© Henry Dombey/FACECOLLECTIVE

By now, you’ve no doubt heard that last week was my final hoorah as a contestant on Top Chef. C’est la vie.

For the most part, I feel good about my run–I made it to the final eight and I cooked some good food. Restaurant wars, the most anticipated episode of the season, was also a unique departure as a milestone in its own right, and a tough challenge. I’m glad that I made it this far and got to participate in this tradition with such a strong team. Coming off of the win on the quick fire the blue team was confident, focused and excited to be working together.

Perhaps this over-confidence was to blame for the missteps that followed. Right off the bat, we decided to skip a dessert, and in hindsight this was a mistake. A dessert course would have likely been an easier thing for Kevin to finish and/or plate, on top of the main course he was already handling…it turns into a game of What If fairly quickly. But I volunteered to tackle Front of House, and the team rallied behind that delegation, which left Mike Isabella to the first two courses, Jennifer Carroll on the second course and Kevin to prepare my lamb main course, in addition to his own pork dish. We had no trouble procuring all the items on our shopping list under budget and besides the minor drama with Robin over our “stealing” their idea to serve Pellegrino, we were in good shape at the end of the first day. Or at least we thought we were.

I finished the prep for my dish early on the day of the challenge, and turned to my colleagues to see if they needed help. Jennifer had said she had a lot left to do, but it wasn’t til I went to help that I understood how far behind she really was. Her mussels and clams still needed cleaning, the fish cut, the consommé finished. The status of the kitchen made it even more difficult for me to get out of the kitchen and into the dining room, which was my assigned post. By the time I was changed, the servers were already waiting for me and I had scarcely time to catch their names, introduce the chefs and go through the menu before I had to just put them to work. When Tom stopped by to check in, I assured him I trusted Kevin to execute my lamb and that I would be checking plates as they left the kitchen.

But once guests were arriving, time seemed to be moving at a clip and the diners arrived just as we were finishing a tasting with the servers. Although the kitchen wasn’t ready, I had to start seating tables. I visited the first round of diners and got some helpful feedback on the plates: namely, the pork loin was over cured and too salty and the fish course had just taken too long to arrive. I relayed the information to my colleagues in the kitchen, which should be useful for an experienced chef but that night seemed to only rattle their nerves. When the judges arrived hot on the tails of our first seating, we still hadn’t ironed the kinks out. I welcomed them to the Mission and then had to run off to deal with other issues; it was at that point, a matter of triage.

Which is why I didn’t linger over any one table, including the judges. A huge mistake, of course. In retrospect, one of many. From the start, we should have elected a leader. No matter how much respect you have for one another, someone should have been in charge. Also, two courses per chef was totally unrealistic. I let Kevin have final say on my lamb, another error in judgment. And personally, I lost sight of the fact that a dining experience is made up of two significant elements: food and service. I didn’t have enough experience in the latter to overcome the shortfalls of the former, and in the end, both suffered. By the end, I didn’t want to chat with the judges over their meal, I wanted the night to be over. We all left feeling defeated and it was a pretty bad night all around.

I’m not sure I was the weakest part of that team, or that I deserved to go home. But it was sort of a matter of time for me. Top chef gave me the opportunity to work shoulder to shoulder with really talented chefs, cooking for some of the best chefs in the world. I forged friendships and had unbelievable experiences in the kitchen, which taught me a lot about myself, my style and my thoughts on food in general. I was exposed to different techniques and approaches to cooking that were entirely new to me.

So what’s next for this Top Chef ex pat? I intend to continue pouring my heart and soul into my business, Left Coast Catering and to continue working to position it as one of the Bay Area’s top catering companies. More specifically, I’m planning some private dinners at Coffee Bar here in San Francisco on November 7th and November 10th, which will feature a three course menu. I’m also looking forward to working with the kids at the KIPP school in the kitchen and the classroom, exploring where our food comes from and the best ways to cook it.

So Top Chef may be over for me, but I feel like I’m just getting started.

© Henry Dombey/FACECOLLECTIVE

Hi there. Just wanted to stop in for a second to let you know I’m on the road this week. I realize it is quite the week. So check back Tuesday for the recap of this week’s events on the show and a full update.

© Henry Dombey/FACECOLLECTIVE

Can anyone say disaster? I think Dana Cowin can, only she pronounces it “cat food.”

