Claudia Greco

I loved the son, hiding in his shirt. Heh. Never really felt the need to go to Cleveland, before. Now? Definitely. Sure, the food looked amazing. But the world's largest used bookstore, located in a retired Twinkie plant? Just. Awesome. ← Oh, God, that was funny - little James (?) fleeing from Bad "Uncle" Tony's labor of love cassoulet by disappearing into his hoodie, like a frightened leatherback turtle! Understandable because he's - what? About 10? - but, in all fairness, Tony's cassoulet (which I have eaten) is actually gorgeous. (And I was never a cassoulet lover.)

Agree-Pere Ubu rocks. And Skyline? That's Cincy, baby. ← I guess Marky lives in Cleveland, so they tied Bourdain's love of the Ramones with the Rock n' Roll Hall of Fame. But you bettuh believe - Mawhky's a Noo Yowhhker, not a Clevelander. For those who think Bourdain has a NY accent (a mild one - product of good schools), you just had to hear Marky say "fohwk" (fork) to know - HE'S FROM BROOKLYN! FUHGEDDABOUTIT! Weren't Ruhlman's children beautiful?

I loved the final segment of the Sao Paulo episode, when Tony went to (the other!) Claudia's house for feijoada. You could see he was all "verklempt", to quote "Linda Richman", and her affection for him was reciprocal. I found it very touching, very tender.

I agree, this is a good thing. When it veers too far away from the food, as I felt it did during the Russia episode, things get pretty boring fast (it's the only episode of his during which I've ever fallen asleep). This season is off to a good start, though I could have done without Zimmern in the first ep. I can't stand that guy for some reason. TB's French Polynesian show was just too cool. Cheers! ← I thought the LA episode was too far off the food mark, too - Tony basically got to suit up with the LA SWAT team for a little cool testosterone-y fun. Loved the Tahiti episode - felt the new York one, being a New orker, was a little weak. But next week - the Cleveland Smackdown with Ruhlman!!!PS: Very cool that Tony is giving a talk in Bogota - no doubt, he's filming an episode there, too, since his trips are almost always multi-purpose (i.e., for NR, maybe an article, too, or a seminar/talk/book tour. Tahiti, I believe, was both an NR episode with a little vacation thrown in, as I believe Ottavia went with him. Good plan.) Tahiti was a beautiful episode. Havi ng just come ack from Hawai'i myself (on my own version of "NR"), I really enjoyed it, since the original Hawai'ians migrated from the Marquesas, followed later by the the Tahitians.

Yes, Tibetans do traditionally dress like that - like a lot of other cultures, they were their entire material wealth on their clothing. But keep in mind that a lot of that elaborate jewelry is composed of turquoise, amber and some silver - they are not wearing 24K and diamonds. (I own a few Himalyan "earth and sky" muti-strand necklaces myself.) Their clothing, too, is primarily cotton and wool, and is what was known down South a few generations ago as "homespun." Again, we are not talking luxury fabrics here. The homes, while possessing elaborately carved posts, lintels, etc. and beautiful murals, are basically mud and hard-packed earth floors. The art is basically Tibetan religious art, and is highly ingrained in the culture - I saw numerous murals on even abandoned dwellings througout Nepal (up to the Tibetan border) - it's not like they call in high-end interior decorators and painters. You will notice there was little (if any) furniture and no other decoration. So, no need to fear - this wasn't a Potemkin Village/Lhasa Disney situation. But while the Tibetans' traditional clothing and homes look exotic and opulent, bear in mind they are a very, very poor country (and people, regardless of where else they might live), and the materials used are not expensive, high-end goods. The ethnic minorities in China, too, as Tony correctled pointed out, still keep, mainly, to their traditional clothing, food, etc. Claudia Raised in Asia, Trekked through Nepal, Loves Central Asian Culture

that's what we thought, too. Why would you put yourself through that awful experience twice. If she gets real skills in culinary school, she can go right to work. ← You know, I think that's what Gordon was doing, in a roundabout way. She's got the chops - she just needs the polish. And then, as she nears the end of her culinary school experience and is looking to extern - BOOM! PHone call from Gordon: "Julia, how about working the line at The Narrows or Warrington's" (his new gastro pub) "or Boxwood Cafe, yes? Then maybe on up to Maze? C'mon, darling, I know you can do it - 'cause you're not a DONKEY!" Even with culinary school, some haute cuisine experience would still benefit her more if she was to run her own restaurant, and Gordon's apprenticeship would serve her better than having to compete for it on a reality TV show. Gordon obviously wants her to succeed very badly, and believes she can. Bless that bugger for THAT, at least.

