it turns out. But more on that later. To sum up: Kevin wins because Kevin wins and seems utterly nonplussed by winning a suite of Monogram appliances since they're kinda crap.

Onto the Elimination Challenge. It wasn't at the F Resort. Instead the happy crew would head to Tom's own restaurant, Craftsteak. They would shut the motherfucker down for one night and let these bunch of monkeys take over. I say monkeys because Mike looks look a bonobo, Jennifer looks like a patas monkey, Kevin is an adorable Spider Monkey, Robin is a red colobus, Eli is an orangutan, Bryan and Mike Voltaggio are both mandrills. [Twenty minutes later, I emerge from the Monkeyhole of the internet. It's so cute in there!] The menagerie go back to the primate enclosure to plan a menu featuring steaks. A bunch of fools. To assume they'd be cooking steak at a steakhouse in Top Chef's bizarro universe is as presumptuous an assumption as expecting that when you swipe your unlimited Metrocard you'll gain entry into the subway and not, as the turnstile turns and you through it, end up on the 30th floor of a tuna salad skyscraper.

The next morning as they rummage through the meat locker, Tom walks in all smiley-like. Behind trails a small human fetus with a wide smile and a beanie. It's Natalie Portman. "Hi, guys!" she says and cum gushes out of every orifice Mike Isabella owns. He cries cum tears and sweats cum sweat. From his gums, cum oozes down his teeth. Jennifer, who is standing near him, is visibly shaken. Portman mentions she's adventurous oh and also, she doesn't eat meat and all that meat they had picked out, they might as well slap back together with meat glue, reanimate and put out to pasture because they will be cooking hippie tonight. Fuck you very much Jonathan Safran Foer, for so many things at this point.

Every one scrambles and goes through the motions of feeling passionate about not cooking meat. It was very boring to watch, in my opinion. So instead I looked up Natalie Portman on IMDB which not only wasted time but reminded me that there are two types of people in this world: People Who Liked Garden State and People Who Didn't. I would be happy never to meet the latter again in my life because that movie was the worst. Zach Braff is a crime against humanity and the only thing Natalie Portman ever did that was okay was The Professional.

Padma mentions little pricks at the end of her tongue. Tom blushes. Salman Rushdie hits himself in his gigantic forehead and says, "That used to be my little prick!" Then he calls Cindy Adams.
Portman mentions that it is important to be able to cook vegetarian because she often goes into restaurants that don't offer vegetarian options and demands she is served and they have to do it because....she is famous/pretty/rich? All those things will fade, my friend. In a few years you'll go to Momofuku and demand tofu pork buns and David Chang will burst from the kitchen like some sort of avenging angel and shove pork belly down your gullet. And you'll be trying to scream, "LOOK ME UP ON IMDB! I'M SOMEBODY!" but you won't be able to pronounce your words and then you'll just be another sad fallen vegetarian from a Roald Dahl short story.

And now, I'm all out of juice, I've shot my wad too early to celebrate properly the passing of Mike Isabella, who didn't know leeks aren't proteins because he is stupid. I am happy he is gone and happy he is gone before Robin if only so, before he is led off to the shed, he is fully debased, his soul crushed and owned before his body is ground to dust. Mike Isabella, may you never show your face again. Robin Leventhal, may your contest end in defeat next week. Padma, may you never tire of little pricks on the tip of your tongue and may we never tire of you tasting them.

Thank you to Mike Byhoff who took a lot of time to get the laughs to line up.

There are eight chefs—Dirty Jen, Angel Kevin, Deadweight Laurine, Humanjunk Isabella, Cancer, Fatbaby Eli and the Brothers Voltaggio—left standing and a gaping hole in their hearts after Ass Fuck was booted off last episode. In the vacuum a new protagonist has entered. Her name is rancor and she's real mean. Everyone hates Cancer; Cancer hates everyone; Michael Voltaggio hasn't yet learned yelling "Relax!" at somebody does not make them obey—and conversely, yelling "Obey!" at someone doesn't make them relax. He continues to antagonize his older brother Bryan who is one day going to pummel Michael bloody. I personally feel a great deal of hatred for Mike Isabella who, if he expended as much effort on cooking well and not being such an ass as he does on whiny sycophantic writhing to avoid responsibility, might be a good chef.

At the M Resort kitchen—M Resort! M Resort! I get it, M Resort! It's like a series of small concussions that leave dangerous tau levels by the end of season—the Quickfire challenge is a culinary exquisite corpse. Actually, I think, along with the Mise en Place Relay Race, one of the best challenges. Padma is wearing some whack shirt with words printed on it and next to her is fish chef Rick Moonen, who looks like Brian Lehrer but plus thirty pounds. The challenge was essentially straightforward and on some levels a more apt metaphor for sustainability than the producer's intended (we are largely blind to the generations that have come and ignorant of the generations to follow. We inherit this Earth as guardians and do our best not to fuck it up too bad. At the end, a bearded angelic man will the eschatological janitor, trying to clean up the end of the world, approx. 2012.) A more trenchant moment, metaphorically, metaphysically and meta-y—is when the cheftestants were asked to pull knives out of an unknowable block and there was nothing written on them, save for two knives inscribed, First Choice and Second Choice, respectively. Isn't that almost Calvinism exactly? Calvinism mixed with Existentialism equals deep sadness. The knife has nothing on it. The knife has nothing on it. The knife has nothing on it. Then you die. Nothing, brought to you by the makers of You.

On to Restaurant Challenge! Well-advisedly, the producers decided to forego the dumbest part of the challenge: decorating. Perhaps five seasons of very ugly looking restaurants is enough. Instead the teams—The Great Blue Yonder (JenSexJen, Wee sleekit, cow'rin', tim'rous beastie Laurine, Stairway to Kevin, Meatus Murder) against The Bolsheviks (Volcanaggio, The Dad, Fatboy Fat, and Ask Me About Herb-a-Life)—had only to concentrate on the food. They went shopping. They talked about some shit. Kevin et al took their name—and to some extent their concept—from Mission style architecture, which was brainy. The Bolsheviks chose Revolt because, you see, R is for Robin, E is for Eli, and the first syllable of the last name of one half of the team is Volt. And then because Communism is cool and Yay for Stalin and Yippee for Castro and hats off to Mao (and while we're at it, kudos to Ceauşescu!). Intonation is no match for ideology.

Everyone who has read this far has seen the episode, I'm guessing so let's—as is by now tradition—Word Tivo to the outcome. Some quick notes before we press fast forward: Mike Voltaggio can be a real dick sometimes. Robin probably doesn't deserve the scorn heaped upon her. Bryan Voltaggio really faltered here but I wonder if—in the larger scheme of things—whether it is more important to be an okay person (or at least edited down to an okay person) with whom to work and a very very good chef than it is to be an excellent chef but a complete twatty tool. Eli is full of himself and not a great talker. Note to Eli: You are not a great talker. Kind of nasal. Thankyousomuch. Thankyousomuch. Thankyousomuch. Now take your 10K and put that toward getting your own place. Oh! And also, tuck in your fucking shirt, you knob. Just because your E is backwards doesn't mean you can dress down. Have you seen Young Stalin? Sure he had smallpox scars but he cut a dashing figure heisting banks in Georgia.

