[Past Seasons Talk: The Stew Room]

S16 (Kentucky): Justin forgot an entire plate of food. He was still recognized as one of the the top 3 dishes, but he was ineligible for the win.

[S18.E12: The Cheesier the Better]

Lol at the blatant lies in this thread. This week was the first time Dawn made reference to her experiences as an African American female chef in the industry. I would know because I found it odd they didn't play up that angle more. They have done it in the past with season 15 runner-up, Adrienne, and it seems like an obvious route to go, and producers love an obvious, easy-to-follow plotline. They decided to go primarily with the Olympian storyline with Dawn. 

I have literally heard more about Shota being Japanese and people not understanding Japanese cuisine (probably like every episode which is ironic since his fans are the main ones yelling in here), Gabe wanting to be the first Mexican Top Chef, Maria being Mexican, Jamie being Vietnamese, Byron being a DACA recipient from Costa Rica etc. None of these bother me because it is who they are as people and as chefs (and I'm culturally sensitive), but to straight up lie and claim that Dawn has been harping on being African American...is a choice. And even if she did mention it multiple times, so what, that's her story and experiences. I can't say I'm surprised she's being singled out though.

It's extremely pathetic, and quite frankly racist, if Dawn mentioning her experience as an African American female chef makes you this uncomfortable and angry. Can't say I'm surprised that people are creating a false narrative to push whatever agenda they've created in their head. 

[S18.E12: The Cheesier the Better]

I thought I was in the Shota fan thread for a second.

 

[Top Chef Season 18 Spoilers and Spoiler Discussion]

10 hours ago, marmarlady said:

so no LCK winner means there has to be an episode where no one goes home right? since the cheese episode says it's a top4, i'm wagering that one

It works out to one elimination per week. so 5 --> 4 --> 3 --> 2 (finale). Had someone won LCK like last season, it probably would have been a three-person finale. As I figured out above, Gabe, Dawn, and Shota are the top 3. I'm 100% sure on this. There is a clear shot of those three walking in the episode where they go digging for clams with Brooke for the quickfire, which is top 3 week. I'm certain Dawn is the finale. I cannot figure out the other chef. I'm leaning toward Gabe, but that's an educated guess.

I think Dawn is winning. Her edit this episode was such a roller-coaster. Very complex. She has the most depth right about now. Maria also has an in-depth edit, but I think there's too much of a gap between her and those three. Dawn had a weak edit and/or narrative earlier on. Sara's elimination made room for the editors to dive in to Dawn's background more, especially in the last two episodes. She's an interesting case cause I cannot remember the last time a contestant has had no on-screen criticism in regards to their food. From what we have seen, she has essentially cooked a good final dish in every challenge. She has had plating issues, but they have never put in her in any real danger of going home (unless you count tonight which one could argue but that seemed like a more complicated issue with the injury). Very reminiscent of Brooke Williamson. A lot of drama leading up to the finished product, and then they somehow pull it off. However, even Brooke had less than successful dishes, especially during her second run on the show. 

I think they started off with the most focus on Shota, but that has sort of died down. He puts his head down, cooks his food, and is usually successful with very minimal problems. Ideally, he should be an easy finale competitor, but I get Sheldon vibes from him for some reason. One thing that they have pointed out is that Shota struggles when he doesn't feel inspired by the challenge. We saw that with his two mishaps with the drive-in movie theater and cooking for frontline workers (he had immunity here), so I don't think Shota missing the finale is entirely out of the question. He still has a chance of winning just solely on his edit, trajectory, and incredible talent. 

Gabe has had a flat edit this whole season. There's 0% chance he wins. They have made no real effort to make him likable or really tell his story. All we really know is that he can cook really well.

[Season 18: Last Chance Kitchen]

12 minutes ago, Irlandesa said:

Thank you for the description.  I feel bad for poor Byron even though he wasn't a fave of mine to win.

