has egg on her face?
You messed up your omelet. - [laughing]
- It was kinda raw and none of us really
wanted to eat it, but we had to.
Can Rogelio finally
gain the confidence to commit to a dish?
Are you trying to deep fry candy?
- Yes, they're pretty hard-- - This is insane.
Or will they choke under the pressure
of competing against "Top Chef" veterans?
- Everyone should have this much fun!
- This is "Last Chance Kitchen,"
brought to you by Hidden Valley Ranch.
[dramatic music]
[tense electronic music]
♪ ♪
- Oh, my God. This sh-- just got real.
- Mama! - [giggles]
♪ ♪
- Being here in "Last Chance Kitchen,"
I'm feeling a little nervous.
I wanna definitely redeem myself,
and I wanna make sure that
I always have some fight in me.
- Hi, Chef. - You're trying to figure out
what's going on here, huh? - [laughs]
- So, Laura, do you recognize any of these chefs up here?
- Yeah. I have no clue
what's going on still. [laughs]
- I mentioned we were shaking things up a little bit
in "Last Chance Kitchen." - You did.
- So these three chefs have already competed,
and they've taken out three other chefs.
♪ ♪
- Oh, two!
[all laughing]
- Hi, guys. - How are you, Marcel?
- What's up?
I know who Jen Carroll is.
It's like I have little baseball cards
of "Top Chef" people. [laughs]
- So we've been having a little bit of fun here
while you were. - [laughs]
- It's unsettling seeing that
Jenn Carroll is already eliminated,
because she is a badass in the kitchen.
I just can't believe that this is my...[laughs]
Shot at redemption. - So there are two of you
coming into "Last Chance Kitchen,"
and this time, two people who will be leaving.
♪ ♪
Stakes are high.
You guys ready to redeem yourself?
- Yeah. - Hell yeah.
- "Hell yeah."
So Laura, Rogelio, you both had
back-to-back challenge failures.
Laura, you messed up your Denver omelet,
and then... - I didn't cook an egg.
- You kind of messed up your omelet.
It was just kind of raw and none of us really
wanted to eat it, but we had to.
- 45 seconds.
What is she draining over there?
- I don't-- - What is that mess?
Ten seconds.
[solemn music]
It's pretty raw.
- I have these days--
I call them "do not drive" days--
where I should not be operating a motor vehicle,
because I'm mentally scattered,
and my last day on "Top Chef" was like that.
- Rogelio, you also messed up your Denver omelet,
but then you went on and you messed up
your corn and cabbage salad, as well.
Rogelio, that salad needed to be cold.
I mean, I think you know that, right?
- I wanted to kind of do it
like, maybe room temperature with the corn,
and then add the cold slaw on the--
- So you wanted it kind of room temperature
but cold? - Exactly, yeah.
- "Exactly."
- So today, we're gonna take those two wrongs
and we're gonna make them right.
[dramatic music]
In each of our baskets, there are two ingredients
that are just wrong together.
We have vanilla beans and pickles.
We have garlic and strawberries.
There's licorice and peanut butter.
We have sour candy and gochujang.
♪ ♪
All kinds of things that I would not want to make work.
That's your job.
- [chuckles sharply] - How many baskets are there?
- Seven baskets. There's five chefs.
- I'm seeing a basket with bonito and chocolate.
I'm like, "Okay, I can work with that."
On the far side I'm seeing,
like, bananas and capers.
I'm like, "Okay, I can work with that."
- You have 30 minutes.
It's all first-come, first-served,
and your time starts now.
[exciting music]
- It's a mad dash for baskets.
Kwame goes and he grabs the bananas and capers.
Claudette grabs the bonito and chocolate.
Ugh. I grab pickles
with the vanilla.
I'll figure it out no matter what.
I know that I can make anything work.
- Let's go, chefs!
29 minutes!
Push!
- I'm just excited to keep going deeper
into the different regions of Mexico
and the cuisine that has inspired me so much.
- Whatcha gonna make, Claudette?
- Raspberry mole. - Oh, yeah.
- Mole, mole, mole, mole, mole.
- The chocolate and the bonito flakes
from my basket are incorporated in the mole.
Bonito flakes is just a bonito fish
that has been dried. Cured it in salt,
and right now I'm incorporating it
into the mole for the umami of the fish.
And I think it makes for a beautiful combination.
- Come on, mama! - Stop chopping, start cooking!
- I'm running!
♪ ♪
- Hey, Laura, are you happy with your basket?
- I am. I am, uh, thinking
in my head right now, but I think I got it
pretty eas--well, no.
I'm not even gonna say that. Famous last words.
[all laughing]
What do you got going on over there?
- Uh, I got Korean chili paste, sour candy.
Today I wanna make ahi tuna
that's gonna be marinated in the gochujang
and the sour candy.
And then I'm gonna take some of the sour candy,
and then I'm gonna fry them, add a little bit of
red wine vinegar, some of the gochujang,
and that's gonna be the dressing.
- Ambitious. I like your style.
- Yep.
- How you feeling, Rogelio? - Pretty good.