Yes, this week’s challenge didn’t go quite as I had planned: a rustic French pork rillette to pair with the French pinot noir I had chosen. For those of you who aren’t familiar with rillette, it’s a rustic French dish similar to a spread-able pâté. It’s traditionally stored in a crock covered in fat and served as a spread with toast points. My first mistake was probably attempting a dish that I’d never done with pork before. I had made several rillettes, always with rabbit, in which case the rabbit is salted overnight, braised in stock or water until tender, shredded and mixed with duck or goose fat. Turns out, there’s a slight difference in technique between rabbit and pork rillette, which is that pork is braised in fat, while rabbit is braised in liquid.

My arguably larger mistake here was attempting this lengthy technique in our limited amount of time. I skipped the salting and curing stages in the interest of brevity, and without this preparation, the meat needed more time to braise, not less. Sometimes you can, in fact, make several mistakes in the course of a disaster. I had never timed a braised dish before, as it’s not a cooking method dictated by time. Mostly braising is used for cooking tougher cuts of meat where heat, time and moisture aid in breaking down the tough connective tisuue and collagens. When it’s done, it’s done, but not a minute sooner.

I’d like to think that when made properly, a pork rillette would have been an excellent pairing for that French Pinot Noir, though of course it’s hard to say. It wasn’t my first choice of the wines we tasted, nor my second, nor my third. I’m not much of a red wine drinker, truth be told, as it more often than not gives me a headache. When I do partake, I enjoy pinot noir and I almost exclusively drink varieties from the Russian River Valley. Ask any Pinot lover and they’ll tell you that the best California Pinot grapes come from the unique blend of Goldridge and Franciscan soil, from the early morning fog, from the warm days, cool nights and afternoon sea breezes you’ll find only in the Russian River Valley, in western Sonoma County. Living in San Francisco, I would never buy a French Pinot Noir. It would be a waste of food miles for it to travel around the globe, when I could get a superior wine two hour’s drive from my house.

My friend Kevin worked for a number of years at Navarro Vineyards and I usually rely on him to help me put food and wine together. Kevin’s terrific at pairing. On the day of this challenge, I certainly wished that I’d paid more attention to Kevin’s choices over the years and asked more questions when I had the chance. With my very little experience drinking French Pinot Noir, I took my first cue in planning the dish from the region itself. I took for granted that a French wine likely pairs with French food and right off the bat, committed myself to making a rillette. There was no going back. I really didn’t have the time to second guess this initial decision again until it was done.

But I knew something had gone wrong when I began mixing the shredded pork with the duck fat. Instead of the pâté-like consistency I knew it should have, the meat was stringy–probably a result of shredding it before the braise had really finished. Despite my best attempts to add more fat, in the form of butter when there was no more duck, I couldn’t smooth it out enough before the time ran out. Now I realize, of course, there was no fixing the texture at that point anyway.

Every chef has had a day in the kitchen when things don’t come out as they’d planned. I still remember, and so does my family, the time I made blueberry muffins when I was seven and I added 1T of baking powder instead of 1t. I’m sure I’ll never live it down. But in the interest of learning from my mistakes on this show, I spent some time researching pork rillette upon my return home and gave it another go. This time, I followed the salting and curing process to the letter and then confit the pork in pork fat. This time, with experience on my side, the dish was a success.

I love that in cooking, there are always lessons to be learned. Don’t rush a salt curing or a braising, cook the pork in fat and perhaps most importantly, don’t experiment with something new while competing on Top Chef. It’s not the proper arena.

© Henry Dombey/FACECOLLECTIVE

I’ve never done deconstructed food. It doesn’t really interest me. It seems over-thought, with little consideration for pleasure or sustainability–an intellectual style of cooking that lacks character or soul. I understand that to deconstruct is to break down, to dismantle, but I can’t figure why you’d take something apart if it isn’t broken in the first place.

If you asked me, I’d tell you I can cook pretty much anything…so long as my heart is in it. Maybe that’s where this week’s task challenged me: present a classic dish, deconstructed in a new way. In my case, fish and chips. It seemed contradictory, to ask us to be creative, but classic, constructing in deconstructing.

I devoured the best fish and chips I ever had with a friend late at night alongside a cold beer, after working a long shift. I remember it feeling so well-deserved. Fish and chips should always be eaten that way, late at night in a hungry fever, out of a plastic red basket. Doing a deconstructed version not only seems silly, it’s just not food I’d want to eat. It doesn’t hit the spot without the context.