But the second challenge sounds familiar. I'm not a regular LCK viewer but it strikes me that one season I did watch, they did a challenge like this but perhaps less complicated.  It was more straight up--here's an ingredient, pick a chef. 

Yeah. They did a similar LCK finale challenge last year and Kevin (he won 2 out of the 3 rounds) ended up returning to the competition (I bolded the winner of each round): 

Round 1: Kevin vs Brian 

Round 2: Kevin vs Bryan 

Round 3: Kevin vs Gregory 

[Top Chef Season 18 Spoilers and Spoiler Discussion]

Well looks like there is no LCK winner, which is why I was having trouble trying to figure out where they come in. So that confirms a 2-person finale. 

[Top Chef Season 18 Spoilers and Spoiler Discussion]

5 hours ago, PackYourKnives said:

Umm Nina follows Shota. Look again. 810 people and one of them is "ChefShota". You are wrong on this: Nina follows both Shota and Dawn.

I checked again. You are right! Not sure how I missed it. I must have checked 10 times lol, but it was late when I was checking. Although, we already deduced that Nina is a guest judge on the challenge where both Shota and Dawn (and Gabe) are still in so the Nina follow doesn't reveal any new information to me. 

I don't know about the "Tiffany being upset" theory cause she follows Gabe as well. Plus, it seems a little petty and far-fetched imo. I don't think grown people think that way. It's only Shota she doesn't follow. It could mean she didn't really interact with Shota as a finalist, while she interacted with Dawn and Gabe as finalists. Another possible reason I just considered is that Dawn is from Houston, Texas, Gabe is from Austin, Texas, and Tiffany is from Dallas, Texas so maybe there's a loose Texas connection there? Shota is from Seattle, WA.

I think it's Dawn vs. Shota/Gabe. Dawn seems guaranteed. The other slot seems like a toss up. 

[Top Chef Season 18 Spoilers and Spoiler Discussion]

I actually looked further into the Instagram follows thing and Nina actually only follows Dawn. She doesn't follow Shota or Gabe, even though both follow her. Then again, Sara also follows Nina so this seems really low-yield lol. The only big takeaway here is that she follows Dawn which means nothing tbh since we already know Dawn makes it that far. 

Another thing is that there is a tvguide description of the finale: "After 13 grueling weeks of competition, the chefs must create the best four-course meal of their lives for their final challenge at Willamette Valley Vineyards. They'll serve it to an esteemed table including Padma, Tom and Gail, this season's All-Star dining panel, and a few additional noteworthy guests including Tiffany Derry, Edouardo Jordan, Peter Cho and Naomi Pomeroy. Former winners Melissa King and Richard Blais join the judges one last time to deliberate and crown the next Top Chef." 

Tiffany Derry (Top chef alumna from season 7 DC and all star) is a finale guest judge and she follows both Dawn and Gabe on Instagram. They both follow her back as well. She does not follow Shota though. Points to a possible Dawn vs. Gabe showdown. I actually feel like this has to be it. Why would she exclude Shota? Shota could potentially miss the finale.

I looked at the other finale judges as well:

Finale guest judge Edouardo Jordan appears to only be following Dawn. Dawn is not following him back. Gabe and Shota are following Edouardo Jordan but Edouardo isn't following them back. 

Naomi Pomery appears to be only following Shota. Gabe is following Naomi but she is not following back. Nothing on Dawn here. 

Shota is following Peter Cho. Only interaction between judge Peter Cho and any of the contestants. So Shota could be in the finale after all. I just think the Tiffany think is weird, since she is only Top Chef alumna, but doesn't completely rule him out.

 

-------

On LCK:

I have one of two theories regarding the LCK winner: theory 1 is the LCK winner comes back in the "Blind Ambitions" episode, giving us six contestants to create three teams of two in the quickfire. The bottom team of two compete against each other in a sudden death quickfire (they haven't done a sudden death quickfire since season 15 so seems unlikely imo) where one person goes home. Then a second person goes home on the elimination challenge. 