- Yeah? That's my San Francisco buddy
over there. - Where does he cook?
What position? - The Commissary,
Traci Ar--Des Jardins' restaurant.
- Oh, yeah.
[quirky music]
You are the machine, Lee Anne.
- [growls] - [speaking French]
[speaking French]
- Traditionally, we think of vanilla
in sweet applications,
but in this particular chicken dish,
vanilla is combined with garlic,
fresh ground chilies, and orange juice.
This is not an ideal challenge.
Fingers crossed that I won't be one of the two eliminated.
♪ ♪
- Chef, you got a couple of those dark bananas
you can spare? - Yeah, definitely.
- Did you just tell her to grab your bananas?
- [laughs] - Just the tip, or...
- Telling her to grab your banana.
- The whole thing, Marcel. - The whole thing, ah.
Atta guy. - What's mine is yours.
- Ditto.
You want some chocolate, bonito flakes?
- I think I'm good. Thank you.
- The bonito and chocolate one seems interesting.
I feel like there's a lot you can do with that one.
- [groaning] Eh...
- Says the guy who is, like, you know...
- Yeah. - Making them do it.
♪ ♪
- Chef, how's it going? - What're you up to, Kwame?
- I'm making this dish that I grew up eating a lot.
It's a Nigerian pepper stew.
- What was your--the combo? Bananas and...
- Bananas and capers. - Okay.
- So, use a lot of dried shrimp over there.
I'm going for another stew because it makes sense.
This is the perfect dish to blend those two ingredients
because you can utilize the ingredients
for what they are, really.
Bananas for sweetness,
and the capers for their salinity
and brininess.
- And you have pickles and vanilla?
- These two went for the basket I wanted,
so I was like, "All right,
I'll go with the pickles and vanilla."
- So what are you making?
- I'm do a...a Veracruz-style
orange and vanilla braised chili chicken.
- Got it. And you're using both pickles?
- Yeah.
- Cool.
Claudette, what was your combo?
- I got bonito and chocolate.
- Bonito and chocolate. - Yeah.
- Oh, great. Why'd you choose that?
- 'Cause I can make a really sick mole
with venison, and I'm gonna do pickled rhubarb.
- All right, so you're-- all right.
- With the miso fortified with bonito flakes.
- Rogelio. - Chef, how are you, Chef?
- You're not making a corn salad, are you?
- I'm not, Chef. - [laughs]
What was your combo? - So this just has
a little bit of the gochujang chili paste,
sour candies. - Yeah.
- So I made a vinaigrette and kind of melted--
- Are you--so you're marinating with sour candies.
- Yes, Chef. - You went for it, huh?
- Yeah, there's sour candy is in the vinaigrette as well.
Make my kids proud. - For the kids, right?
- Yeah. - That's good.
- Definitely taking big risks.
For me, I've been through,
you know, so much.
I had three jobs. I worked seven days a week,
doubles, just to put food on the table.
That was a struggle with two kids.
I wanna prove that I belong in the competition,
and I wanna stay here.
Go big or go home.
- Laura, what are you making? Not an omelet, right?
- I had black garlic-- - You had black garlic?
- White garlic, and strawberries.
- I like this combo, actually. I like this combo.
- And you had halibut in the refrigerator,
so I went homeschool with this one,
and I'm doing Alaskan halibut basted in black garlic butter
with a fresh garlic, tomato, strawberry salsa.
- Salsa. Yeah, we had the halibut
in there just for you. - Thank you.
You having fun yet, Rogelio?
- Oh, lots of fun.
- Everyone should have this much fun!
After the huge embarrassment
with the omelet challenge,
I just really want to make sure
I execute my fish properly.
This is yet another challenge with another clock,
and it's proving to myself
that I can actually get my sh-- together
and cook a dish.
- Are you trying to deep fry candy?
- Yes. - [stammers] It's gonna melt.
Oh, my God. - They're pretty hardened.
- This is insane.
- I'm not gonna lie,
I'm kind of a huge fan
of sour gummy candy,
and I'm not sure what Rogelio's doing,
but I kind of wanna taste it.
- This is crazy. - Oh, they are gonna melt--
yeah, they are. - This is crazy.
- Ah... - [laughs]
- When I go and fry the sour candy,
they melt down. As chefs,
we just have to roll with the punches.
- You are going for it, man.
Mad props to you.
♪ ♪
- Okay, chefs. Four minutes left.
Time to make sure your proteins are cooked,
make sure your dishes are seasoned.
- It definitely adds more pressure
knowing that two of us go home.
The odds are almost 50/50
on whether or not you stay.
I feel like I got this.
[electronic music]
- Season, guys.
Don't make the mistake like I did.
[both laughing]
- Two minutes left, chefs. Two minutes.
- Yes, Chef.
♪ ♪
- I think this dish is gonna beat out the other competitors
because it's so flavor-forward.
I grew up on this food, honestly, you know?
So my research has been most of my life.
The flavors, they're just so wild.
- Oh, Laura's going over to the wood-burning oven.
Oh, no! Don't overcook the halibut.
[dramatic music]
- 40 seconds.
- Coming out hot, hot, hot, hot!
