pally

I have a feeling that the final 2 will be Rashika and the guy from LCK. Right now, Danny is the only other chef I can see making it all the way

Bad basic cooking skills will get you sent home over a badly conceived dish almost everytime

I knew the minute Ashley finished her cake that she would win as long as it tasted ok. She had the best-decorated cake by far and away. I wonder how much time Kevin lost by having to remake his cake. I never got a sense of racism in Nancy's behavior towards Sherrod. His techniques have been hit-and-miss00 all season. He was a more reserved person so it was much harder to play off of him for "good" tv. It sounded like all 4 of the final cakes tasted delicious so it came down to the decorating and Ashley aced that

Ashley always over decorates. There is too much stuff on her bakes. I've been watching too much Great British Baking Show. I was wondering what "blitz puff pastry" was until I saw what they were doing then I knew it was "rough puff pastry" Too bad about Javier. I hated to see him go but raw pastry when everyone else did ok was the kiss of death. I think that Duff directs the outcome far more than we thought. He has more specific comments and I think he balances the opinions of Carla and Nancy. Not that it would have saved Javier last night

Right now, Javier and Kevin seem destined for the finale

Cat will be back as host. Judges will be Nigel, Alison Hoeker, Comfort Fedoke, and DWTS alum Maksim Chmerkovskiy. This has the makings of a good panel set to air Mar 4 at 9PM

I suspect that all 4 will go to the finals, they've done it before unless someone really screws up next week. I think they really want to see a collection from all 4 as they all are so different as designers Even with anonymous runways, it is impossible at this point for the judges not to know which designer did what. They all have their signature looks. Rami won because that kind of pleating and draping is not normal for menswear. Those colors would look great on a red carpet. Bishme lost because of the hat. Brittany lost because she used Gucci's design for Harry Styles down to the big bow tie. She didn't design she copied using different fabrics.

I really liked Bishme's vest. The vest was cool. The hat and train thing not so much. It worked with the ball cap and veil from a couple of weeks ago because the fabric was light and flowy. This just looked like it was heavy and made him look like a pimp. Prajee's looked like a matador met a ringmaster but I think he was done in by too many recent stints in the bottom. Laurance...kilt...been there done that but to then pair it with a pair of shiny loafers, yuck. Brittany loves to "borrow" ideas. Just because she sewed it well doesn't mean it wasn't someone else's design in the first place. She should have been in the bottom for that alone. I liked Rami's and could easily see it being worn by either sex

I just finished watching Season 5, Korto's original season. She was sarcastic and snarky, especially towards Kenley, who no one liked. In the current season, she was still sarcastic and snarky but somehow a bitterness came through more than anything.

Prajje's branded underwear aside, I remember reading that they actually film the runway twice so that the designer's comments are filmed after the judges see the designs for the first time

I thought Bishmee's little dress was really cute. I think it was the best outfit for a plus-size model in some time. Almost any woman could wear that. I did like Laurance's overalls. The cone bra...meh on the losing team, my favorite was actually Anna's pants. The plaid worked well there and I loved the flare

I liked Korto's cloak and headdress and I liked Fabio's dress. I just didn't like them together. It looked like 2 different people. Same thing with Laurance and Kara Saun's outfit. Loved the cloak...that thing underneath looked like someone was wearing her petticoat and hoop skirt without the actual dress. Herster and Fabio needed a different fabric. Something that moved and was color rich not heavy, unmoving, washed out gray. They might have won if they had. Viktor and Kayne's dress was interesting. It definitely veered into costume. Without the corset, it was still costumey. it was the detailing and headdress. Dump the corset, dump the head/neck thing, put a choker on her for jewelry, keep the leg detailing which I thought was cool and they had a good look. However, I'd rather keep people who gave me too many ideas than keep the people who gave me none like Brittany and Anna. That dress was sad...bad color, bad fit, bad styling, etc. It looked like a princess dress at the end of a drunken night... limp, heavy, and droopy. As much as I would like to see Anna go, I would have sent home Brittany. She was responsible for that horrible skirt. Personally, my winning look was Rami and Bishnee's. That is a dress I could see a royal in. Shoot even pair it with Korto or Laurance's clock and it would still work. They might have won if they had time to produce a more dramatic shoulder. The dress was simple and elegant. Drama at the shoulder would have made it runway. Even doing it in white or silver would have elevated it.

