Kat Tanaka Okopnik

FYI, yes, those leaves are shiso, but I find them too large and fibrous for a lot of the classic Japanese uses. I have no idea why it's labelled "sesame leaf".

I think you're forgetting the museum episode, where people were outraged that Antonia's undercooked/overcooked egg team didn't result in a PYKAG, instead of JenC's pork belly. It's the killer Jamie factor - pork belly (JenC), "tennis" (Spike), and now fish (Tiffani).

Another vote for *only* Hot Taco Bell hot sauce. At home, it's all about Tapatio or some other hot sauce (not Cholula), but at Taco Hell, only the Hot will do.

I used to live on a boat, so I tried out a bunch of dehydrated products...and dehydrated egg whites are meant to reconstitute to something like raw whites, not cooked. You're going to lose out on the coagulating effects of egg protein in the recipe.

This appears to be an insoluble problem, then. Either a dish is based on indigenous ingredients, and ancient technique, and likely to be very primal/basic, or it's going to have been adapted to newly available imported goods (spices, vegetables, domesticated animals...) You've eliminated "bread" as too basic, ditto congee, roasted meat...what's left?

Fruitcake? Are we talking about the same product? Refined sugars, preserved exotic fruits, doused with distilled liquor? 8000+ years? If we're talking about that loose an interpretation, we're back to porridges and soups!

At least as far as 20 years ago, "melty cheese" was a (branded?) food product in Japan. I only found this out in my capacity as my aunt's au pair in Brussels. She decided I didn't know about food at all, because I couldn't translate "melty cheese" into French for her, and produce this particular variety. ("A cheese that melts well" did not produce the result she wanted.)

10 years ago, there used to be an amazingly good Thai restaurant somewhere on the drive between the Venetian and Stratosphere. There was a Thai bakery/dessert shop next door. Is that possibly enough hint for anyone to tell me a) whether it's still there, and b) whether it still exists or not?

Not what they claimed, though. They claimed they were trying to get a good angle on her face for their surprise photo.

Not an apples-to-apples comparison: with a broken finger, all the hospital is going to do is splint it, the same thing as the show's own medic. With stitches, their efficacy is dramatically reduced the longer you wait. When you need stitches, you need them NOW. Plus, with modern stitches and various adhesives, it's hard to say how serious a cut is based on the number of stitches. In my opinion, what we are seeing here is a clear case of the Elves giving the "villain" edit: I strongly doubt Jamie had any real choice about going out to get those stitches. If she did, the producers and their lawyers are sleeping on the job. I think the lawyers are eyeing the potential liability of penalizing people for seeking medical treatment. As far as the comparison - it all depends on how the finger was broken. And stitches ... http://www.glenn.cockwell.com/scouting/Stitch.html - basically backs up what I've seen as far as when to get stitches - knife wounds aren't really a big thing, they're clean cuts that just need to be held together somehow. And up to 18 hours... Again, I think the producers pretty much don't have a good choice when it comes to a competitor with a potential need for medical attention. Unless they are clearly unfit to continue competing, in which case if they do *not* take that person out, they're going to be liable (Seth Caro?). If they create an environment where one is penalized for getting medical care, that's huge can of worms, liability-wise. I'm assuming from reading all the blogs that the issue was, "we will not stop you from getting immediate medical attention to this; if you do not get immediate medical attention, you are responsible for that decision (i.e. we cannot be sued if you don't go to the hospital)". We've seen other competitors cut themselves and glove up to keep going, haven't we?

Was it the medic's decision to take Jamie out? I doubt it; Fabio competed in the final with a broken finger! I think the medic erred on the side of overcautious (liability issues!) and told Jamie that if she wanted, that was likely to need stitches. Staying or going has to be the decision of the competitor. On the other hand, the producers are not interested in creating a situation where future competitors feel they need to forego medical care in order to stay, because this creates a dangerous precedent. Jamie's lost herself a bunch of cred with her peers. Whether it's prudent or not, it's a part of kitchen culture to Get The Food Out No Matter What, and she opted against that. (Then again, I'm a big proponent of crazy glue in lieu of stitches.)

I got the impression that they didn't have the usual assortment of M.G. chemical tricks on hand...?

May as well put that lock on now then. Someone will eventually ignore your greeting. But perhaps it's because its a proverbial "emergency." I'm still in the "cut the public some slack" camp. As a consumer, I dislike locked restrooms. I dislike asking the clerk for the key. (I'm not in prison or elementary school -- I don't need permission to use a toilet.) I dislike walking to the bathroom with a key that is usually connected to a length of PVC pipe. I wonder if anyone has washed and sanitized that PVC pipe* and key -- ever. I don't really know where to put the key while using the bathroom. I'm certainly not putting it in my pocket, that's for sure. There's never a key caddy. So usually it sits on the edge of the sink. Or on the hand towel dispenser. And then, after washing my hands, I have to pick up the PVC pipe/key combo, which is likely contaminated with eColi, salmonella, and every other fecal germ imaginable, and walk it back to the counter without somehow contaminating my hands. Point blank -- if a restaurant puts me through those kind of hoops just to urinate, I will find another restaurant. * Or similar anti-theft device. But they're all identical. PVC pipe, brass bar, acrylic wand, doesn't matter. It's a germ magnet. On the whole, I'd prefer a retinal scan or similar means of entry that doesn't involve extra microbial transfer. The door handle is nasty enough. Why add an extra layer? I absolutely agree about those devices. The only time I'm okay with those is when the loo is clearly used as a merchandise storage location. (And those I find sort of repulsive, even if it's necessary.) You might try being passive aggressive, and sticking a sign on the exiting side of the bathroom door - "Hi - hope everything was to your satisfaction. If you ran in without saying 'hello', we hope you stop to at least say 'goodbye'. We like to be social that way..."

