The whole SYTYCD Sara vs. Food Show Sara thing is giving me whiplash.

Hee. Yeah, I guess we gotta do a better job at labeling show commentary since these two run concurrently. We've been doing okay having the cross conversations, though, right? No toe stepping? It's been working fine for me.

Anyway.

Top Chef: I think maybe I don't have a good feel for the distinction between Mediterranean and Italian cooking. Is the ingredients? The preparation? The lightness? Somebody explain to me.

I didn't care about the truffles, because I was all, yay truffles. If Bertolli sold a stovetop frozen pasta dish with truffles, I would be all over it. Oh, and about the product placement, this has got to be the most successful yet. 'Cause I already use Bertolli olive oil, and I'd seen their frozen baggie dinners before, but had never bought them. And then I was all, hmm, that looks good. Sometimes I'm in a hurry, you know?

Oh, and I agreed that I liked that this competition had home cooking implications. One of the things I've been trying to do is cook my own convenience food. I make Emeril's pecan crusted chicken strips and freeze them so I can nuke them at will. I make homemade spaghetti sauce and freeze it (err, with lemon juice, so it doesn't do that weird poisonous low-acid thing). I haven't done the equivalent of packaged meals, but I totally could make up some of my favorite pasta dishes ahead of time. Now I'd just know to freeze the ingredients separately and bag them together so I could just throw them in a pan. I would have thought to do some of that, but I probably wouldn't have thought to freeze the sauce and cut it into little pieces. It's a good idea. Then I can have my own, healthier, cheaper convenience food.

I thought the same thing as Jesse about the pasta, but then I remembered the brand of pasta I buy is Barilla, not Bertolli.

I agree that I could have seen any of the low four go. I thought Joey's bid to send his family was sweet. I liked that he got so emotional at the end. But yeah, I think the time is over for kitchen shenanigans. I definitely think there are weaker chefs than Joey remaining, including the Sara's (did I say last week she was my favorite? 'Cause I dunno.)

I thought the lower dishes were bad enough they might do a double elimination. But no.

I think that they conflated mediterranean with Italian because the company is called Bertolli.

I thought that by doing so they were going from wide to narrow but Colicchio seemed to think that by "mediterranean" they meant Italian food from the coasts.

Sarah M and Sara N have both had dishes that did well but managed to not shine enough to get into the top whatever. (I think Sara N. had a really good dish in the barbeque challenge and Sarah M. had a good one in the Latino Lunch challenge.)

I think that they conflated mediterranean with Italian because the company is called Bertolli.

I think this was the problem too.

I thought the lower dishes were bad enough they might do a double elimination. But no.

I thought (and was sort of hoping) they might do a double elimination because they handed out a double win. That challenge was ripe for a "one team wins, one team loses," sort of thing.

But the casting. They don't want to dump someone everyone loves to hate....

Oh, and about the product placement, this has got to be the most successful yet.

100% agreement. FWIW, I had a one month trial membership at dream dinners and pretty much all the strategies employed by the successful TC team are at work here:

[link]

The place is too expensive for a family of 2 (which is what we are), but for larger families or those willing to go in as 2-3 couples, it could work.

The challenge was to produce something that would fit in with "Bertolli's Italian Mediterranean-style Meals." Bertolli's Italian is the brand, Mediteranean-style was the product line. So I can see why the contestants were confused.

I also think they're smart enough to know at this point that tasting good is more important than following the challenge to the letter, and truffle butter tastes really good. So it was a pretty safe risk to take.

I thought the same thing as Jesse about the pasta, but then I remembered the brand of pasta I buy is Barilla, not Bertolli.

Ah-ha! That explains it.

Mom's hairstylist's daughter met Cedric! She went to some kind of dance camp thing and he was there and Shane Sparks and the daughter talked with Cedric for a bit. She said he was really sweet and took a bunch of the classes/workshops offered.

There were also a bunch of choreographers and dancers from Hairspray and the some of the campers ended watching Hairspray.

I don't know exactly when this was or where it was though.

OMG. Mission: Man Band.