And now to the Mission! Misery Mission. Mission To Sad. In short, everything sucked. Nothing is sacred. Jen is in the weeds. And a liar. Molly Ringwald was In the Weeds. Eric Bogosian was In the Weeds. Jennifer Carroll was the all-night partier in Slacker. She couldn't cook her fish, but at least she could identify it. Her butter sauce broke which, in case you are wondering, means the fats and the oils separated (I made that up. If someone actually knows, please inform.) Kevin did one thing okay (pork, duh) and effed up the other (lamb). Fartdick sounding-enthusiast Mike Isabella made two boring dishes (ah, the embassy of mediocrity). Laurine just in general tarted about in the front of the house with few responsibilities and even less ability to fulfill them. In the end, she went home, of course. She probably shouldn't have based on one night's performance (the fault rested firmly at SexJenSex's feet) but we all know Top Chef's unities and rule of law credentials are hooey.

At 10:15pm, when the episode ended, some lessons had been learned: No one is infallible. Steaming clams to order is a bad idea. Sustainable fisheries are good. And when we finally do pull the cosmic knife from the block of life, on it will be written Nothing. Nothing. Nothing.

Thank you to Jonathan Lotan for the video. Mike Byhoff, feel better soon.

A mustache grew in Las Vegas last night, on the upper lip of Charlie Palmer. Something was raised last night in Las Vegas, the voices of the brothers Voltaggio. A whine from the mouth of Eli issued under the Nevada firmament. Something eclipsed the hot sun, momentarily, the large hat of Padma Lakshmi moving sedately, pausing, pregnantly. Someone survived cancer last night. Someone braised pork belly, and as the harpsichord of the heavens plucked dawn's strings, one pig met his posthumous fame, dancing a little jig on the Etch-a-Sketch of the public consciousness before being shaken again to oblivion. Garçon, fill me up!

The scene opens with Charlie Palmer, Matt Dillon plus age plus hair plus talent, in the kitchen, along with Padma Lakshmi wearing Nancy Sinatra boots and—frankly, I couldn't tell you what else because her face is so pretty I only look at that but my wife says it wasn't pretty what she was wearing which makes her 0/2 (with the jumpsuit). Charlie Palmer is to American cuisine what Evander Holyfield was to heavyweight boxing: the real deal. New Yorkers probably know him best for the recently re-opened Aureole but he also has some sort of Boschian enterprise in Las Vegas wherein wine-angels flit around transforming grape juice into pure profit. Another measure of his caliber is that two of the top contestants, the Brothers Voltaggio, worked with him in his kitchen, Bryan for ten years, Mike as Executive Chef for one. Palmer had the honor of announcing the Quickfire Challenge: pairing food with some shitty new prepackaged chip snacks called Adventis, Adrongia or something. Dementia? Advertia? Advertia, yeah, that sounds about right. Anyway, having a chef as high caliber as Mr. Palmer judge a challenge based on a chip is like having John Currin judge a painting contest based on painting with diarrhea. And you couldn't use a brush either. Anyway, Eli won the quickfire. That was fine by all involved.

Everybody who is reading this—I assume—was present for Hippity's liveblog so there isn't any need for me to rehash the particulars of the Elimination Challenge. Suffice to say, contestants were asked to pair their pork dish to a particular wine for Charlie Palmer's big charity event Pigs & Pinot which benefits Share Our Strength. They drew knives indicating which part of the pig they would use and then Padma led in a Mangalitsa hog .The contestants quickly clustered around the terrified animal, no one wanting to plunge their dagger first. Finally, Jennifer Carroll who said, "I did this shit all the time in North Philly," gouged out the animals voicebox—which she made a lovely souffle from—so at least one couldn't hear the beast's cries as the other contestants solemnly but fanatically set about carving up the still thrashing animal. Kevin hacked off the beast legs and as it wriggled like a beached porpoise to the studio's door in a desperate escape attempt, Mike Isabella attempted to tackle it. Wet with blood, however, it shot pigskin-like, across the room and into a boiling vat of Charlie Palmer.

Contestants went home to wash away their sins in the purifying ritual of being annoyed all by the same person and we viewers at home too were abluted by our communal hatred for Robin Leventhal. Robin Leventhal, \self-righteous cancer-surviving yogi. Well known is my disgust—although a disgust tempered by commenter defenses which struck me as reasonable—of Robin's cashing in on her unfortunate medical history for a cheap Quickfire victory. But how her cancer had metastasized to pervade every shred of her being with a holier-than-thou survivor mentality wasn't fully revealed until the talkative tan tank was left to scribble in the lines of her own insanity with a never-ending monologue. Sure, Eli is a whiny kid but the rest of the contestants—even Angel Kevin—can't stand her. What's a poor wretch to do in her midst? Continually kowtow to her story; spend the rest of ones life with one hand cupping her drybreast to feel her heartbeat and the other patting her on the back? Her life-affirmation is deadening. Her cancer may yet prove fatal for it has rendered Robin chronically insufferable.

But lest one imagine all victims are craggy cheesefaced loonies, one need only look at the episode's guest, Food+Wine Editor Dana Cowin who, in 2008, was diagnosed with stage III breast cancer which required "chemotherapy, a double mastectomy, removal of the ovaries and fallopian tubes, radiation, and breast reconstruction"
Amazingly, in all of her 45 seconds on screen, Dana Cowin didn't mention her cancer once! Not once! Instead she talked about the food and the flavors. She liked Jennifer's, she loved Michael Voltaggio's, she lerved Bryan Voltaggio's, she coo'd for Kevins. But did she say, "Oh, this pork rillette is like the cat food I had to eat when I was getting chemotherapy but I survived. Oh Padma, you should be very grateful you got pregnant for life is precious. I know because I had cancer."? No, she did not. She's left cancer behind her. And Robin, who will be eliminated next week during restaurant wars or else this world makes no sense and there's no sense in saving it from global warming because we're all just a bunch of fools, would be a much more likeable and sane person if she let it go too.

Video: Mihkail Byhoffski

The night began next to a drunken Atlanta business man named David to whom the premise needed to be explained. He made a lot of jokes about his wife being in the bathroom giving birth. Later he showed me that he had texted her, "Watching Top Chef with a bunch of freaks at bar. Plot difficult 2 follow." For the practiced eye, however, it wasn't.