As a customer, I may not remember every place that was neutral about my using their bathroom, but I *will* remember the who were unkind, or especially kind. I don't know what sort of neighborhood you're in, but when I was pregnant, I was incredibly grateful for the places that let me use their bathrooms without a quibble, and tried to make up for it later, or at least suggested to my friends that they patronize those locations. Unless you're having a huge problem, is it worth it to make your toileting on a par with service stations?

Is the contention here that the winning team was a foregone conclusion?`No way for Team T-rex to win? I find that hard to believe, but I think it would make a fascinating discussion here.

Whether it's a villain edit or actually a difference in attitude, the first two to go this season seem to share a "my food don't stink!" attitude that clouds their perceptions to the point where they're sabotaging themselves. (Tre, watch out!) That stew room scene where Jen talks about cooking to please the judges, and no one else? After having witnessed the Quickfire judging going entirely to the vote of children? Hello, message to Jen...maybe that's not a winning strategy. (Easy to snark from here, but I suspect it's hard to shift gears under that much stress.) Looked like a fascinating division in approaches to food, by team selection. I don't know all 17 cheftestants' styles well, but it seemed to break down into the classicists and the innovators. Too simplistic? More-or-less right? (I note that this is probably flawed, as Fabio strikes me as more on the classic side.) I am fond of TiffanyD., and Carla, and Tre; emotionally, I want them Team T-rex just imploded, evidently. I imagine if the tables were turned, Marcel and Richard and Angelo (among others) would have been dreaming up wild approaches to all-animal breakfast. Bacon strata, using ham or bacon? Eggs in a ham-cup, with a bacon garnish? Chawan-mushi with an all-meat base? Paper-thin omelettes used like crepes? And what say you, eGulleteers - would you have gone for the flashlight stroll, or tried to make the most of 45 minutes of sleep? Me, I would have gone romping, because 45 minutes is basically just long enough to get grouchy.

Butter knife. (My problem is when they're not anchored well, and come out, no matter how gently I do it. AARGH.) I'm weird, and don't mind cleaning the deep gunk. It's oddly satisfying. What I hate is gathing up the staticky wisps of paper onion peel.

Dark chocolate KitKats are divine, for commercial candy bars...are they back? I couldn't find them last time I went looking.

Half the time, they'll be using the same barely-washed equipment to make coffee. So you've got a combination of mineral buildup from their tap water, and tannins and other goop from the baked-on coffee dregs. When I was working at a sandwich place for a while, I was the only cook who bothered really cleaning the coffee stuff thoroughly. (Actually, for one English customer who'd come in, I'd make her tea by melting icecubes (which were made with filtered water) in the microwave, in a scrupulously clean cup.) I've also seen some pretty grotty holding containers for iced tea, that end up having a sneaker odor.

yaslh - I've been won over by sethro's last, very classy response in this thread, but seriously - it wasn't one outburst, it was a string of them. And with lots of other "cheftestants" who were under their own individual experiences of pressure. Seth himself said, "but of course I could have behaved like a sane adult and not soured the soup. It was a mess all around." I think he's amply defended himself for what was defensible, and owned up to what could have been better. Time to let the thread move on from Seth, and on to the rest of the competition, no? (Or, if we're going to focus on Seth - how's your mother, sir? I hope she's doing as well as one can hope, given the circumstances.)

Cook the best food. Since my version of eGullet doesn't come with smell-O-vision, much less taste-O-vision, could you describe a "playing to Seth's knowledge and strengths" challege? I'm not getting much out of "Cook the best food". In your fantasy TopChef, or hell, in your fantasy "Show Off What Seth Can Do!" what happens? What's "ancient Japanese techniques" when it comes to pastry/desserts?

I am very, very cross with Tom's of Maine for discontinuing a toothpaste flavor that an old lover of mine introduced to me as the only one you could ever be safe using before orange juice - GingerMint.

Not quite the same, but a memorable "ZOMG, what the hell happened in my mouth?!" experience. Yummy bowl of classic Japanese natto. (Hush, you natto-haters...this is not the horrendous part.) Sip of lychee black tea afterward. wRETCHed. The only thing you can drink after natto, it turns out, is hot Japanese green tea.

Every contestant is operating under the same constraints. This isn't Chopped, or MasterChef, or any of a dozen other cooking challenge shows, it's Top Chef, and ridiculous ingredients have been a show staple for years. "Make gourmet food out of truckstop vending machine goods!" is crazier than "make a sundae out of Breyer's!" The theory is that being a great chef means you can spin gold out of any dross out there. Whether that's a good theory or not, it's the underlying story of Top Chef. Someone else mentioned that Malika's walkout is unprecedented in Top Chef - unless it was meant differently than I read it, this isn't so. It's happened before, starting all the way back in season one.

Blueberry lager ought to make smashing beer bread. Everything else sounds like it's just waiting to become halohalo, eGullet-style. almond syrup, forbidden rice, various tapiocas and coconut jellies, maybe some semolina-cube-like bits of non-gluten starches, the chickpeas and pintos cooked in sweet syrup (pectin sugar?), mandarin oranges - all we need is some coconut milk. (I love rose jam mixed with plain yogurt, either as is, or frozen. I also love it as a component in a supercharged PBJ - Russian black bread, rose jam, and almond butter.)