On this week's episode of Chopped, contestants were placed into yet another group challenge, thrown in the woods to make camping food... that was far from camping food, and given baskets of certain death.
Basically.
I get that group challenges are probably easier to film and judge, but I'd like to see more of what the individuals are capable of without Matthew telling everyone how to do it.
Which, by the way, one of the groups was Cory, Matthew... not pictured because he wasn't supposed to be on the show, and Amy. Matthew, while he can cook and woo the judges, basically stomped all over Amy this episode by telling her how to cook and jacking up her demo in from of the family and judges. He didn't however do that to Cory. Which just goes to show that Matthew will take advantage where he can. Cory isn't exactly a personality to be stepped all over, and while coming off as charming and handsome on the show... he would take very little had Matthew upstaged him.
Somehow Amy was criticized for not mentioning that she was a mom again. Twitter has complained nonstop about her reference to having children, but Giada clearly is wanting the contestants to stereotype themselves and talk about it at every filmed moment.
I say just Giada, because, well, Bobby wasn't around. And neither were his eyebrows.
Unlike when Sue is absent from Great British Baking show... I didn't miss Bobby.
I preferred his personality back in the days of his grilling show with that hillbilly in overalls.
In other group challenge news... David did amazing and made a great dish, and then Jason attempted to kill him.
Oh you didn't know David was deathly allergic to peanuts either? Clearly the producers didn't know as well.
David being absolutely beast mode managed to overcome certain death and still manage to present to the judges. Jason wasn't eliminated simply for trying to kill people either.
The dish he did try to kill everyone with though was said to be good.
The only real issue with actual tastes came in the fact that Andrew Zimmerman was a judge and he would drink the blood of a squirrel if you told him it was a native dish.
Rusty freaked out during tonight's demo and said 'together' approximately 456 times.
Addi made s'mores bark. It was super innovative. She was an innovator. I know this because she told me.
Oh yeah before I end this, the former FNS winner who doesn't have a show told Cory she wanted to see the beef jerky used. He made a gravy. They liked it.
Had they challenged Trace he would have made a bowl out of it for his Campbells tomato soup.
Speaking of which, Trace was sent home tonight after a painful 4 episodes of watching him because they couldn't make excuses for keeping him on any longer. He may cook decent in real life, but under pressure and on the spot clearly isn't his game.
The guy gave the judges a bell pepper bowl of Campbells tomato soup. I don't know anyone that takes soup camping with them Food Network, but I don't think it was a dish Giada will ever recreate.
She looked like she was going to die tasting that dish.
Then she said he needed to thin it, but he did thin it. With vinegar.
It was a train wreck that just kept on wrecking. From his not cooking the first two segments before commercial and saying how he doesn't do 'outside' and wanted champagne to the bell pepper bowl that gave me flashbacks to that time someone I personally know served something in an undercooked bell pepper bowl.
And that's it folks. He went home.
Finally.