Like Spanish moss, victim politics swathed last night's episode. At this point the producers are courting it, like a Freudian psychologist eager to bring out the deeper issues of leaving the toilet seat up (anger at mother, fear of abandonment, etc). For the Quickfire, the chefs were challenged to produce a dish embodying the dichotomy between good and bad, or as Jung might say the anima and the shadow. Clearly someone in the producer's booth is a Manichean. Bryan Voltaggio did something smart, a play on darkness and light. Michael made salmon two ways. Kevin put down some fat bacon which turned guest judge Michelle Bernstein into an orchard of desire. But, all was for naught. You see, Robin Leventhal had lymphoma. Little Robin Leventhal had lymphoma and so let no lack of talent, no logorrhea nor the fruits of competition stand in her way. It's like she said, "My mother died," in the middle of a Snaps competition; it's an automatic win but a dirty one. For just as Yo' Mama jokes don't take literal aim at one's mother—Do you really think I think when your mother wears a Malcolm X t-shirt helicopters try to land on her? Do I have that low esteem of helicopter pilots? Have I even seen an X t-shirt for years? Why aren't any on eBay?—neither should the challenge have occasioned such a visceral and weighty response.

Eli's well-directed anger, as well as my own, I suppose, isn't so much because Robin had cancer, though we all hate cancer, but because she's profane enough to capitalize on it for an ultimately petty goal. It's really a matter of cynical and disproportionate use of force. It's just like Sabra and Shatila. See? I'm allowed to deploy that because I'm Jewish.

On to the elimination challenge—what a relief. Escaping that last graf was as hard as getting out of Treblinka!—to deconstruct a well-known dish. By the way, at this point the drunk business man David next to my wife and I were fully enthralled in the show, so much so that he spilled wine all over his penis area trying to unmute the television at the end of a commercial break.

Another great challenge, I'd say, for it truly is a technical one and useful for separating the wheat—the Voltaggio's, Jen Carroll, Kevin Gillespie—from the chaff. Chaff like gash mouth face fuck Isabella who didn't know what Eggs Florentine is. "They're Eggs Foreigntome," he says and feels real clever; Laurine, whose cachet briefly rose when she talked smack on RobinWon'tShutUpCancerTit, but royally fucked up making potato chips and Papa Ron didn't know what either paella or deconstruction meant. Ashley was poor growing up and didn't eat pot roast. ["That boy is pretty," said David.] On the wheatier side of things, Jennifer Carroll deconstructed meat lasagna though it was well beyond her ken but not of her ability. Kevin Gillespie from nearby Atlanta—in fact, during the show, one of the chefs from the Avia Hotel stopped by to tell us he had done his stage under Gillespie and that he had been a consummate intense and very talented chef under whom to work—was selected to (de)make Chicken Molé Negro, a task as difficult as unravelling a black belt Gordian knot made of X'chatik chilis, chocolate and bloodsugarsexmagic. Amazingly he did it which means Ron was finally voted off this island which means we no longer have to be made to feel uncomfortable by his hulking hapless presence and that, finally, we can discuss Toby Young.

Toby Young may be a friend of Gawker somehow but he is no friend of mine. As soon as he stops acting like a twat-for-forehead, beads-for-eyes, mulch-for-brains asshole, perhaps then we can found a truth and reconciliation committee. But until then, don't fucking mispronounce paella, per CC "pa-eya", as, per CC and linguistic British imperialism coupled with ignorance, "pay-ella." Furthermore, when Tom Colicchio, who actually is a chef, calls you out on it, hang your dickball head and silently assent to his superiority. Finally, learn about food. You knew you were coming back on the show which is still, in some small way, about food. Didn't your, "This fennel tastes like anise," comment humiliate you enough last season? Apparently not, for one must have pride before it can be wounded. Maybe if you had had cancer or if your balls were as big as Salman Rushdie's, you might know. Also, your mother is so fat when she wears a Malcolm X t-shirt, helicopters try to land on her and I mean that.

Video by Michael Byhoff.

On a dusty alluvial plain somewhere on the grim scorching prairie of Nevada, the tumbleweed blew as a caravan of Bravo production trucks snaked across the horizon. They had come to lay out the craft table and to construct firepits for a motley crew of cheftestants. In the morning, straight from Whole Foods, like white-toqued mirages, they would be farted from S.U.V.s, directly onto the dusty sweep. There they would find teepees in which to spend the night and firepits with which they would cook their alternately try-hardy and brilliant bids at stardom for ranchers and cowboys. Salt of the earth types, their audience. Along the way, they might discover not only that the heat of an open fire is uneven but that the fire in their breasts was as untrue, flickering and fickle as a late day Mojave dustup.

As the chefs prepared to bed down for the night in tiny two person teepees, there was time in the long-shadowed evening to gaze into the horizon and the future and contemplate how little under the promontory we all are. Flickers in the desert, dots in a buzzard's eye. Introspection and recent aunt-hood spurred Ashley to reverie. She was poor and lived in the woods on food stamps. Papa Doc Ron busied himself ripping apart a tree to build a Voodoo barrier for snakes. Non-person Laurine,, concerned for the dryads therein contained, looked on with horror in her unseeing eyes. Robin Leventhal survived cancer. Tintin-like Mattin waved his scraggly arms in delight and spoke of an ancestral farm. "Zeere were sheeep and hens." (Not mentioned: the pride of unicorns, the bevy of centaurs, the parliament of sequined butterfies.) Gash-mouthed Isabella stuck his penis in his anus and peed and cried himself to sleep because contestants weren't allowed to read Goop and he wanted to know Gwenyth's "fashionating list of Fall (sad face) Winter (even sadder face) trends for 2009/2010."

Aside from the joke contender crazy bad cannon fodder chefs, the minds of the real talent were heavy with the task tomorrow. The red-face Voltaggio, tattooed and cocky, asserted that he wasn't going to debase himself for his hick audience. "You don't change each dish for every customer as they come in," he said, or at least something to that effect, "they come to your restaurant." The right choice considering a) it's true b) though the ranchers might be eating they certainly weren't voting c) despite the ranchers being ranchers, they aren't idiots and can certainly appreciate good food. On the other hand, Cancer wanted to do something like barbecue so she made shrimp and sausage because, as you know, people who work outside have no idea how to eat anything subtle. Older Voltaggio looking like a shaven Wyatt Earp straddled the line, eschewing both Cancer's patronizing attitude or his brother's elitist dashi.

There were a bunch of saveeches made, an interesting choice for a hot day. Papa Doc stormed the kitchen demanding a sword so he could split a coconut in which to put his salmon saveech. Mattin made saveech three ways. Hosea made a saveech out of Leah kisses and Far Side comics. Hung made a saveech out of kosher beef and arrogance. Austin Scarlett made one out of crushed velvet and sidelong glances. Georgia O'Keefe made one out of vaginas and irises. You get the point.

So finally, the gay cowboys shuffle in. Some have beards, some have beards, many have vests, none were stupid, some had accents, all had interesting commentary. Tom was wearing a real cheesy shirt (she's real cheesy this season.) Padma was wearing a denim vest a la Little House on the Prairie. The other judges—Gail Simmons, an angel, and Tim Love, an straight-talking Texan—were fine. No comment. IN fact, no comment on Gail Simmons until next week when there will be ample time to bemoan her absence when shit-stained twat Toby Young comes and already makes a bunch of overwrought stupid puns in his twerpy voice makes his season debut. God damn you, Toby Young, I was finally getting a handle on my anger issues.