Fish and chips is a traditionally British preparation where the fish is fried in a batter, served with a large pile of fries (“chips”), malt vinegar and lemon. Such simple flavors are hard to deconstruct beyond their already essential components, so I turned to the traditional condiments for inspiration, which as an American, includes tartar sauce and ketchup. In my brainstorming phase, I had no idea we’d be judged by Toby Young, the very British food critic, and he very well could have torn me apart for including the ketchup and tartar elements on my plate. But lucky for me, he noted that Brits also love the sweetness of ketchup and the mayonnaise based tartar sauce with their fish. A small relief!

So in addition to the fish and the potato, I included in my deconstrctionist’s pallette: oil, beer batter, malt vinegar, sugar, tomato, vinegar, mayonnaise (egg + oil), pickles, capers, parsley and lemon. And I had a bit of experience to guide me in selecting the fish, which is always to smell fish before purchasing. Matine had just been eliminated for bad fish, cod specifically, and since my dish traditionally uses cod as well, I inspected the available cod thoroughly with my nose.. It smelled off, and I immediately suspected it to be the same fish that sent Matine packing. Thinking on my feet, I opted for the halibut instead.

I wanted to oil poach the fish instead of frying it, as a twist on the original, and intended to make round chips of potato with parsley pressed between them for the more traditional fries. I planned to do a sabayon with malt powder, crispy bits of beer batter and a string of the remaining ingredients from the ketchup and the relish: sugar and vinegar poached cherry tomatoes, pickled zucchini, a lemon confit and fried capers. It was a fine plan.

I blame a bad quickfire and the potatoes, the chips, of the fish and chips, for my breakdown that day. The chips were an absolute disaster, either soggy or burned to a crisp. And this was without a doubt, my least favorite day in Vegas. I don’t know if it was the lack of sleep, the stress, the feeling of missing my life or the fact that I was being asked to deconstruct my food, but I felt like it was me who was getting deconstructed. I was done. Done with the show, done with the challlenges, done with the people. I wanted to pack up and go back to San Francisco where I loved to cook for people who love to eat my food.

When I entered the kitchen the day of the elimination challenge, Mike Isabella and Mike Voltaggio were plating their food. I watched as Mike Voltaggio carefully placed that Caesar salad on his plate–truly an inspired dish. I will be the first to say, he is a truly talented inventor in the kitchen and was clearly the most comfortable with the deconstruction challenge. Isabella, on the other hand, was still struggling to understand Eggs Florentine. Before I could think too much about any of it, I started to heat the oil for my poach.

Very quickly, the oil was too hot and I had to wait for it to cool down enough to poach, which never actually happened. With ten minutes remaining, I cautiously lowered the fish into the oil. It cooked in a matter of minutes and was very overcooked. Laying out all the ingredients beside the two chips per plate and the overcooked fish, I knew I was in trouble but I placed each part carefully on the plate and lined up every component in a dotted straight line. Effectively, this erased any lingering cohesion among them and that’s how they headed out to the dining room. Looking back, I don’t know why I plated like that. I would never put ingredients meant to be eaten together, so far apart.

This challenge pushed me outside my comfort zone in such a way that I lost sight of myself in that food. I lost my direction, I lost my sensibility, and I ended up breaking my own rules to comply with the rules of the game. I escaped elimination, but left judges’ table feeling broken down, knowing I needed to regain my perspective on food and sense of myself if I had any hopes of sticking around that kitchen.

And I happen to make a great fish and chips. The kind you eat with beer.

©Marianne Jackson

As a catering chef, I have cooked in all kinds of kitchens, with all kinds of equipment, and nevertheless, it is always expected that I will deliver great tasting food on a pretty plate at an appetizing temperature. In catering, there are no constants. Things are always different and often unexpected. If there is any one thing that catering has taught me, it is how to cook anywhere.

When the show this week asked us whether we could cook anywhere, I know a lot of the other cheftestants didn’t expect that to mean over a fire pit in the middle of the desert. We’d been told we would be spending a night on the ranch and that we’d have to cook a high-end lunch for the ranchers. Thinking back to it, I have to chuckle; so many people were really thrown by the change of scenery. I was okay with the plan, but I know I was one of the few who didn’t find the cooking environment and the sleeping arrangement outrageous. Having lived on a ranch in Colorado years ago, I had an inkling of what to expect and the possibility of outdoor cooking had occurred to me. I realize now how that early experience adapting to a rustic ranch kitchen prepared me well for catering, and more recently, this challenge.

