‘TOP CHEF: WISCONSIN’ TEAMS BATTLE IT OUT WITH POP-UPS FOR THE DREADED RESTAURANT WARS

Top Chef season 21 airs Wednesday nights on Bravo, and Eater Austin is recapping the home team’s progress in Wisconsin. Last week, the contestants took swings at a ballpark-themed sausage challenge. Amanda Turner of Southern restaurant Olamaie earned her first top three placement with a spaetzle dish. Sadly, Kévin D’Andrea of French bakery Foliepops fell victim to the Top Chef risotto curse, and he exited the competition.

In the eighth episode, Turner continues to make Austin proud as the show tackles its most notorious challenge: Restaurant Wars.

Battle lines are drawn

The chefs get right to business this week, so we pick ourselves up and dust ourselves off from missing D’Andrea. They meet host (and Austin hotel restaurant Arlo Grey chef/partner) Kristin Kish and judge Tom Colicchio at Milwaukee’s Discovery World science museum. There’s no Quickfire Challenge, Kish says. It becomes immediately obvious why.

“It’s Restaurant Wars,” Kish says. “You made it.”

That’s right, one of Top Chef’s most infamous challenges, which breaks a good chef’s composure like dry spaghetti every season. The contestants laugh the most nervous laughter we’ve ever heard.

There will be two teams. Each will open a pop-up restaurant in a day and serve three courses, with two menu choices per course. There’s $40,000 for the winning team on the line.

“This challenge will push you in ways you have never been pushed before,” Kish says. “I should know. This is at the point in which I was eliminated.” We get flashback footage to that dark day in season 10.

“Sorry,” Colicchio apologizes. (Of course, Kish fought her way back into the competition and won.)

Turner teams up with bestie Dan Jacobs, fellow Texan Michelle Wallace, Danny Garcia, and Savannah Miller. Garcia points out that he and Turner have worked together on every team challenge so far. “Her and I lock eyes and we’re like, ‘That’s a done deal,’” he says.

The teams split off to brainstorm. Turner’s group decides on a coastal theme, with an emphasis on seafood and vegetables. She wants a single-word name. The chefs like Garcia’s suggestion of Channel, which suggests connection between waterways, or between the team’s cooking styles.

They decide to overachieve and offer three entree options instead of two. Turner thinks up a tea-focused set custard as a dessert. She and Garcia are simpatico on the idea of a tea cocktail, too.

Meanwhile, the opposing team — chefs Manny Barella, Laura Ozyilmaz, Kaleena Bliss, and Soo Ahn — draw from their collective backgrounds to devise a Mexican Asian fusion concept called Dos by Duel. A fun little Austin moment: While discussing a marinade technique, Barella namedrops Uchi. He did a stint at the Denver location of the Austin-founded Japanese restaurant.

Turner and her teammates struggle with cohesion

Once the teams get into the kitchen, menus take shape. For a Channel entree, Turner cooks up a vegan gumbo z’herbes with greens, grilled mushrooms, and kombu. Jacobs joins her to develop the custard dessert.

Wallace, who’s really sweating things this week, is skeptical about a vegan gumbo, but sees that Turner feels confident about it.

Using kombu, an edible kelp, means “there’s the feeling of seafood without there being any in there,” Turner says. She continues, “It’s a very Amanda dish.”

The gods of Wisconsin smile upon the chefs, and their pop-up restaurants come to life. The judges split into two VIP parties. Colicchio and Kish visit Channel first, while judge Gail Simmons and her dinner guests head to Dos by Duel.

When Turner’s gumbo comes out, guest judge (and Top Chef season 13 alum) Kwame Onwuachi questions her choice to make a vegan dish for a seafood concept. But Kish points out that kombu is part of the sea. Colicchio likes it, even though he doesn’t think it eats like a gumbo. The judges also rave about her and Jacobs’ honey custard, jasmine tea and citrus gelee, and buckwheat crumble.

Channel gets plenty of praise, including for Jacobs’ smoked walleye, labneh, potato cake, and harissa dish. It has sour cream and onion potato chip vibes, Kish compliments. But there are criticisms, too. Front-of-house manager Wallace wasn’t attentive enough to the table.

“There were no bad clunker dishes,” Kish says. Colicchio agrees, but adds, “This is not a cohesive restaurant. It’s a bunch of ideas.”

The judges switch restaurants. Simmons’ party heads to Channel. The kitchen is backed up, and the VIPs wait 30 minutes for their first course. This time around, guest judge (and Top Chef season 4 champ) Stephanie Izard thinks tomatoes overwhelm Turner’s gumbo. Thankfully, Simmons and company love the custard, too.

The judges reunite to compare notes. Channel had a forced theme but good food, they agree. Meanwhile, Dos by Duel biffed it on the fusion cuisine, but the concept felt cohesive.

Channel’s seafood menu wins the war

At Judges’ Table, Channel wins the Elimination Challenge. Izard gives Turner feedback about the one-note flavor of the gumbo. Colicchio says the idea of a vegan dish using seaweed for a coastal concept is brilliant. The honey custard was beautiful and light, Onwuachi says.

Ultimately, the judges name Jacobs the individual winner of the challenge, thanks to his walleye. Colicchio says it had a “sense of place.”

Then we’re back to losing restaurant Dos by Duel. Bliss gets eliminated for the second time. (Like Kish, she had fought her way back in Last Chance Kitchen.) As the kitchen’s head chef, the judges hold her responsible for a disappointing pork tenderloin entree that the whole team collaborated on.

Turner’s still in the game, with eight chefs left. Next week: an in-studio cranberry bog and Indigenous cuisine.

2024-05-09T16:46:11Z dg43tfdfdgfd