Obviously older Voltaggio wins because he's wonderful and professional and very serious. I bet he'd be a good dad. His bro is bummed but understands. Both Jennifer and Kevin were overlooked but whatever but since they're certainly in the top three, no big deal. I'm just happy Isabella finally was on his own so he could get notably excluded from the winning cull. On to the losers, the glorious losers. Robin Leventhal whose shrimp stank turned into a sad old lady in a blink of an eye as all the energy she expended in keeping her spirit upbeat, young and unbowed was immediately sapped. Papa Doc has no idea about anything so he was blithely untouched. Mattin, boynicorn he of the unedible saveech and uncooked cod, had no idea why he was there. "I sought eet was wahnderfool," he protested. Tom, Slomo Padma, Tim Love and Gail Simmons disagreed. Outclassed and underperforming, the Basque twink took his red bandana and white togue and headed back to Pamplona and somewhere, as the sun rose on the Mojave, the light filtered through a coyote peeing on a cactus and for a moment, the sand was splashed with rainbows.

Video by Michael Byhoff.

Like Gen. Douglas MacCarthur, I have returned. Let's chat about last night's episode which, to my mind, may have been the best of the entire season for all trifling human emotions were subjugated for the common good of classical French cuisine. Say what you will about the abuses of the European stage system —amply illustrated by sadistic twat-for-brain Michael Chiarello—it does usefully turn one into a batonnet, Bearnaise, sauce Americaine making machine. There were also flashes of love and, of course, predictable flashes of gummy-mouthed babyboy MIchael Isabella's credit-grabbing grubiness. On the whole, however, the producers restrained themselves from playing up too much the Cane and Abel Voltaggio's rivalry and from overt mind-dick-heart tugging editing.

First of all, Daniel Boulud, the chef equivalent of Hilly Kristal and Tom Colicchio, the chef equivalent of Tom Verlaine, ask the assembled chefs to make escargot. Aside from being gross because the snails were alive and look like zombie boogers, it's not really that hard. Snails have been cooked for years in many ways in many countries with little freaking out. But freaking out ensued. SNAILS! WHAT THE FUCK! REALLY? SNAILS! YOU PRICK, YOU CAD.

Refreshingly, a subtly eighties Colicchio announced the loser of the quickfire could be eliminated. Gasp. Some weak feminism ensued. But it was welcome news because at this point I'd love to see the dead weight of the cast excised. Au revoir Laurine, Jessie, Ashley, Ron, Isabella, Robin, idiot chefs of the dumb dimension. Kevin won, of course, because he's a very good chef and maybe a pork-based angel. Jessie, untrained pierced lip crier, got sent home because her shit is wack, she had no inspiration (how tired the formulation ____L.T. is!) and isn't formally trained. Mostly someone went home, though, because the Elimination Challenge needed an even number. Ah, the French! Never ones to shy away from cutting an expedient deal! .

On to the Elimination challenge wherein contestants were divided, loosely upon their volition but really upon standard French preparations, into six teams of two each with one cheftestant responsible for the protein and the other for the sauce. It was a great challenge because you actually got to learn about French cuisine and there's a verifiable standard to which to hold the efforts so there's none of this New Criticism shit. Also, for those unfamiliar with some of the preparations, the English version of Basics: Foundation in Modern Cooking by Filip Verheyden is a great place to start.

The challenge would be judged by a panel of intimidating French people: Joel Robuchon, Hubert Keller, Daniel Boulud, Laurent Tourendel and....Pork-based Angel Kevin who not only won immunity but got to eat at a table with the world's greatest chefs. Happily, Mike Voltaggio and Jennifer Carroll were paired together to make rabbit with a sauce chasseur, thus safeguarding one or the other from working with an imbecile. They also worked in uncanny silence and it was kind of like watching two people making love watching them cook together. So entrained! So keyed in! Bryan, sadly, was paired with dick for dick Isabella. Haitian Ron made frog legs which is ironic (is it ironic?) because he looks like a frog while Cancer Vixen Robin talked about garbanzo beans and nearly everything else and ran around like a woman who knows she's living on borrowed time and isn't going to waste it not being frantic. Ass Fuck, who gets more likable every day, is thwarted in his au poivreté by Hector's inept beef-cooking. Ashley is an idiot who is cute and likeable but can't get anything right meanwhile Mattin thinks he's a man but he's really a boy, he thinks he's a man but he's really a toy. He also is only okay at cooking and not great at it.

Now onto the dinner! Kevin and Tom match which is cute. [They'd make a very cute couple, hanging out on Shelter Island and what not.) Joel Robuchon apologizes, in perfect English, for not speaking perfect English. His commentary on the food, however, was enlightening and incisive. It was really only about the food and couldn't have come, I don't think, from anyone less talented. Athena-of-the-subcontinent Padma Lakshmi nodded a lot like she understands French (doubtful!). Hubert Keller of Fleur de Lys and the X-Men movie franchise, also had interesting things to say. I hope Gail Simmons never leaves.

At Judge's Table, Isabella tries to take credit again for a dish not his. Bryan Voltaggio gave him the exact ingredients for the bernaise. Any old fool can say, "Let's deconstruct!" but only a wise man knows the component elements that give structure to the deconstruction. How much longer must we wait until there's a solo challenge where Isabella's giddy fuckness is revealed. In the end Bryan won, rightly. Every one was civil plus he gets to work at Robuchon's kitchen for a week. The losers came out. Ass Fuck was fine. Ashley, the Terry Schiavo of Top Chef, just won't die. Mattin, who is unctuous true, made it to live another morning. It was Hector Santiago who left, due to his hackwork with his steak and for not letting it rest. Whether the fault was his or perhaps sacrosanct sponsor Monogram's was left unresolved as he grimly walked into the sunset, mouth set and eyebrows furrowed and begging for business at his restaurant.

Video by Mikey Byhoff.

I suppose it's all fitting in the end. Top Chef like Gawker seems to have made a concerted effort to appeal to the mainstream. In our case—meaning Gawker's—this meant decentralizing the content from its Manhattan-based obsession. I like to think, however, that we haven't assumed that our new national audience isn't an army of fools. We've simply broadened the focus. Bravo, however, has premised its national appeal on the supposition that everybody is an idiot asshole. They may not all use Axe products, but they are all in need of the sort of oversimplified grande geste aesthetic that presupposes a lack of not only basic motor skills but any capacity for subtle discerning thought.

How else could one explain the elimination challenge, as essentialist and retrograde a premise as Robert Bly's Iron John? A boys and girls team for a bachelor and bachelorette party, really, producers, this is what you came up with? What are we, in summer camp again? Bring on the Gaga, let's make gimp bracelets, I'll fingerbang you on the bunk before lights out.

Though I find the outvictiming of the cast disheartening, in this case, the lesbians had a point. Not only is the challenge degrading to both women and men by using an entirely irrelevant biological difference to separate the chefs but also forcing them to cook for an even more insulting event, the bachelor/bachelorette party, nights that usually end with the groom being sucked off by a cheap hooker while his friends slap at her tits or with the bride-to-be wandering around First Avenue with a dildo stuck on her forehead, tit hanging out of a novelty t-shirt, shit-faced and smeary and probably crying.

