[QUOTE=Grossbottom]
I agree that Lisa should have been bagged over Dale, but it was perfect poetic justice since he was talking trash non-stop about Nikki’s lack of leadership being unacceptable during wedding wars.
[/QUOTE]
But it was pretty unacceptable, wasn’t it? From what I remember.
I’m sad now. Dale’s been the only one whose food I’ve really consistently wanted to eat every time (even the pretzel pork, if a little more fully realized), and I’ve never really bought him as an asshole, with the young urban Asian guys around here for reference, though I don’t want to paint anything concretely with such a wide brush. Similar stuff was kind of par for the course around the circles I hung out with round college, it was usually at least somewhat justified (he certainly hasn’t built up his “act like you like people even if you think they suck” people skills, but that’s arguably an honesty issue) and it wasn’t sneaky and wormlike, like Spike’s behavior seems to be. I still always assume the editors are fucking with the audience each episode, but unless they made up sentences out of random words Spike’s spoken, he really is an asshole. A conniving one I’d never want to work with because he employs snake-tactics instead of relying on work and talent. I like him less than Lisa, who may be belligerent and complainy, but at least she doesn’t seem to be focusing on how many people better than her she can screw over. When Dale was teamed with people he was cool with, he did fine. And even when he wasn’t, he held out for civility for a good while. He encouraged everyone during the relay race, even Nikki.
I think the only cooking Asian thing was kind of BS, too. He’s made things in both quickfire and elimination challenges that weren’t Asian; he even specifically addressed it at some point, but I don’t actually think he even had to. As long as it’s appropriate for the challenge and good, who cares? He’d be stupid to avoid his areas of strength consistently, and especially with Ilan’s (undeserved in my view) win that shows that the judges don’t even seem to take it into account. Asia is a pretty giant continent with many different cultures, and it’s somewhat insulting to lump them all together as “one-trick”. So some of the major countries have some common or region-specific base seasonings, like mirin, etc. - so does European cuisine. It’s just more ‘distinct’ from a western point of view and easier to point out than ‘vinegar’ or ‘smoke flavor’.
I actually even wanted to try the butterscotch scallops. Sure, there’s a probability that it came out gross, but I don’t think it was wrong to make the endeavor - it was a push - and I like sweet stuff. I guess Dale implied that it came out too sweet, though.
Also, I took his “Asian guy, asian food” comment as tongue-in-cheek, considering his chuckle afterwards. But that’s me.
Ah well. He ended up my favorite, but I sort of assumed he wouldn’t win because he’s too similar to Hung (not really, but from a TV-to-middle-America standpoint - I imagine it hasn’t escaped the producers). I’m just pissed because it really seems clear that Spike and Lisa are not of the same cooking caliber as the others (including Dale - Jen, too), and they’ve been in the bottom so many times - each at least once when I thought it should have been them, based on what was shown to us, and the judges made a bad call.
Now I don’t really care who wins…I’m assuming Richard. I wish he’d quit it with the naming things after things they’re not thing, it gets on my nerves. A chunk of watermelon isn’t any technically better just because you called it a steak. I guess it gets him out of the kiss-of-death of making a classic dish that doesn’t follow historical practice exactly.
I agree that if they’re going to keep doing teams (which I hate anyway) executive chefs need the requisite power that comes with it, otherwise holding them responsible for team performance is meaningless, and that leader picking who gets kicked off - unless the leader’s made an obvious deadly mistake or didn’t carry out duties as leader - seems more appropriate.