♪ ♪
all: Five...four...
three...two... - Go, Laura, go.
all: One. - Time's up.
- Heads-up. both: Good job, Chef.
Whew.
[dramatic music]
♪ ♪
- Okay. - Hi, Chef.
So this is a Veracruz-style chicken.
I used three different types of dried chilies.
- Mm-hmm. - Vanilla, garlic,
black pepper, fresh orange, grapefruit juice--
- So where is the sweetness coming from?
The orange juice and grapefruit juice?
- Yeah, yeah. And then I took the pickles--
I took both cornichons and bread-and-butters,
mixed them with a fresh cucumber salsa.
- Thanks.
Kwame. - Chef.
- So tell me about your stew here.
- So here we have
Nigerian red pepper stew-- chicken thigh,
crispy plantain.
- I don't know much about Nigerian food.
What's some characteristics of Nigerian food?
- So, Nigerian food, they use a lot of dried shrimp.
- Mm-hmm. - Tomato, onion, and
red pepper. That's kind of like
our mother sauce. That's the sauce
that we eat. - Thank you.
Hey, Claudette. - Hey, Chef, how are you?
- That looks fantastic. - Thank you.
So I have just a lightly seared venison
with a raspberry mole, with guajillo peppers,
garlic, onions, the 52% chocolate.
- And the bonito you just kind of shaved over the top?
- I had it on top and I had it inside the mole, as well.
- Thanks. - Thank you.
♪ ♪
- Rogelio. - Chef, how are you?
- Good. What do we have?
- Fennel, apples, peppers,
fried sour candy.
- [chuckling] - That liquid that I kind of
soaked the vegetables in,
it's is sour candy, Korean chili paste.
- Let me ask you a question.
There's two other baskets over there.
Why the sour candy?
- Um, I don't know. I just grabbed it.
[both laughing]
I figured everything was gonna be difficult.
- Cool, thanks. - Thank you.
- Hi. - Hey, Laura.
Alaskan halibut. - Alaskan halibut.
I made a strawberry salsa,
some arugula for the crunch,
and garlic in the salsa, and then I basted the halibut
in black garlic. - Thank you.
- Thank you.
[dramatic music]
- Chefs, I gotta hand it to you.
You actually used the ingredients.
I was quite surprised.
So, Lee Anne, the dish actually looked fantastic.
The chicken was perfectly cooked.
- Thank you. - Could've used
a little less reduced juice, 'cause it was a little sweet,
and maybe a little more salt and some more acid in the dish.
Kwame, I wanna know more about Nigerian cooking.
You really built up a lot of umami flavors,
and there were some nice herbal notes as well.
Claudette, perfect cooking on the venison.
The mole--clearly, it's something you're doing
in 30 minutes, so... but you still developed
a good amount of flavor there. Rogelio,
I gotta hand it to you. I mean, you went for it
with those--with the gummies.
I thought--marinating the gummies, I thought,
was a really, really good idea. Frying the gummies?
Eh, not so much. But beautifully cooked tuna.
It was perfectly grilled, nice and rare.
Altogether, a nice dish. And Laura,
clearly you know how to cook halibut.
You nailed that.
I thought the dish really suffered
from a lack of seasoning,
but the fish cookery was spot-on.
So, winner.
Tough one, 'cause I liked a bunch of the dishes.
But I have to say that the dish I liked the most...
♪ ♪
Claudette. You talked about these flavors
and now we're seeing them. Where were they when
you were in the competition? - You should've kept
me in there. [laughs] - No, no, no, see,
that's not the way it works.
We let go the worst dish of the day.
- [laughs] - It's not about
what you can do or what you did,
it's that day, and... you weren't doing this.
So it's good to see.
Oh, God. The two bottoms.
The two that are gonna not go through.
This is tough. I mean, it's hard to do this.
♪ ♪
Kwame, Lee Anne...
♪ ♪
Guys, you're safe.
Rogelio, that--it was good until those gummy worms,
and you didn't have to use them.
- Yes. - You used them
in the marinade. That would've been enough.
And Laura, again, I loved the--
the halibut was delicious, but the rest of
that garnish really needed some work.
- No, I agree. I agree.
- Anyway, you guys can exit the kitchen.
But thanks. both: Thank you.
- Of course I'm sad to leave.
I mean, this is an amazing experience
for anybody, and it is
much more difficult than I thought it was gonna be.
But as a "Top Chef" super fan,
it's like going to a fantasy camp
where you actually get to meet your culinary idols.
- Good job, Chef. - You too, thank you.
I don't have any regrets. I think that everything
happens for a reason. I definitely want to make
my mother proud, and my kids,
and everybody that knows me proud.
And so that's what I did.
- Claudette, two in a row. - Thank you, Chef.
- Wow. - Uh-oh.
- Good stuff.
I feel, like, this weird wave of confidence
throughout this whole process, and I'm gonna prove to you
that I'm a lot more than what you see.
- All right, well... we'll see you next week.
all: Thank you, Chef.
- Oh, God. - Ugh.
- When he said "Kwame, Lee Anne," I was like...