Yep, I've watched it for a few seasons now. This is the "kindler, gentler" Ramsay that Bourdain keeps mentioning. I like KN best of all of his shows, because it really tackles some concrete problem-fixing, a lot of psychology, a lot of kitchen/menu technique and streamlining, etc., etc. You see all of Gordon's smarts, drive, ambition and experience in this show - not the screaming, maniacal, abusive GR. I like the problem-solving and restauranrt management aspects - you learn something, you see the ins-and-outs - it's not just a bunch of "donkeys" being screamed at. And I think the owners/chefs actually learn something, too.

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I don't think he was so much upset about the trash, as he was that the blue team lost on the bisque. GR said the bisques were equally good, but he gave the win to Jen's standard version rather than the blue team's more original version with the creme fraiche and serrano. GR had specifically stated he was looking for creativity and originality and, on that basis, I agree with Rock - the blue bisque should have won. Both bisques had equally good flavor, execution, presentation, etc. - it got down to creativity and originality then. Once the loss set Rock off, the garbage detail just fueled his indignation. Me? I personally wouldn't care - gutting fish is pretty awful, I agree, and prepping two kitchens is back-breaking, but at least they're both chefly duties. I just think that the ADDED twist of summoning him to the photo shoot and making him pick up the garbage there was (a) unnecessary and uncalled for, and (b) just tacked on to add more dramatic tension to a scenario in which a good man was already seething from being wronged, as he saw it, competitively - and then thrown into the garbage heap. I felt the blue team, including Rock, was wronged and Rock, a good, proud cook, felt that keenly. Although outraged and venting, Rock DID work the garbage detail, and to therefore then be singled out for additional punishment - well, I felt it was really picking on him and designed to humiliate him - for drama's sake. If the idea was to try to humble him and shush him, I don't see how further beating down an already outraged cook was going to either (a) calm him down or (b) humble him. Jesus. After all the freaking hand-holding GR did with Aaron and all the crap he took from Melissa? So what? They should've just let Rock seethe as he worked until he got back to his own little happy place. Rubbing salt into an open wound with the extra punishment was just a vicious little dramatic jack-off, courtesy of the producers.

Whew. Good to hear. Thanks. ← Tony's is the top-rated show on TC. He cross-promotes OTHER people's shows, you notice (Bizarre Foods, Miami Ink, etc.) Right now, he's the 800 lb. gorilla at the network. Glad to hear Pat Yonge is throwing lots of money at him and zeropointzero. Please, Tony - proceed full-steam with your Master Plan for World (OK, just Food TV) Domination!!Thanks for The Word, Beth.

And it seems Padma and Rushdie are in the middle of becoming unmarried. I watch Top Chef when my hellish life allows which is not often. Bravo runs a marathon right before the finale anyways so I can always peak in then from time to time. ← Yep, Padma has been reported hanging out with one or two members of the TC crew (not the cooks or judges, as erroneously reported). But the split with Rushdie seems to have actually begun a while ago.Oh, update on Melissa's . . . grwth: in today's NY Daily News, she says she was splashed with hot oil - so I guess that was a nasty blister there. But it looks much worse than a burn/blister . . . much worse . . .

You know, I think the nanny might just skate past Brad and Josh. Rock has it in for Josh, but Ramsay has it in for both of them, so I think one of the guys will go next - and I'm thinking Brad. I think it'll get down to Julia (if she can hold it together), Jen (if she can stay away from the garbage cans), and Rock. Jen says she's just a pastry chef, but she obviously knows a lot more about cooking than just pate choux. I'd love to see Julia win, but I think the nanny might be right - as the herd thins, Julia will come up against her own lack of fine food experience. She won't have a team helping hr figure out the intricacies of creme brulee or correctly steamed lobster. TNFNS is infinitely worse than HK - I kind of respect Top Chef more, although the freaking product placement and Padma's molasses-slow Let's. Pause. After. Every. Word. kinda gets on my nerve endings. But at least Padma's a foodie. What is it with Top Chef? They only hire female hosts who are the 22+ year-old juniors of their more famous husbands? Billy Joel and . . . Katie Lee Joel? (!!) Salman Rushdie and . . . Padma Lakshmi? Thast's pretty narrow hiring window . . . who's next as host? Catherine Zeta-Jones?