I kept waiting for there to be some twist that would save the nominally gay friendly network from the mire of hegemonic reinforcement. Maybe the groom was really a lady? Maybe the lady was really a groom? Both seemed possible. But no. There would be no twist when the twist urgently was needed. But the real condescension wasn't even in the challenge. It extended to the editing. For instance, the battle of the brothers. Was it really necessary to cut to Kevin Bryan every time Mike spoke and vice versa? Must you, oh Ghouls of the Cutting Room, force your narrative down our throats thusly!?!? We get it. They are brothers and are competitive and sometimes compete and use hair gel but not sun screen. And no, showing us a lez table bitching about your insulting challenge does not constitute a "framing of the issue in a way that is accessible to our viewers." It's more of asking the ADF's Special Events committee to plan a "Auschwitz Banquet" called "It's a Gas" and then filming the tears.

Now if I don't seem to mention much of the cooking it's because in this episode at least, it was mostly irrelevant. Eve went home, which almost redeemed the episode for she is the sort of opaque miserable old who makes everyone feel uncomfortable at a party. But other than that, the most bitter morsels weren't found in the kitchen and the most tasty morsels must have been left on the cutting room floor.

Video by Michael Byhoff.

Shucking clams is a whole different project than shucking oysters. It requires a different technique and a new approach. This young Preeti learned in an embarrassing and bracing Quickfire, the mise-en-place relay race, and thus we will not compare Season 6 to Season 5, trying to parse the present with the past. Let's just take a look at the nutters that arrived into an evermore Real World like set.

Like the first ten minutes of Up, this season started with a concerted attempt to jerk tears. Cancer! Twice! Single Motherhood! Gay! French! I tuned in to watch cooking and, like poor pixelated Frogger, was hit by an emotional truck. We were all made especially vulnerable by a series of discombobulating events, Bravo's version of waterboarding. In loose chronological order: Tom's soul patch has expanded laterally and he wore a vest, looking more like New Jerseyite Renaissance Faire enthusiast than ever. Sad! Padma Lakshmi seems to have gotten even slower than last season. Now she talks like a skinny overly animated muppet in amber. Magic, over! A parliament of showgirls entered the kitchen and awkwardly gyrated in formation. Tits! Sparkles! A new and confusing pay-to-fillet scheme was introduced wherein contestants are paid per Quickfire challenge but they can gamble that away in some sort of bid to trepan directly into our brains that Las Vegas is fun! [Call for information: Can anyone tell me how much of the production cost is covered by Las Vegas? I have the feeling that hosting Top Chef is the result of a process not dissimilar to hosting the Olympic Games. Anonymity guaranteed.]

Then Robin Leventhal revealed she had cancer twice. Thus began a high-stakes game of out-victim. It's like canasta but with adversity! Ash Fulk revealed he was gay. Jennifer Zavala, she of tattoos and large ear holes, hot tempers and seitan, revealed she's doing this all for her kid because she wants the little guy to go to Yale. So, of course, I want all of them to win because they overcame so much and you know when they came so far that if they failed now it would just be that much more tragic. But then the Haitian Ron Duprat told of the time when he was at sea for 26 days on a boat with other immigrants from Haiti and survived cooking fish they caught from the sea. So, suck it up Robin, Ash and Jennifer. You've been officially outvictimed.

Despite of the blatant emotional pube pulling, there are some real keepers here. Kevin Gillespie, the winner of last night's challenge, seems head and shoulders above the others. He's smart, bearded and sweet. Jennifer Carroll has an off-center ponytail but other than that is furiously talented (it seems). Those two will make it into the final three, for sure. Three to lose: Mike Isabella, a misogynistic cocky fuck who will later claim that the producers distorted his words but who actually said those things about being beaten by a girl—no offense!—and so should just stop whining, realize he's actually a crummy piece of shit, either go to therapy to fix his self-esteem issues as best he can or at least learn how to control the gummy vitriolic shit that billows from his buttmouth. Eve Aronoff, a spineless weak-willed woman who lacks imagination and talent. She's the kind of weak that far from inspiring pity calls for cruelty. She was on the chopping block last night and I hope she is diced to oblivion in an upcoming show. And finally, Eli Kirschstein who has no business being as arrogant or proud of his arrogance as he is and is a shonda for the goyim at a time we need no more shonda, or more goyim.

But this is the great thing about Top Chef: Those three probably will fail in some deeply humiliating way, the Top Chef equivalent of dying by diarrhea, deprived of dignity, packing their knives with their pride already excised. Kevin and Jennifer hopefully will prevail. Tom will shave. Padma will take some uppers. Gail Simmons will trip Toby Young on the way to the craft services table and he'll be out of the season, contussed and with a herniated disk. This is the promise and the gamble of Top Chef Las Vegas and I'm all in.

Video by Mikey Byhoff.

Three things weigh heavily on my mind as August 19th draws closer. First of all, the familiar yet nearly forgotten bristle of joy and discomfort that accompanies hostess Padma Lakshmi's every appearance. Some things are simply too beautiful to behold. Thus Moses beholds the burning bush but not Yahweh and thus, from the same principle but less manifest, do we shiver when Lakshmi smiles or the camera tilts slowly down from her eyes to her torso, as if following an invisible bead of sweat. (Happily the potency of her beauty is somewhat dissipated by the lens of the camera and screen of the television.) Between last season and this, Lakshmi has signed to a NBC food-related sitcom called Single Serving, a show whose all but assured crappiness is all the more welcome since it may, in some small way, humanize Ms. Lakshmi. A goddess with a laugh track somehow seems a little more approachable.

Secondly, I've missed the small bitter ids of the Top Chef contestants, crouched in the corner of their mental kitchen like dibbuks, jealous, zealous, too rich in tactic and short on strategy, bent not on achievement but on sabotage. That shit is mad fun to watch. Top Chef Masters simply has too much bonhomie and competency. Messrs. Bayless, Keller, DuFresne and Ms. Lo are too good-natured, talented, and mature for real drama. Let's face it: Top Chef Masters was a bit of a snooze; it's good for the world but bad for Bravo (the same can be applied to all Bravo television programming.) On August 19th, a raft of try-hardy famewhores will beam into our living rooms, each one eager to establish him or herself, to appease the wrathful writhing ambitious worm inside them. They'll be put under intense stress in situations designed to confound and to sift out from their unprocessed ore, all that makes them human, leaving only the nasty golden nuggets, sandwiched between Glad Family Product advertisements and light molasses and lovely honey rich shots Padma Lakshmi. Unlike other lesser reality television shows, the cheftestants on Top Chef are nominally there to cook and it is through this filter that we see their Machiavellian jockeying. Unlike the newly neutered Project Runway, Bravo is under no obligation to soften the edges and make the show feel-goody. It's all cynical manipulation here, chef-against-chef, producer-against-viewer, chef-against-viewer. Like a john and a painted lady, we all dance the ritualized tango of coyness and submission, enacting roles written long before August 19th, before even the birth of Bravo and I can't wait.

