-
- Come on. - Give a guy a break.
- David's Music City dish was off key.
- You are gonna get so much sh--
- I know. - When you go back home.
- Can he find redemption
and make a dish that'll sing?
- I don't like the sound of that, sir.
- This is "Last Chance Kitchen."
Brought to you by Hidden Valley ranch.
♪♪♪
- I'm excited to cook again.
- I'm one of the fiercest competitors on this planet.
I know how much I want to win.
And I know I have what it takes to be Top Chef.
I wouldn't be here if I didn't think I could.
- Hey David.
Welcome to "Last Chance Kitchen."
- Happy to be here.
- Surprised to see this guy here?
- Not at all. - Not at all?
- I am not surprised to see wonder boy.
He is like the Ivan Drago of the house.
He was, like, born and bred to be a chef.
But he's going down.
- How was your trip back from Nashville?
- Definitely faced the music in Nashville.
Top Chef is a grind.
And I just got a little lost, I got a little...
unsure, wasn't cooking confidently.
My music memory is.
"Morning View" by Incubus. It's an album.
- This biggest problem I had with David's dish
was that it was really salty to me.
- The potato is nice and crispy,
but then there's other elements of like, mush, in there.
The was it was plated, you can't tell what anything is.
- Dave, you're Portuguese.
You were went for doing, like, the best known
like, mostly eaten Portuguese dish.
You are gonna get so much sh-- when you go back home.
- My family is never gonna forgive me.
- Yeah, exactly, they'll be like,
no way you're ever cooking for us again.
- Yeah. [laughs]
- He used these clams
and kinda cut them up
and I couldn't really identify what they were.
And it was just weird.
It's really hard when you're trying to eat a dish,
and really, you have no idea what you're eating.
It's probably even more difficult to cook a dish
when you don't know the ingredients
you're working with either.
♪♪♪
- Come on out. Oh, there we go.
There's our display.
Very nice.
So, these are some alien ingredients here.
This is a UFO.
An "unidentified food object."
- I'm not gonna be abducted by aliens.
UFOs are not gonna get the better of me.
I'm winning tonight.
- You guys look a little confused and stumped here, huh?
You choose three items from the display.
One mystery meat,
and two other mystery ingredients.
- There's ingredients up here
that I don't think either of us know what they are.
So at this point, I'm personally gonna try
and attack it and base everything off of taste.
- You have 30 minutes.
And your time starts...
Now.
- Let's go, guys. - Woo!
- I ran over to the table,
and quickly identified the scallops.
They're really easy to work with.
Now, it's about tasting.
Curds.
Some things are slimy,
some things I can't quite point out what they are.
Be like, oh, that's awful, okay.
So the three ingredients I think I'm grabbing are
Scallops, piquillo peppers,
and some sort of nut.
- Hey Brandon, what three ingredients
do you think you have in front of you.
I want to make sure this is mango
before I tell you that.
Yeah, I got mango and...
[laughter]
- Deli meat?
- Yeah, maybe.
It's really hard to tell what it is.
But the flavor is good, and it's ground,
which is kinda the key for the dish I have in mind.
- What's in the sundae glass?
- Sunchokes?
- Oh, are you asking us or telling us?
- Change of plans, artichokes.
- Oh, artichokes. Ahh.
Do you know everything that you grabbed, David?
- There's nuts, roasted peppers,
and scallops, so...
- You have nuts?
- Is it not a nut?
Is it like a sweet roux?
It's, like, weird.
I'm not positive on the exact ingredients
that I'm working with.
But I know that I'll get some oily, sweetness
from these nuts.
And I know that I can turn these humble ingredients
into something pretty elevated and special.
- What are you gonna make?
- Little scallops with some romesco.
Keeping it peninsula, baby.
I got eliminated on a Portuguese dish
so I'm starting to come up with some Spanish,
Portuguese, flavor profiles.
- Brian, come over here and fix my hair, man.
- I would, but I hate you.
- Yeah, you don't like him, right?
- What do you got there?
What do you think you have there?
- [laughs] Honestly,
I feel like it might be mortadella.
- Really? - Or possibly some sort of
sheared turkey.
It's already seasoned. - It sure is.
- I don't, uh... I don't know 100%, Chef,
I'm gonna be honest with you. But what I do know--
- I have a feeling. - I'm making some empanadas.
My wife's mom showed me how to make empanadas.
- Oh yeah? - My wife is Colombian.
Empanadas are something
that her and her mother taught me how to make.
So, I think making an empanada is a good way to kinda
tie my dish into my personal experience.
- Do I lose points for not being able to figure out what it is?
- No, no, no. - I appreciate that, Chef.
- Hey,
- Traveling back to the Iberian Peninsula.