Theory 2 is that there is no quickfire (the episode description only makes mention of this one "box" challenge. They usually provide a short description of both the QF and EC), the box challenge is actually an elimination challenge and the bottom team of two gets eliminated in a double elimination. The only people accounted for past this episode are Shota, Dawn, and Gabe so any of Jamie, Maria, or the LCK winner could join those three to make the top 4.

-------

I just think the top 3 is Shota, Dawn, and Gabe. I say it's Sara as the LCK just based on edit and ability. She is a stronger cook than Byron imo. It could be Bryon, stranger things have happened, but his edit is nonexistent. Another thing is that Brooke follows Gabe, Dawn, Shota, Maria and Byron. She doesn't follow Jamie or Sara (although Sara follows her). So that might support Byron coming back? Although a lot of these follows could be based on relationships or interactions outside the context of the Top Chef competition as well. Either way, I don't think the LCK winner matters in the grand scheme of this season tbh.

[Top Chef Season 18 Spoilers and Spoiler Discussion]

On tvguide, they have the descriptions for the rest of the season but skip over episode 11, "Blind Ambitions." It makes me wonder if this is when the LCK winner comes back and they didn't want to spoil it. 

Scratch that, I found the description on another site: "In teams of two, the chefs each take a turn entering the box where they blindly taste a dish created by guest judge Gabriel Rucker and then must try to re-create it." 

Episode 10 (Tournament of Tofu), we go from top 6 --> top 5 

So the episode 11 description supports my theory that the LCK winner comes back because how else would we get teams of two from five contestants? It kind of looks like Brooke entering the box alongside Jamie and Shota, but it would be unfair and make no sense for her to be on one of those teams of two. 

But then the tvguide description for episode after that, 12, says " As the final four chefs near the end of their journey in Portland, Padma is joined by Vitaly Paley and Gregory Gourdet to introduce an old school Quickfire Challenge paying homage to the Oregon Trail. For the Elimination Challenge, legendary chef and special guest Massimo Bottura tasks the chefs to pull inspiration from his famous parmigiano reggiano dish and create delectable dishes utilizing cheddar five different ways." I feel like this is where the Alice Waters clip (w/ Shota and Dawn) comes in since a google search has many articles about Alice Waters pivotal role in the California's artisan cheese movement.

So (final four?) could this mean a possible double elimination (or quick fire elimination, although we haven't had one of those in a while) in episode 11?

And then episode 13 (description) is when they go digging for clams with Brooke. From a trailer, we know Dawn, Shota, and a third taller guy (who I suspect is Gabe- see reason below) make it this far. And someone noted that Nina Compton follows Shota and Dawn, and Gabe follows Nina. And guess what? The description for this episode states Nina is a guest judge. 

Episode 10 elimination: As others have pointed out, Dawn, Maria, Shota, and Jamie are part of a challenge with Brooke and Kristen that has yet to be shown. This leaves Bryon and Gabe. If you rewatch the preview, it appears that Dawn and Maria are standing next to each other waiting for results. This suggests they loose their head-to-heads in round 1 and have to compete in round 2 alongside Byron. Since Dawn and Maria appear in a challenge yet to be shown, I think Bryon goes home. This could also mean Dawn or Maria leave and re-enter via LCK but that seems less likely. I think Sara is returning?

 

So going by this, maybe we have a two person finale (even though it was three people last season)? Everything is pointing to a Shota vs. Dawn showdown imo. Off-show controversy and chatter and a weak overall edit makes me think Gabe leaves right before the finale. Sara and Byron could be Shota's finale sous chefs which could possibly explain their friendship. I think Dawn has kept a low enough post-top-chef profile that I think she wins, although her edit needs to be kicked up a notch these last few weeks (think season 15's Adrienne) for me to be fully confident. I get fan favorite runner-up vibes from Shota although he seems like the obvious winner right now. My only thing is I can't really pinpoint how the LCK winner fits into all this.