On 3/5/2016 at 5:58 PM, Lisa Shock said:Phillip is the first contestant to push hard and loudly about the claim that the judges are biased to personal taste rather than industry standard. I am inclined to disagree with him as we are in season 13 and this is supposedly a newsflash that no contestant or guest judge ever leaked to the public. Notably, no one has come out of the woodwork to support his claims.
In his first TC season (Season 4) Richard Blais, no less, who is now a judge himself, declared in one episode (the Wedding Wars one, if I am remembering correctly) that he needed to cook only to please the judges – fuck the diners, or any other standard that others might have.
In Season 7, Kelly Liken (another established chef) commented that the judges (especially Tom Colicchio) wanted things salted far more heavily than she would ever do herself and frequently got in trouble with Tom over that.
In Season 11, Nick Elmi also constantly got into trouble with Tom & Co. for what they (the judges) claimed was lack of seasoning. Funny, Nick's customers through the years have not agreed (and, in fact, some of the guest judges on the episodes also murmured that Nick's seasoning was just fine).
And so on.
ETA: In the last episode of this season's LCK, just after Amar and Carl completed their dishes, Amar tossed another large pinch of salt onto his dish. He won - with Tom C saying that the difference came down to enough salt in Amar's dish. Carl, when he tasted Amar's dish, murmured "Wow, salty", IIRC.