- Oh yeah, so what do you think you have?
- I thought I had some kind of nuts.
I'm not sure.
But it's sweet, and nutty.
So, I'm using it as part of a romesco.
Keeping it simple, Iberian.
I want to show my face at home.
- Everything coming together?
- Yeah, I think so.
- Part of me is sorry to hear that.
- You have your good looks to rely on
for the rest of your life.
Come on. Give a guy a break.
- Brandon, when you chop like that
it makes your face look wicked weird.
- He's like-- - Like kinda ugly.
- He's like, licking his lips.
- You notice his hair doesn't move though.
- I know. - Oh, no.
- Has he formed the empanada or anything yet?
- I haven't seen them.
- Can I give you a hand?
- Looking good, man. - Okay.
- This is nerve wracking. - It is.
- It's like watching a car crash in slow motion.
- Five minutes chefs, five minutes.
- My timing for the challenge is a little bit behind.
I'm just starting to roll out my empanada dough
with five minutes left.
It's making me a little nervous,
but I'm confident in what I'm producing,
so I think I'll be there.
- He's having a hard time with those empanadas.
He can't close them. They're too dry.
- Yeah, no. - Yeah.
- You want this win more than me, Dave?
- I think I do, buddy. I think I ----ing do.
- I don't like the sound of that, sir.
- This cook is almost too good to be true.
I'm almost worried that I'm gonna trip
and the scallop is gonna go flying out of my pan.
- One minute left. - One minute!
- I pull my empanadas out of the fryer
just in time to get them on the plate.
They're crispy, light golden brown.
And I think they're gonna be really nice.
- Five, four, three, two, one...
- Times up, you guys. Times up.
♪♪♪
- Okay, David. - [sighs]
- What do you think you made?
- I made a scallop dish with romesco
cauliflower puree, roasted cauliflower,
apples, some little lemon zest
in the cauliflower puree
- So the three ingredients you chose were the...
- It was piquillo peppers,
I thought these were nuts.
They're acting as the nuts in my romesco.
And then... um, scallops.
- This, I thought was raw cookie dough.
It's actually sugar cookies ground up.
- Ground up.
- Oh my God, no wonder they were so sweet.
- Thanks. - Thank you, Chef.
- So, Brandon, what do we have?
- Mystery meat empanada.
Some red potatoes, curry, mango puree,
and then a kale chimichurri
- Did you taste your mystery meat?
- I did. - After it was cooked,
did you taste it? - Yes sir.
- Okay, your mystery meat is...
spiced ham, otherwise known as...Spam.
- Oh. - Have you had Spam before?
- [laughs] - No?
- It's probably actually better
that I didn't know what it was until now.
Because if I had grabbed it and found out it was Spam,
I would have no idea what to do with it.
How is it?
- I'll tell you in a little bit.
- No secrets, huh?
♪♪♪
- Well, I have to say both dishes were tasty.
It's amazing when you don't know what you're cooking,
you can actually produce good dishes.
David, I liked your dish.
I liked the use of all the ingredients.
I think it's kinda cool having scallops cut that way.
The peppers, you made a nice sauce,
not knowing what the sugar cookie was,
you still put it to good use. I thought
the cauliflower cooked both ways were really good.
And I think that little blast of raw jalapeno
right at the end gave it some heat.
Brandon, that mystery meat, man.
Um, I know we were all really worried watching
you make those empanadas. Looked like you were having
a hard time getting them sealed. And you were really risking
that they were gonna blow up inside that fryer.
But they didn't, and they were really tasty.
The dough was nice and flaky.
and everything inside was really well seasoned,
and the sauce I thought was the real star.
You did a great job with the mango
'cause it gave a little sweetness.
- They were both really terrific.
When I look at food,
first I look at how well everything was cooked
In both cases, everything was cooked really well.
I look at seasoning.
In both cases, everything was seasoned.
So I go to the challenge.
And I got a look at how
everyone incorporated their ingredients
and that's why I chose...
David.
[applause]
I think he did a better job
of taking those ingredients and making a dish out of them.
But yours was really tasty.
Brandon, you can exit the kitchen, thanks.
- To come this far,
and then lose on what I thought as a great dish,
it's always a let down,
but being on "Top Chef" has kind of reignited my fire
to be in the industry and be a prominent figure.
So leaving here, I'm looking forward to getting out
and starting my climb to the top.
- David, I hope you got all of that UFOs
out of the way now.
You have two more
before you can get back in.
Ready to go? - Yes sir.
- We'll see you next week.
- See you next week. - Thanks.
- Good job.
- I feel like a ten pound weight
has lifted from my shoulders.
I made a dish that was out of this world.
I am a dad. I have dad jokes for days.