Lastly, this is the the sixth season of Top Chef. Like the sixth season of the Real World (who can forget Genesis, Elka and Syrus!?) by this point the reality television industrial casting machine should have—in tandem, effected and effecting the fame-headed public—crafted the ultimate reality show cast. These are the people who the producers want. These are the people who want the fame and know exactly what they need to be successful. A quick look at this season's character bios is highly enlightening. First of all—in line with other Bravo reality shows—the amount of tattoos has increased noticeably. One guy, annoyingly, has a knife and form tattooed on his hand. He'll be out by the third episode, I think. There are two plus-sized heavily tattooed women (Jennifer and Jesse. One guy with a beard and an Austin Scarlett epigone named Mattin, for whom a beard would do no help. Following Bravo's half-hearted stab at inclusivity, there's the black guy, the latino and the asian too for good measure. There's also a guy in a bow tie named Ash Fulk (rhymes with Ass Fuck!) A finer cast of characters more ready to exploit and be exploited one couldn't ask for. Though we may know something about these chefs' bios, we would do well to forget them. For that was their civilian life. Now they are part of something larger than them, than the truth. They are part of theatre, glorious theatre, and the curtain rises Wednesday night.

One of the gay community's biggest secrets is that there is no such thing as a gay community. Instead, the country's gay populace is made up of tons of little factions divided by race, ethnicity, body type, socio-economic status, and whether or not they love a good dance remix. The only thing they had to bring them together was going to the same, gigantic discotheque on the weekend to score drugs and try to get laid.

In the article (not yet online), Gawker alum Joshua David Stein writes that instead of taking up residence for the entire weekend in gigantic clubs like Twilo or the Roxy like gays did in the '90s, they're now going to smaller lounges and parties that are catered more towards specific gentlemen's tastes. Yes, my friends, it is officially the end of the monolithic gay culture.

Instead, the boys will be hanging out at parties like Manthrax!, a New York event that caters to guys who like guys who like heavy metal, and Main Man, a weekly night for homo hipsters on the Lower East Side, that is so disdainful of gay culture that it sells itself as a "gay party for gays who hate gay parties." Even better is the Tall Gay Agenda, a monthly party for 'mos who thanks to genetic accident are 6'2" and taller (and their admirers, of course).

Sure, the endless Lady Gaga tracks at your typical gay bar in Chelsea or Hell's Kitchen are as annoying as a bad case of the crabs, but there was something to be said for the old days, when, at least once a week, everyone had to hang out under the same roof, listen to the same lousy house music, get harassed by the same drag queens, and generally tolerate one another. Now the only shared experiences we will have are taking it up the ass and Madonna concerts.

Stein, who is straight, channels his inner gay:

As groups of all types of people—from gay indie rockers to gay minimalist techno geeks—reach sustainable critical mass, identifying as gay is no longer as interesting or as useful as it once was. We can be many identities simultaneously.

Isn't that a little sad, especially because—for the culture at large—we're still seen as gay first? As queer culture goes quietly into assimilation with the mainstream, instead of being defined by our orientation, we're going to be defined by the music we like, how tall we are, or some other sort of cultural affiliation. If we're going to get stuck with a label, it might as well be one that matters the most.

I've always wondered what Top Chef would be like if the pool of contestants didn't always include a couple of homeless characters the producers picked up off the street for poops and giggles—Erik Hopfinger et al—and a villain or two for narrative purposes— the Devil in the red bandanna Lisa. Last night, that long abandoned hypothetical became reality. The four chefs, as Mister Hippity broke it down, were all exceedingly professional and nice. I liked it that they didn't really give a shit, especially DJ Magneto, played by Hubert Keller, a cross between Patrick Stewart, DJ AM and Werner Herzog.

The only bitches on the show were the Girl Scouts, who judged the quickfire challenge (dessert!) Especially the redhead. She's working her way to the Shitty Tween merit badge. However, I do applaud the Girl Scouts of America for finding the four (or were they five? they were so tiny it was hard to tell) Girl Scouts who don't like sweet things. I can just see the email they sent out to den mothers: Is your daughter precocious, IN A BAD WAY? Does she not like the things most people like, LIKE SWEETS? If so, contact your chapter leader. God bless.

In fact, that whole quickfire thing was a little weird. A bunch of grown men staring at Girl Scouts on closed camera? The only thing more slightly creepy was the Elimination Challenge wherein the old men raided a college dorm. It was like that MTV show where a van of would-be lovers snoop around the room of some poor sap who has been kidnapped by the network's in house NKVD with an utraviolet light (to look for CUM!). Of course, these guys just spread a sheet out on the bed and made ceviche. But still, why the fascination with school girls, producers? I did like the harrowing shower macaroni scene.

Let's also take a moment to ponder how fired the guy from GE who thought it was a good idea to give master chefs microwaves. Product placement doesn't work so well when the product placed is derided, hilariously, by well-respected individuals. Microwaves, says Chef Keller, are for "drying out newspapers, or something." Anyway, I hope that guy is enjoying his severance package. He should go see August Osage County and go to Junior's or something. You know, really treat himself.

The numerous GE malfunctions were the most dramatic moments of the show. Everything else was surprisingly understated. Bravo Bravo! Gael Green didn't mention how she fucked Elvis (she always mentions that). That English guy is notably not Toby Young. He's nicer and less ass-like and seems knowledgeable. The editor from Saveur is a sweet man. ANd though I thought I'd be disappointed by Kelly Choi because she is much less beautiful than that collection of angel eyelashes and platinum pipe cleaners that constitute Padma Lakshmi, I wasn't. Though she lacks charisma and, for me, much beauty, it was a welcome change from Padma's tyranny. Padma's presence in a room, on the show, eating a burger, upsets the natural calibration of her surroundings. She's too beautiful and you can't get her out of your eye, like a squiggly on your eyeball, she just floats and floats and stays. Everyone around her darkens and coarsens. Not so with Kelly Choi who is a neutral presence. So yeah, Top Chef Masters, it was nice and good. I just gave $20 to Chef Christopher Lee's charity of choice Autism Speaks and I feel pretty good about it.

Thanks Mikey Byhoff for the video.

One of our foodiest friends, erstwhile Gawker Joshua David Stein, recently spoke with Ed Sorel, the fellow who crafted the large, backroom mural. Per Carter's request, Sorel created an olio of various 1920's and 30's notables—society scenesters, publishing demigods, and showbiz types. He told JDS:

we decided essentially on a who's who of who is in New York between the wars. We have Fred Astaire, this is the Fred Astaire who appeared on Broadway with his sister. There's also Henry Luce, Herb Ross, Conde Nast, Blanche and Adolph Ochs, the Fitzgeralds—Zelda and F Scott, Billie Rose, Dorothy Parker and Edna Ferber.

So basically the type of people who just won't ever exist anymore because instead of somehow (knew a guy!) getting a table at Monkey Bar and sitting in proximal awe of these storied people, we can just lie on our couches in Brooklyn and type incessantly about them, thus rendering them kinda unfabulous, so why would we want to stare at them at Monkey Bar in the first place? It's kind of a Lost-style time loop sorta thing.

