Top Chef New York - Episode One - A Fairie Will Take You Home Now

And so it begins – the fifth season on Top Chef. And this time they are competing in my hometown – New York City.

The show opens with shots of the cheftestants arriving at Grand Central Station. This is curious, considering that Grand Central only has trains to/from Connecticut and upstate New York. The first guy we see, Fabio, is from Italy. When did the train from Europe arrive?

We then see The Lesbian® – Jamie – a tattooed blond gal from San Francisco. We also meet Gene – a tattooed dude from Hawaii. Gene never went to culinary school and has worked his way up from Dishwasher. He is the George Jefferson of the restaurant world.

We meet some other cheftestants, who all seem to be gathering on a ferry boat. We see Lauren, whose husband is stationed in Iraq. Alex is this season’s Papi who will surely break my heart, and we also meet Carla – who looks like a stone-cold lunatic and is 8 feet 9 inches tall (at least). We are introduced to PocketGay Patrick, who was a classmate of Lauren’s at culinary school. They hug during their mini-reunion and we find out that PocketGay, 21, is still in school. Sounds like the 6-year-plan I eventually completed at Penn State.

We also meet Richard The Pooh, a big, cuddly gay teddy bear of a man – who says the Queens back at the Bear Bar will want hourly reports on Padma’s outfits. I thought they only drank beer and talked about facial hair and Rugby down at the Bear Bar? Who knew Bears could be so girly? Woof???

All 17 cheftestants disembark the ferry and arrive on Governor’s Island where they are greeted by Chef Tom and Padma. TomPad sings them the typical “if you can make it here, you’ll make it anywhere” song (the Liza version – this IS Bravo, after all) and mentions that 650,000 people work in the food & beverage industry in NYC (me being one of them). That number is dropping fast – trust me – so go out to eat every once in a while, you cheap bastards!!

Time for the Quickfire challenge. The very first Quickfire will also be an elimination challenge – the person who loses has to go home immediately. Cut to Lauren talking about how she KNOWS there is a chef’s coat with her name on it and how she KNOWS she’s making it to the next round. Note to Top Chef producers: a naked gay marching band playing “I Want Your Sex” at St. Patrick’s Cathedral would be less obvious. Lauren is SO going home.

The Quickfire challenge will consist of three rounds. Round one: peeling apples with a knife. Confident Stefan Of Finland finishes first, he and the next 8 finishers are all safe. Richard The Pooh cuts his finger and bleeds on his apples (damn those chubby gay fingers!) but manages to be one of the safe ones. Because he finished first, Stefan Of Finland gets immunity and can’t be eliminated during the Elimination challenge.

Round two of the Quickfire will be to finely chop (brunoise) the apples. Cue Lauren talking about how extremely difficult this is. Hasn’t she gone home yet?

During this round, we meet Daniel – the straight, Long Island version of Richard The Pooh. His bio pics on the BravoTV website look like a Bear411.com 'looking-for-sex' profile (see below). Except Daniel is straight and sounds like Joe Pesci and Stella from Project Runway taught him how to tawk English. Leah-tha!!

Seriously, he would get laid with those pics if he were gay. Especially down at the Bear Bar.

After the chopping round, four more cheftestants are safe – leaving the bottom four to compete or go home. The final round will require them to cook something for Chef Tom with their peeled and chopped apples. Lauren The person with the weakest dish with be shipped home via ferry – with a magical train connection at Grand Central Station to any destination in the world.

Radhika, the Indian gal who said she didn’t want everyone to think she only cooked Indian food … does an Indian dish. Way to think outside the (curry) box. PocketGay Patrick is making an apple slaw/salad and says he’s not very fast because he likes everything to be perfect. In other words, he's gonna take his time and do it right - like a funky Isaac Hayes ballad...

Utensils down, hands up, BITCHES!!! I have been waiting MONTHS to hear those words.

Lauren has created the losing dish a spinach salad with bacon. Lauren says something cheesy about how everything is better with bacon – further prolonging the time before she is thrown onto that slow boat home.

Sure enough, Lauren is leaving – and her friend PocketGay Patrick barely scrapes by. Padma says “Please pack your knives and go. There is a ferry waiting for you”. Based on Patrick’s twinky good looks and desire for slow-and-steady perfection, I bet there are a few Fairies waiting for him as well.

Lauren’s last statement before heading into obscurity: “I’m going down on apples”. I’m SO not touching that one.

Elimination Challenge:

The 16 remaining cheftestants pull knives from the knife block. Each knife has the name of a New York City Neighborhood – 8 neighborhoods in all, meaning the cheftestants will be pairing up.

The cheftestants will each create an ethnic dish inspired by the neighborhood they have chosen. They will compete head-to-head – the winner of each pair will be eligible to win the challenge, and the loser of each pair will be eligible to get on that ferry to Nowheresville.

They call it a night and head back to the apartment(s) – which based on the views from the balcony must be located in Long Island City, Queens (UPDATE: Thanks to NancTWoP, I now know the apartment is located in Williamsburg, Brooklyn). Long Island City was one of the featured neighborhoods – with “Middle Eastern” being the ethnic food. This was surprising to me, as Long Island City is filled with warehouses and old factories – and few residents. It also houses a Correctional Facility (don’t ask me how I know this). So based on MY experience, the challenge shouldn’t have been Middle Eastern food, it should have been “Making Grilled Cheese Sandwiches on the Radiator” or "Ramen Noodles a la Cell Block H".