I had no problems with Zoe winning as she apparently had the best-tasting cake. I did have an issue with the "advantage" being so big for the finale. In the past, it has been something like assigning the themes or being able to have an exclusive flavor. To give someone, exclusive access to certain decoration elements, such as the star cutouts for the 4th of July, seems a bit heavy-handed, especially for the finale

I liked Viktor's design. Prajje's design was awesome and probably the most commercially wearable garment. However, one of the challenges was to make a whimsical garment and I that's why I think Viktor won out over Prajje. Both Mila and Laurance phoned in the challenge. I was surprised they didn't eliminate them both Brittany was annoying during her season and hasn't changed any

I said in the previous episode thread that the biggest challenge Buddha would have in the finale would be that he wouldn't surprise the judges (and he didn't) whereas both could and did surprise them. Sarah's undercooked liver is just not acceptable at this level so it didn't matter how good the other 3 dishes were especially since the other 2 didn't make any game-changing errors. I thought Gabri put together the menu I wanted to try the most but his too thick overcooked grasshopper thing and his textureless dessert did him in. Buddha just didn't make any errors that would give the win to someone else. I think Sarah grew the most as a chef. She has finally figured out how to mesh her food with upscale ingredients and international flavors. I can't wait to see what she does with her menu going farther. Gabri's restaurant would be the most fun. His growth came in finally really embracing his Mexican food heritage (except for the bean cooking). He just needs some fine tuning but maybe in his own kitchen his cooking style isn't quite as frentic. I would love to sit at a chef's table and watch him cook. He needs to embrace making his food and menus playful and fun because he has the flavors down I'll miss Padma Tom seemed like he's been having more fun this season than in years

I wonder if you would feel the same way if he hadn't won back to back seasons. If he had won like 5 years ago it wouldn't have seem quite like he was winning everything all the time. Buddha was the most consistent over the entire season

They must have foreseen the complaints after that episode was filmed because this week's was as straightforward as they ever get. No crazy flavors and each preselected flavor was essentially equivalent to the others. I thought that Johan was the only baker to really upscale his cream pie. I could see that pie in a high-end restaurant

I think there may have been less obvious enthusiasm for the announcement of Buddha in the finale because they expected that. Sarah winning was a surprise. In the past, they have used family members for the wall challenge. Besides the obvious Olympics tie-in for this competition making Olympians an easy choice, Buddha's wife is also a chef which would have been an obvious huge advantage for that team over everybody. Maybe next time instead of them getting their own family member, they are assigned another contestant's family to work with. They've had 2 straight seasons of Buddha's food, his challenge is to do something that surprises them for the finale. They already know it will be delicious and beautiful but will that be enough against 2 chef's who consistently have surprised the judges with their flavors

Carla Hall would also be an option.

Frankly, NOTHING should be out of the wheelhouse of any of these chefs at this point in the competition. The challenges certainly may be out of their specialties but these really aren't brand-new techniques they are being asked to perform. Gabri is the only one who hasn't worked in Michelin-star restaurants. The last challenge was one of technique. And anyone who knew they were selected for the show and didn't bone up on traditional English foods did themselves a disservice.

I think the fact that Ally had gotten to use her preferred flavors acted as a mark against her in the main heat. She had what amounted to the easiest flavor combination, one that she took from someone else, to work with and screwed it up. The minute she piped out that Pavlova, I knew she was in trouble. One that big and deep was never going to dry out in the amount of time allotted. She would have been better off building individual ones.

It is never fair to give someone grapefruit and someone else apple. One is inherently easier to bake with than the other. Besides grapefruits are more a winter fruit than summer and apples are more a late summer/early fall. Why not peach, apricot, plum, tangerine, nectarine ,or watermelon (next week)? They like to use some unusual combinations. I'd just like them to expand their idea of fruit flavors to some actual available in summer

Previously, Prime had a documentary on Warren Jeffs and the Fundamentalist Church of Latter-Day Saints. It was very well done and they did not pull punches on that particular cult. There are a lot of similarities between Gothard and Jeffs.

What I've noticed, through both seasons, is that in any of the team challenges Buddha just naturally takes charge. He doesn't come in with both barrels blazing as we've seen others do. He just steps up quietly. Of course, because of his pre-planning, he always has some idea of what to do for every challenge. But, isn't that what a leader is supposed to do...be well prepared for anything? What is amazing, in a group of executive chefs, is that I don't recall anyone objecting to him taking the lead. Granted they may have edited nasty or resentful comments out of the talking head segments but I haven't seen anything post-production either. This says a lot about his character. Whoever wins it, will have earned it through a tough competition. They all seem like wonderful chefs.

They can taste the absence of the salt because things aren't balanced or properly enhanced.