Season Five of Bravo's Top Chef was never an easy season. Like a colicky baby, it mostly consisted of whining, wailing, and runny poop. But some babies grow out of this stage and for a while, it seemed like Top Chef could too. No dice.

Last night, the top three contestants—piss of shit Hosea, arrogant sweetheart Stefan, and cartoon saint Carla—were asked by a very good looking Indian woman and her blue-eyed Paddington Bear to cook the best meal they could. The meal would consist of three courses, be for twelve people and would be judged head-to-head. Of course, there was help. Or rather, "help." From the shadows in the courtyard emerged the runners up from the last three seasons. Marcel, who lost to the pela cuca Ilan; Richard Blais, the adorable dad, who lost to Stephanie Izzard last season; and Casey, the zombie bitch from hell who fucks everything up who combines confidence with idiocy. You may remember her from Season 3, when she fucked up so horrendously in the final that her name has become synonymous with abject failure at a straight-forward task. "Oh, man, I totally Caseyed my taxes this year. I'm not getting any refund!"

After drawing knives, Hosea picks first. He picks Blaise. Stefan picks Marcel. Carla is stuck with Casey. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. FUCK! WE DESERVE TO BE EXPLAINED WHAT IS GOING ON. Here I'll help: Hosea fucks Stefan by taking all the foie gras. Hosea fucks Stefan by taking the caviar. Hosea gleefully eats a cake—he's a fucking fat whore—in which he finds a golden baby. This translates into his using the golden baby to fuck Stefan some more by giving him alligator meat whilst choosing the less challenging red fish from himself. Hosea continues to demonstrate a creepy and malevolent obsession toward Stefan that transcends the competition and delves into deep, if well-founded, insecurities on Hosea's part concerning his lack of intelligence and skill. Casey advises Carla to sous vide steak which is not only a bad idea in pure culinary terms but also runs completely counter to Carla's strong suit, cooking with soul and passion. Casey advises Carla to make blue cheese souffle rather than a cheese tart which Carla has made successfully before and is wonderful. Viewers were reminded how Casey fared in her own finale [hint: she bombed harder than NATO in Kosovo in 1999, as Toby Young might put it.] Stefan helps Carla with her crabs. Stefan freezes his fish for the first course and decides to do dessert for the third. Commercial break, viewers left feeling worried for Carla, angry at Hosea and unsure of how Stefan will do.

Judges' table: The pulchritude of Padma's face competes with the volume of Gail's breasts for viewers attention. Branford Marsalis could eat "fras gras" all day. Carla is out of the running, almost immediately. No one likes her suck vide steak. Hey, Fabio, looking good! Everyone is starting to get worried. Why did Stefan freeze his fish for his first course? (Oh, it's standard practice) But why didn't Marcel warn him? Eh, whatever, Stefan's squab was great, he'll win. Oh no, no one likes his lollipop desserts. Gail harshes it. "Straight out of 1992," she says. But, you know what, so was Wrecks-N-Effect so—zoom, zoom, zoom— maybe Stefan will win after all.

Tragically, Carla knows she lost but keeps her composure. Stefan suspects the same. Saddled with the sinking realization Hosea will win, the contestants head back into the kitchen. Hosea sucks Stefan's lollipop. Stefan serves Hosea wine. Casey seems oblivious to the fact that it was she who fucked Carla—audience favorite, talented chef, general good person—out of $100,000. Back at the judges' table, Toby Young is making the argument that Stefan should win because he made a dessert and that meals should have beginnings, middles and ends. Chef Tom finally loses it with his smaller poutier more anus-faced twin and tells him that is a moot point. The parameters of the competition made it clear dessert was optional. But Toby Young continues to whimper about how much he liked Stefan's dessert. Padma witheringly tells him it was "pedestrian." Honestly, I see Young's point. You abbreviate management to mgmt not, for instance, mngm. That same logic seems to work for meals too. But I'm not going to argue with Tom either. Hosea's progression wasn't incomplete as much as it was flared, opening up towards the end rather than tapering down. It might be cowardly but it was not incorrect to omit a dessert.

Young chastised, Stefan classy, Carla crying, Hosea tasting the win in his idiot wind, the three head back to judges' table. Sure enough, it's Hosea who wins. Blech meh. [If this recap seems cursory or emotionally removed, it's because I'm still blanched with rage and dead inside.] This is the worst possible outcome. It's unfair on universal grounds—twats shouldn't win—and fails on the show's own terms. To anyone watching the entire season, it is clear that Hosea wasn't the Top Chef. He was inferior to both Stefan in terms of technical skill and Carla iin terms of imagination and passion. He earned his victory by cynical machinations like stealing all the foie gras and caviar and giving Stefan alligator meat; by exercising cowardly caution, notice how he avoided dessert and served the clichéd combination of scallops and foie gras; and by default, reaping the benefits of Nazi chipmunk Casey's sabotage.

Ultimately, it doesn't matter that much who won Top Chef. A victory on the show is no guarantee of success. Hung, last season's winner, is working at a kosher steakhouse not his. Past winner Ilan has fallen off the face of the planet (and that's a boon to the planet). Whereas loser Sam Talbot is quite successful. Hosea's $100,000 can't buy him imagination or intelligence or his hair back. He'll be hawking Diet Dr. Pepper with the rest of them soon enough. Though Stefan lost and Carla bit it hard, both of them leave Hosea in the dust, masturbating alone on his pile of cash and catching the seed of his climax in a Glad container. Towards the end of the episode Carla says, "I came here to show there is a different way to compete. I competed with love." At that she succeeded. Though by the cankerous logic of Top Chef Hosea may have been victorious, it's Carla and Stefan who emerge as sympathetic, talented and kind chefs. Hosea, you can take your money, you can be creepily kissed on the lips by Harpy Leah while the credits roll, but you will never truly be Top Chef.

[Thank you to the Sara to my Dylan, Mike Byhoff, for the great video.]

• Dismissed contestant Fabio is clearly having a grand sexual moment with Padma Lakshmi. Probably while this photograph was being taken and probably under the table.
• Toby Young, white shithead from Planet Suck, knows this to be true and feels peevish about it and thusly will think of a biting bon mot like, "In the words of the Italianate gentleman on my starboard side, this is Top Chef. Not Top Footsie."

What is not clear is who will win. I am pretty sure it will be Carla who is coming on quite strong. It could be Stefan but he might be too much like Hung, that is too cerebral for the viewers. But that's just one incredibly informed opinion. I'm open to others. Gawker odds: Carla 2:1. Stefan 4:1. Hosea: 19:1. John: 3:16.

Be sure to tune in to Mr. HIppity's orgiastic commenter ball at 9pm and my recap tomorrow.

Spectacles, testicles, wallets and watch what happens, last night's episode was a panic-inducing angry-making roux of rue, magret du regret, the last crayfish boil before two of the three remaining Top Chefs pack their knives and head into the twilight of semi-celebrity sadness.

