Top Chef Season 3 and one specific challenge

[chorus]

So far I'm rather enjoying the challenges and the contestants overall in this season, much more so than I did last season. I think my favorites right now are CJ (he reminds me of a guy I used to work with who I rather liked, which may figure into it) and Tre. I kinda want to like Hung but he keeps messing it up by being a bit of a divajerk. It

Comments

[ladycalliope]

Hung's my favorite so far. He's super-arrogant, but in his case, I think his arrogance is far more justified than Marcel's or Stephen's was.

As for Micah, she used her daughter too much as an excuse when things were going poorly, and I was happy to see her go.

[tibicina]

I think, while those were classic 'Americana' family favorites, honestly, depending on where you grew up and what sort of family you grew up in, you didn't eat those. And if you don't live in America or come from the right reguonal/socie-economic background in America, you didn't get them either

[chorus]

Eh, granted that maybe not all of them would be known by any given person, I still was boggled. There were a wide variety of dishes on the table -- there was even one left over when they were done picking. Even if you hadn't ever encountered some of them, something should've been familiar or easy to figure out. Heck, Hung managed, and he didn't grow up here; even if I think his dish wasn't spot on it still wasn't bad

[tibicina]

Oh, and the dumplings were one of the pierogi variations, but there are five or six alternate spellings for that depending on exactly which country/region your from since they're /allllll/ over eastern europe. (And then you get into fights about the 'proper' ingredients and stuffings and whether you boil them or fry them... or boil and then fry them. And do you boil them in water or chicken stock. And and and and... It's like trying to have a discussion about how to make spagetti sauce. Or meatloaf.)

[chorus]

Actually, I don't think they were technically piroshki. There's a specific dish that uses potatoes wrapped around meat like that that's not piroshki, but it's not kotleki either I don't think. Anyhow, piroshki is what I call them if I mean Russian, pierogi if Polish. :D