At the risk of sounding like a 10 year-old, I admit to enjoying every time Fabio tried to say “burger” and it came out sounding like “booger”.
Here’s some more of judge’s table that talks about the problems with the three dishes:
What was the point of even having a quickfire? There was no prize or advantage for the winner, no penalty for the losers.
I betcha Carla won at least in part because she showed how animated and fun she would be on the Fallon show.
This recap said Dale won a trip to Napa Valley:
http://tvrecaps.ew.com/recap/top-chef-season-8-episode-9/2/
Which I don’t really remember either.
I thought the quickfire winner (can’t remember–was it Dale?) won a trip to Napa Valley and a tour of a vineyard. Not the greatest prize they’ve offered, but it’s something.
And I think they mentioned it after the fact. Kinda like, “You won, and oh BTW - we’re sending you to Napa Valley.” I don’t recall them mentioning the prize before the quickfire started.
I giggled when I saw them doing the muppets next week. All through out the show Carla kept reminding me of Beeker. Her pot pie looked yummy. Good for her! Blaise is starting to annoy the heck out of me. On one hand he’s nice and helpful when telling Antonia to pressure cook the tongue but on the other he comes across as such sour grapes on camera most of the time.
Cookies for the cookie monster. 
Making them without a recipe will be tricky. I remember you cream together butter & brown sugar. Mix the dry stuff (flour, baking soda, salt) separately and then blend into the wet. Add oats, chocolate chips, nuts etc. depending on the type of cookie. Proportions are the problem. I always have to double check my recipes.
Cookie Monster may spit out a few of the cookies made without recipes. 
They definitely said it in the beginning cause they cut to Antonia saying she’s never won cash or any prize.
I thought Carla’s personality must have contributed to her win.
Yes, they definitely said he’d won a trip to the Napa Valley, and then Antonia said she’d never gotten a trip or cash.
What did Antonia get last week as winner of the elimination round?
Wow. Major upset there.
Pretty much all the front runners now are from the Chicago season. My guess it will be those three plus Carla in the final four.
Quickfire - cookies for the Cookie Monster! And Elmo! Loved loved loved it.
What a cool elimination challenge! Tar-jay!!! I’m still watching.
Wow, another challenge ruined by a ridiculous short time limit. No one really fixed anything special. A grilled cheese sandwich cooked college dorm style wins? It’s kind of sad. Given even another hour these chefs could have done some real cooking. Something actually worth seeing on “All Stars”.
Just once, I’d like to see the chefs quietly agree to all take their time. The bell rings and no one is done. Maybe then the TPTB would get the message. Instead, everyone risks a heart attack frantically running 100 yard dashes over and over again. I was actually worried about Mike. That’s a lot of weight to run with, and I bet he hasn’t run like that in ten years.
I saw an all too familiar side to Carla. She can get distracted easily. Sometimes running around like a chicken with their head off can derail her. That happened tonight. She’s blindly looking for a tablecloth instead of a protein for her dish. That’s the Carla I remember from the S5 final. I’m not an Angelo fan, but seeing a chef of this caliber get sent home for this bull-crap challenge hurts. It’s a shame.
Dale does deserve praise for quick thinking. Grilled cheese and tomato soup is classic college dorm food. It kept me alive through undergrad and grad school. I’ve used an iron many many times to cook with. If the dorm’s RA showed up, I didn’t get busted for having an illegal hot plate. I bet Dale used an iron in college for the same reason.
Possible Spoiler about next week. Read at your own risk.
[spoiler] Based on the next weeks preview, I’ll predict now that one chef will return. They are calling it the Redemption episode. One of the chefs is complaining that he’s worked hard to get rid of these guys and now they are back. Almost exactly what was said in S5 when they did a redemption and brought back someone.
Fabio oddly said last week that he plans to continue his Top Chef twitter comments and blogging. Maybe he’s the one that comes back? That would explain why he’s willing to blog. That’s just a hunch on my part. A major WAG.
Coming back didn’t work out to well in S5. There was a lot of hostility. The other chefs clearly felt screwed over and it was an us against him attitude. It’s not going to be easy for whoever comes back this time.[/spoiler]
They like Fabio, though. I don’t think they would hold it against him as much as some others.
I don’t know, judging by the previews, it looks like
they are just brought back as sous chefs. Richard was telling Fabio to do something and Tiffani said “just cook my food” about Marcel.
You may be right about next week. I don’t have a DVR and only saw the preview once. It did get me excited for a few minutes.
The final discussion amongst the judges, while the losing candidates are in the stew-room before final elimination, seems to have dropped the previous plan of misleading editing. You can pretty much be assured that the contestant who got the worst comments is the one going home.
I like this.
I’m just now watching since I recorded while I was at work - this quickfire has me cracking up. Making cookies for Cookie Monster? OMG!
I was surprisingly amused at the Muppets QF. I love the Muppets, don’t get me wrong, but Top Chef should be above such things. or so I thought.
Here’s an excerpt from Tony Bourdain’s blog:
StG