The cheftestants do some bonding at the apartment over dinner, and “Team Rainbow” (AKA “The Scary Gays") – Richard The Pooh, PocketGay Patrick, and The Lesbian® hold their first official meeting (over cocktails, natch). FYI: that’s what we do when we get together, we hold meetings – usually so we can form strategies on how to “redefine marriage” and ruin civilization in general. Oh – and recruit your children. We’re so fun and evil! Cheers Queers!!

The next morning is Elimination Day, and the pairs go shopping. Here are the match-ups:

Team Astoria/Greek. This is 2/3rds of Team Rainbow - Richard The Pooh and The Lesbian®. Richard is bummed that he has to compete against "my little lesbian" - which coincidentally is the name of the hottest toy this Christmas in San Francisco.

Team Brighton Beach/Russian: Hosea (boring white guy) and Crazy Carla. Carla asks the lady at the Russian Market if something was "Yummy Yummy". I would have called her "Crazy Crazy". Then Carla casually mentions that she lets her "Spirit Guides" lead her through her cooking. This is one to watch, I'm telling you.

Team Long Island City/Middle Eastern: Stefan Of Finland, who already looks like he will win this season, and Ariane from New Jersey, who is afraid of her own shadow.

Team Ozone Park/Latin: Blond "How's My Thinning Hair" Jeff, and Italian Fabio. I'm going to just put this out there. I know Fabio is probably the biggest Asshat in the world - but his accent just DOES IT for me. I could listen to him say the words "apple" and "soccer" all day (and night).

Jamaica, Queens/Caribbean: Indian Radhika and someone named Jill. As always, the white girls all look alike to me.

Little Italy/Italian: Leah and Melissa. Leah is from NYC, and Melissa - somehow - calls herself a Chef BUT IS UNFAMILIAR WITH ITALIAN FOOD. You never heard of Chef Boyardee?!? Actually, I was surprised to see them actually shopping at an Italian market in Little Italy - which has shrunken down to about 3-4 blocks. I think there are probably only one or two stores left there anymore - everything else is Italian restaurants. Leah and Melissa should have just ordered takeout from Da Nico and called it a day.

Chinatown/Chinese: PocketGay Patrick, and Daniel from Strong Island. Patrick, typically cute but dumb, keeps telling Daniel exactly what he is going to do. Daniel can't believe his (dumb) luck.

Little India/Indian. Papi Alex and Hawaiian Gene (who has never cooked Indian). I don't even know where Little India is.

Everyone enters the shiny Top Chef Kitchen - filled with GE Monogram appliances - and they start to scramble. I thank Jeebus that Fabio is cooking pork, and I pray to the Baby Jeebus that Fabio says the word "pork" 400 times this episode.

Crazy Carla is de-boning fish (her opponent Hosea bought de-boned filets - he's not Crazy Crazy). Richard The Pooh is a chatty gay bear, but The Lesbian® wants complete silence. Miss New Jersey Ariane is having trouble with her Pharaoh - apparently she thought she was cooking Egyptian food. That's a joke - I know it's "Farro". Blond Jeff doesn't get everything onto his plates before time is up. He was too busy checking his reflection off those shiny GE Monogram appliances.

Time to introduce the judges. Chef Tom and Padma are there, and the cheftestants all freak out because NYC Chef Jean-Georges Vongrichten is the guest judge this week. FYI: Gay Ted is no longer on Top Chef. Color me sad :(

But color me happy when I see my favorite threesome in the world - GAIL SIMMONS AND HER BOOBIES!!! Happy Days Are Here Again!! She had the girls pretty well covered this week, but this is only week one. I hope for much more boobage during the rest of the season. When Gail appeared on-screen, I literally cheered out loud and clapped – and then realized that my roommate was trying to sleep. Woopsie!

They call in the pairs one-by-one (no – NOT Gail’s boobies). Stefan of Finland wins in the Middle-Eastern matchup, beating timid Ariane from New Jersey. Richard The Pooh gets his first long look at Chef Tom, and admits that Tom has nice eyes, and that he would love to buy Tom a drink (or three) down at the Bear Bar. Richard sure does spend a lot of time at that bar. When does he have time to cook? Anywhoo - The Lesbian wins despite Richard's flirting with Tom.

In other pairings, Daniel from Long Island beats PocketGay Patrick by a mile, and Gene (who has never cooked Indian food before) impresses the panties off real-live-Indian Padma - even though Gene called his "curds & rice" dish by the wrong name.

The judges judge and the cheftestants head off to the NYC version of the Not-So-Glad Storage Room to drink and await sentencing. They are pretty calm back there, which makes me long for a Lesbians vs. Dale fight from last season. Ah, memories...

The winners (Stefan Of Finland, Gene-Gene The Curds & Rice Making Machine, and Princess Leah of New York) and the losers (PocketGay Patrick and Ariane) are called in front of the judges. Stefan is the winner, and Padma notes that in 3 of the 4 past seasons, the winner of the first Elimination challenge ends up winning the competition. Patrick and Ariane hope that means they can all just go home now.

In the end, Team Rainbow is torn apart because PocketGay Patrick is sent packing for his "cliché" Chinese Cuisine. But don't you worry about Patrick, there are Fairies waiting to take him home - one of whom is named Hedda Lettuce...