Top Chef - Restaurant Wars!

Chef Tom wakes up the chefs to work the egg station at a Chicago landmark, Lou Mitchell's as their quickfire challenge. The chefs all have the final four in their sites. I say one challenge at a time guys because you all know that Richard has a spot, most likely Stephanie and Antonia. 4th place is up for grabs at this point. Antonia is finally starting to show her culinary stuff, it's about time! The owner of Lou Mitchell's looks very rough, the kind of person you don't want mad at you. The chefs take turns at the egg station cooking, eggs of course along with the breakfast meats. It was fast and furious with eggs flying all over. Antonia was first at the station and held her own to the satisfaction of the owner. Spike, who said he used to be a line cook, fell behind quickly and Stephanie couldn't fry her way out of the kitchen. I know I couldn't cook like that, I have a new appreciation for the cooks at my favorite breakfast spot! Antonia wins the challenge and is told she will get an advantage in the elimination challenge. The elimination challenge is restaurant wars! This is my favorite challenge. I was afraid since they had wedding wars that they wouldn't have it. Antonia's advantage? She gets to chose her team. She wisely picks Richard and Stephanie, the same team they won wedding wars. Dale wastes no time alienating his team mates and putting them on edge by trying to take over. I say let him. The guy is talented, he might pull if off, he might not. If not, it's all on him. The teams get $1500 to spend on food and $5000 for decor. Dale's team decides to go Asian. Spike takes the front of the house and ends up decorating all by himself as Lisa and Dale (who appoints himself head chef) do all the cooking. Their menu will consist of short ribs, coconut laksa with grilled prawns and butterscotch scallops with Dale's Halo Halo and sticky rice with coconut for dessert. Butterscotch scallops? Maybe it will be good, who knows. Antonia's team decides to go with a modern American gastro pub theme. What the heck is that, gourmet chicken wings and upscale nachos? Stephanie will run the front of the house with Richard as the head chef. Instead of chicken wings and nachos, they come up with linguine & clams, trout & cauliflower and broiled loin of lamb and braised lamb shank. Now we find out Chef Tom's replacement for this challenge is my fave Anthony Bourdain! Chef Anthony comes bearing good news, the teams get to chose a helper from the chefs that were sent packing. Dale, who gets to chose first, picks Jen which makes Lisa happy and Antonia is ecstatic since she needs someone to make pasta so she naturally picks Nikki. Dale wants to make his signature Halo Halo for dessert but ends up putting in a rotten avocado only noticing when the mixture comes out brown. Ok, Dale is a chef, how does a chef not know he is cutting a rotten avocado? Dale gets in a bad mood which puts everyone else in a bad mood (boy do I know how that feels when someone you work with is in a bad mood). Dale pulls Lisa's rice off the burner so it didn't get "sticky". Dale tries to give suggestions to fix the rice but pretty much leaves it up to Lisa to do it. After making the pasta, Nikki finds the clams really gritty. Antonia says she already washed the clams but Nikki insists they are gritty forcing Antonia to rewash them all. Everyone gets ready and it's show time! Spike comes right out and tells his first guests that his team will win the competition. Now that's confidence. I guess he didn't see, or notice, what was going on behind the scenes. The judges were loving Antonia's team. Even the dishes they didn't like they at least liked the presentation. They also liked the fact they were thinking outside the box. Dale thought everyone was making mistakes except him. Anthony Bourdain described the sticky rice as baby vomit with wood chips. Spike was doing a pretty good job keeping everything together out front while the rest of the team were duking it out in the kitchen. At least Jen can leave. At judge's table, Antonia's team wins with Stephanie being the individual winner. Her prize - a trip to Spain. Sweet! This means, of course, that Dale's team wasn't so lucky. Chef Anthony comes out with guns blazing asking who chose the table cloths and who's idea was it to make the scallops in butterscotch. Dale is so busy throwing everyone under the bus that he can't, or won't, remember what he did or didn't do. Lisa told the judges that Dale told her what rice to use and he naturally denies it. He SO told her what rice to use and went as far as to tell her to follow the directions on the package! This team has way too many I's in it. As the judges tell Lisa her shortcomings her expression got more and more sour. If looks could kill. Spike starts to jump in a few times and wisely shuts up after one of the judges tells him that he is not safe just because he was in the front of the house. Dale is told to pack his knives and go. While Dale is saying his goodbyes, Lisa just sits in her corner looking as if she wanted to take the head off someone. As long as Spike doesn't screw up royally next week I think Lisa is the next to go. Double D