If you're Ramsey, with whom do you want to share a photo shoot? Wasn't all that tough a decision. My only goal this season is to see Waffle House cook outlast the harpies who wanted to get rid of her earlier because they had ever so much more fine dining experience. ← I'm glad Gordo dispatched Melissa without a vote, but I'd rather have seen the punishment be something more cheffy - like having to prep both kitchens, first; second, I thought the extra punishment - by dragging a member of losing team in to empty garbage at the shoot - was totally unnecessary, and rubbed salt into a open wound. And third, why did Gordon single out Rock, a proud cook, a good cook, whom he had, up to that point, admired? I thought it was specifically humiliating to Rock. Gordo said he thought he needed to do HK to boost his profile so he could open his restaurant in NYC (ridiculous), but demeaning a good, professional man and cook, a man of color, on national TV is a new low for Gordo - as a chef AND as a human being. He should not have agreed to participate in that extra little bit of debasement.

Yeh, what's with all the loose hair? And why are all the chefs' jackets way too large for the girls? They are swimming in those cuffs!

Amen to THAT, Roux. Melissa alternates between aggressive/aggressive and passive-aggressive ("Can I help anyone with anything? Can I help anyone with anything?") but she isn't a good leader - or even a good cook. She's been a line cook for 10 years and she can't figure out NOT to leave sliced potatoes out in open air so they don't turn black? Not once, mind you, but twice! Shit, even home cooks know to put them in water and to acidulate apple slices, etc.!! Rock is gonna tear her a new one, oh, yes. She should have gone home, but in the interests of the dramatic tension that is surely going to splatter like hot oil in the next week or so, Gordo has flung her right her literally from the frying pan into the fire. I see a beatdown in the works . . . (!)

You know, I'm thinking Rock can cook - and he can lead, too. Bonnie is cute, but I don't think she can handle the pressure - although I'm glad she finally told Melissa to shut up. I think Jen can cook, too - although her judgment is appalling. I think Julia can cook, can crank it out and can probably lead, but she's going to run into problems with some of the higher end foods and tech niques she might have to deal with. Unless you've made creme brulee, how would you know it has to sit in a pan half-filled with hot water while it cooks, or that it should be torched on the top? But I like Julia, and I'm rooting for her. My dollar is on Rock, though.

Claudia, I'm not a model! Everything else is absolutely correct. Thanx. ← Well, you are certainly lovely and slender enough to be one, having seen you a few times at some of Tony's NY gigs. Mi dispiace e mi scusa, signora - that naughty Ruhlman described you as a model from Milan in his original Tony's 50th Birthday Party post on megnuts.com

Definitely not (!) Tony is not seeing anyone - he is happily married to an Italian model, and they are the ecstatic parents of a baby girl born in April.

Well, Tony has never done NY for NR, and he was dared to do Cleveland by Ruhlman (on the ruhlman.com blog, January archives, I believe), but I don't know why he's picked Charleston. I still don't think it's budgetary, though. Because, as God was his witness, Tony did not and was not ever going to do what the Food Network wanted him to do with A Cook's Tour - i.e., do the great backyard-BBQs-across-America kind of show. From what I understand, TC's been pretty generous with the NR budget . . . I guess we'll see about Cox, huh?

← Bummer! I better get my butt into the Mitchell line ASAP, before the final passing of BBQ greatness! And Bob Gibson will be right behind . . .

Does anyone know what time the pitmasters will be open for business? I seem to recall that noon-ish was kick-off time, but I could have been delirious from all that good 'cue . . .

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Yes, Aaron should stay, but he's gotta get the waterworks under control. I'd love to see a 48 year-old survive the grueling life of a professional kitchen, but the weepies are going to get him long before the exhaustion, crackling knees and burn-out does.

Took the words out of my mouth! ← I had a great time last year - no Bubba Pass - and got served faster than the Bubbas. Hmmmm . . . I don't know . . . maybe I just had a New Yorker's gift for picking the fastest moving or shortest lines . . . I'll be there Saturday . . .!

Yes, Tony defends Gordon a lot as he is now, and says shows like Boiling Point were Gordo 10 years ago, when Gordo was a lot angrier and under pressure to (a) get his Michelin stars and (b) fight off his ex-partners from Aubergine. But shows like HK is Gordo being that Gordo from long ago, not the newer, kinder, gentler Gordo of Kitchen Nightmares. No wonder viewers are confused. Which Gordo is the real one? (I think he's both - but he puts on a lot more vintage Gordo because gets more generally pissed off at the useless contestants - on HK.)