His mother - and the other chefs' mothers - were on one show. That's the one where he said "Smile, mum. You're scaring the contestants." Endearing's the word.

And last night they eliminated my more-or-less favorite. sigh

I'm catching up on Masterchef. I hate Christian I want him to lose so bad. Especially after he gets called out on a bad dish and then says "I'm the best chef ever."

And no! Not Ben Star. I found his website and was reading his blog. He said that he doesn't like reality tv because he thinks it brings out the worst in people and when he went on the show he wanted to show that contestants don't have to be mean and backstabbing in order to have a following.

He has a self published cookbook, I may but that at some point.

I really liked Ben - he took such joy in the cooking. And, when things went wrong, he was so disappointed.

I think Ben's mother should start a cottage industry making chef hats (maybe matching aprons, as well).

And I want Christian to lose - he's SO arrogant and has no respect for the others. There was one show - last week, I think - when Jennifer's dish was praised. They told him to come up and taste it; when he did, he kind of shrugged and said, "It's good. I've had better." They've called him out, saying that he's stopped learning. And he never admits to a mistake.

I couldn't believe Christian thought chili would get a better reception than the meatloaf or any of the other dishes. Jennifer's meatloaf and side dish looked beautiful.

I thought it was odd the reaction to ground beef, veal, and pork was -- "what am I supposed to do with this?" When that's a classic meatloaf mix.

I missed the first five to ten minutes, so I had to infer what the ingredients were. I thought Ben's pie looked yummy.

Suzi is another one who can go - she's back there making faces and bad-mouthing the others ... and with even less justification than Christian.

When the lid was lifted they showed 3 mounds of ground beef and various veggies - carrots, peppers, potatoes.

As soon as I saw it I knew it was meatloaf mix and that's not something I grew up eating. We just had meatloaf made from ground beef.

Suzi's arrogant but she doesn't come across as completely disrespectful as Christian does.

She's just ... sour. And she went through a long period of doing badly, but not undertanding why they didn't like what she cooked.

Or meatballs!

I don't mind Suzi, either. Christian, on the other hand, is a complete dick.

I think Christian may lose just for being obnoxious. He's disrespectful to the judges, as well as the other contestants.

Edited to add: and he's not going to be offered any consolation prize, either.

So I've been reading Ben Starr's blog and getting some insight to the Masterchef process.

He said that one thing he's learned on Masterchef - he doesn't want to be a chef. At least not in a restaurant and not what Masterchef is looking for. Also he says he doesn't really eat "cuisine" or cook it (meaning gourmet expensive restaurant stuff). So a lot of times he was out of his comfort zone.

I'm still sorry to see him go and I liked him the best. Partially because he was often times very informative about hows and whys of cooking.]