The night started off with a scare. Time waits for no man. Over the break of indeterminate length, Faboi had given himself the classic Italian fauxhawk that they seem to love so much in that country and also in Spain. Shades of Kanye West, perhaps but bad/worse. Stefan, on the other hand, gained approximately 20 pounds. Carla straightened her hair and looked great. Only Hosea remained unchanged and that may be because he's made of packing peanuts, flesh-colored band aids and chicken wire.

But no. The scare isn't the inevitability of time passing. The terrors came later, in the front yard of a plantation and under the beady eyes of guest judge Sean Connery Emeril Lagasse. The Quickfire challenge, somewhat infuriatingly, brought back Jamie, Leah and Dildo Jeff for a crawfish challenge. The already executed contestants could, if they won, rejoin the land of the living and possibly win the title of....Top Chef. So from behind the white columns came trouncing Leah Cohen, bane of the civilized world, who we thought we had permanently rid ourselves of last week. But no, Cohen was back and so was her whiny ineptitude. Jeff won the challenge whilst Leah and Jamie sauntered back into the master's house, no doubt to get tanked, take off their shirts and appear, somewhat later, on the Top Chef: Girls Gone Wild DVD.

[Also: Did anyone else think that Padma seemed to be concealing a deep sadness?]

The elimination challenge was pretty straightforward and inoffensive. Contestants had to create a meal for a party and one dish had to be Creole. I think Mr. Hippity and his band of commenters can offer a better recapitulation, in real time, of the challenge than I can here. Suffice to say, Carla weirdly chose oysters which are risky because shucking them takes forever, especially if you don't know how and she didn't. Hosea like the hosebag he is made a "really authentic" Gumbo and serves a drink called "The Hurricane" and makes a ton of jokes about how people in New Orleans knows what he's talking about (nudge, nudge, get it? KATRINA!). Jeff made something that was unmemorable as he was. Who was he again? Who knows? Fabio didn't break any fingers but on the other hand didn't blow any minds. Stefan [shakes head] the fat bald dork, smoked a lot of cigarettes and didn't give a shit. His dishes were okay but, as Gail pointed out, merely lovely. No soul at all. [And: YAY! GAIL IS BACK! TOBY IS DEAD!]

Cut to the elimination: Padma's still sad inside but drunk. Gail is being great. Tom could not be better looking. Emeril may have suffered a stroke. Carla wins. Jeff leaves (he had to win to stay). Hosea is safe (and aggressively mediocre). And Fanboy and Stefat are the only ones left. So here's the dilemma: Fabio cooked his heart out and made errors, perhaps fatal ones. Stefan is clearly technically a better chef but didn't apply himself at all. In fact, he aggressively sucked. The issue before the judges was, in many ways, the same one faced between Jamie and Leah in an earlier episode. In that instance, the producers chose to keep the less talented contestant, Leah, if only for the down-the-shirt shots she offered. This time around, perhaps sensing that Fabio had reached the top of his game and that this wasn't Top Efforte but rather Top Chef, cut loose our beloved Italian. This gives Stefan the chance to repent of his cockiness and redeem himself in the finale. Hosebag, well hosebag is dead weight. It's Carla who, odds on, is going to win this season. And it's Carla's restaurant—full of love and former models (?)—in which I'd most like to eat. Feel the love. Taste the love.

[Gracias, Michael Coppola Byhoff for the video.]

This season of Top Chef started out lost but now, Praise God, it is found. Let the light from its lighthouse shine on me, Oh Lord. The unclean among you may suspect this enthusiasm is because Padma "Tits McParvati" Lakshmi wore a revelatory tank top last night. But that's not it, or not it exactly. Ok, that's it exactly.

No it's not. Everything went well last night. It was a charmed evening. Toby Young kept his inanity to a minimum. In fact, I can't think of any botched one-liners. There were no obvious product placements awkwardly integrated into the challenge. (Other than the lingering shots of Calphalon, Monogram and Glad.) The panel of guest judges was uniformly kind and knowledgeable. Think of the Warren Court with Jacques Pepin as Chief Justice. And the challenge itself, the Last Suppers of abovementioned chefs, was sufficiently broad as to showcase the contestants' skills whilst being sufficiently restrictive as to demand discipline and creativity. It was a culinary sonnet, as opposed to, say a lipogram villanelle.

The contestants themselves shone outstandingly, especially Carla. Ms. Hall, who started off the season a Sesame Street character (in a bad way), has truly become one of the most enjoyable and heart-warming characters. Plus, she used to model though Google Image Search doesn't seem to know it. All in all, the producers knew they were sitting on a gold mine. And they pulled out all the stops. Thus the gauzy end-of-days lighting at the exclusive event space douche vortex for hire, Capitale; the Biblical seating, in which Toby Young plays St. Bartholomew, Wylie Judas, Lidia St. Peter, Tom St. John, Jacques Christ, Padma St. Thomas, Marcus St. Matthew and Susan St. Simon; and Padma's tank top, the only pink slip I want, that article which reveals by obscuring, those shadows, that terrain untilled, that reward which awaits the righteous in the lands of milk and honey just beyond the valley of this world, Jesus is waiting, don't let yourself down.

But if those were the rosy moments, let's not forget the bloody ones. For instance, when Fabio breaks his pinky finger in two parts. The lower half was still attached to his hand but the upper portion of the Italian digit waved madly back like a windsock. Does he care? No, he doesn't care. As he aptly puts it in the Stew Room, in his charming definition-through-negation way, "It's Top Chef. Not Top Pussy." Ha, I smell (!) a spin-off. Another mess: What is Hosea still doing here? Doesn't Gary Larson want him back for the Far Side Gallery 24? Without Hosea the Far Side is just a bunch of talking cows and cacti.

Then there is the deeply problematic fact that, based on the dishes set before the judges and by their reactions to said dishes, it was adorable Stefan who should have met his end. Don't get me wrong, praise the Lord and pass the ammunition. I'm ecstatic that Leah Cohen packed her knives and went home —hopefully to patch things up with her boyfriend. She was dead weight, a concession to producers who shrewdly calculated the very last moment at which she was bearable to the viewers before cutting her loose. But last night, her greatest sin was making overly thin Hollandaise sauce which ran weakly down a mildly undercooked egg. This would be a sin of omission and a venial one at best. Stefan, on the other hand, horrendously overcooked his salmon, a sin of commission and a gravely mortal one by any culino-theological standard. By the logic and conceit of the show—that each contestant must be judged not on the merits or demerits of previous dishes but on the current plate of food in front of the panel of judges—Stefan's obvious general superiority as chef as demonstrated throughout the entire season should have found no purchase at Judge's Table. But this, I allow, is a concession to be made in the name of a larger justice. As Dale Carnegie once said, "Any fool can criticize, condemn, and complain - and most fools do." I'm just happy we're headed to the finale sans Leah. Carla, Stefan, Fabio and Hosea are good company enough.

[Mike Byhoff, thanks for the wonderful video. You have a future at Skinemax.]