I enjoy camping too, so the teepee wasn’t a deal breaker either. I was honestly happy to get out of Las Vegas, if only for a night. It was canned beer and s’mores around the campfire and then off to bed for me. Desert wind had those teepees flapping around noisily, and I don’t think anyone slept very well, happy campers or not. By morning, the wind had subsided considerably and we awoke to a cool morning and beautiful sunrise. We were able to enjoy the moment only briefly before the sun rose over the hills and cool turned to sweltering. The heat of the challenge was on.

I’ve done a lot of cooking over a fire pit and in an outdoor setting, but the 90 minute time limit was a challenge. Working quickly in that heat tested my strength as a chef and a person. When our time started, I immediately transplanted my station out of the pavilion and out near the fire to escape the chaos that was overtaking some of the other chefs. I also wanted to be near the grill so I could incorporate its charms as much as possible into my meal. Once again, I was thinking of the guests (I can’t seem to stop doing that) and found inspiration in hearty staples with southwestern flavors: corn, tomatillos, potatoes and fish, all cooked over an open flame. The potatoes finished in the nick of time and I dressed them with lime sour cream, bacon and scallions.

We served the ranchers and judges, brushed off the dust and packed up to head back to…judges’ table. Nothing ends an exhausting day quite like judges’ table. But I am my best judge, and I knew I delivered with this challenge. It felt great, as the only caterer this season, to finally finish in the top.

Catering can sometimes be looked down upon by restaurant chefs, but I had a definite advantage in this case. At its core, catering is adapting. You cater to each situation by adapting the menu, the preparation and the service while maintaining the integrity of the food. At the end of the day, can I cook anywhere? I can now say with near certainty, yes.

© Henry Dombey/FACECOLLECTIVE

Perhaps this week I should start by explaining the importance of who we were cooking for, because it was a huge deal.

Joel Robuchon was the most influential French chef in the post-nouvelle era for cuisine and is still reknowned for the perfectionism with which he executed his food. He was seen as instrumental in leading French cuisine away from the excesses and excessive reductionism of nouvelle cuisine, and back to a more authentic, bourgeois French cuisine, which aimed to have each ingredient taste of itself. Besides this reputation, he was also named “Chef of the Century” by the French restaurant guide Gault Millau in 1989 and awarded the Meilleur Ouvrier de France (France’s Best Craftsman) in cuisine in 1976.

Daniel Bouloud was Executive Chef at Le Cirque from 1986 to 1992. His tenure saw the restaurant become one of the top rated in the country. Despite all of their accolades, I was most impressed with their humility. Both men are very warm and incredibly kind, despite their exacting methodologies.

Joel spoke to us following the challenge, expressing that he understood the difficulty of the task we were given and offered his respect for our undertaking–preparing traditional French proteins and sauces for a table of some of the best French chefs in the world.

By a coincidence, I am estaging in Michael Mina’s kitchen this week, as the Bouloud Robuchon episode airs. Estage is a French culinary term that basically means to work for free in a kitchen in order to gain experience.

In Michael Mina’s kitchen over the last few days, I’ve been reminded of the things I love about working in a traditional kitchen. The love and the passion and the discipline of the cooks, for one. There are at least twenty people working to create 100 dinners at Michael Mina, and working their butts off to do it. So much finesse goes into each ingredient and it seems everyone is abuzz to get their mise en place, which means to have all the necessary ingredients prepared and ready to combine up to the point of cooking. Cherry tomatoes are fried, peeled and then dried in the oven. Haricot verts are blanched and cut in half lengthwise. Quails are confit (cooked in their own fat), picked and made into rilettes. The myriad of techniques working together can only be described as art. These kinds of kitchens take food to the next level, where the meal is a masterpiece and each ingredient, paint on the canvas.

To work in such a kitchen, you must be committed to your craft, as they demand long hours and grueling schedules. I am sure that Joel Robuchon and Daniel Boulud spent most of their lives in such kitchens, and the experience of working in devotion to such a practice certainly contributed much to their work inventing new and glorious ways to cook food.

At this stage in my career, why would I estage in someone else’s kitchen? Simply, I believe you can never stop learning as a chef. While I often glean information reading books, I find that hands on training is still the best. Famous chefs like Joel and Daniel no doubt continued to refine their knowlege in the kitchen long after they’d grown quite famous. There is no question. The humility they showed us during the classic French challenge seemed to me a true testament to their mastery of our craft–a reverence for the human energy embodied in the meal and the knowledge that such precise execution is never a simple task.

Though I may never be a Joel Robuchon or a Daniel Boulud, I intend to learn as much as I can about all things edible. And to do so with a similar humility for my craft.