Restaurant Week Coming in Hot

Share YOUR Restaurant Week picks! Plus: Top Chef reviewed

A WHOLE LOT OF MALARKEY

Happy New Year San Diego!

I hope everyone had a great vacation. For those of you in the restaurant industry, I hope you were all very busy and had a horrible vacation but made lots of money. At this time with the sluggish economy, we have to take it any way we can and the best thing we have going for us now is the first edition of Restaurant Week 2009, and it’s coming in hot. Starting this Sunday, 100-plus local restaurants will be offering either a $20, $30 or $40 three-course meal to stimulate some excitement in the dining scene. So If you’ve been pinching pennies or hiding from the debt collector, it’s time to get out and enjoy yourself ... PLEASE! For the love of your favorite restaurants, we need you and you need us. This is a great week to explore the restaurants you have always wanted to check out, revisit an old friend, take a drive to a different neighborhood or walk down the street; but most importantly, get out and have a good time.

Take the opportunity to share your experiences with us using this blog; tell us where you went and where you want to go. Let us know how the food was, how the service was, and whether you’d go back. Today you are the restaurant critic — please share your reviews.

And for the Top Chef fans out there, enjoy and partake in my blog about the show. Let’s just say the show was shot in San Diego: what local chefs would you like to see as judges? I say Sam the Cooking Guy and my godfather Bernard Guillas for sure ... Who do you like?

Top Chef 5 NYC: To Judge the Judges! 

This episode seemed to be more about the judges than the contestants. Do we not have enough talent in this country to find some of our own judges to dismantle, critique and pan our contestants? Where is Anthony Bourdain when you need him — off eating lizard gizzards in Timbuktu? Our lovable Ted Allen jumped channels to the Food Network, where Tom also seems to be moonlighting more and more (see every Food Network event and you see Tom). This week let’s change focus as Top Chef did and “judge the judges.” Who are your favorites over the seasons and who drove you mad? Who made you laugh and who made you want to throw something at the TV? Yes, this week, my friends, we are sitting behind the Top Chef judges table and we're going to let them have it. Not even our beloved Tom is safe this week and I’m sure Padma is going to get lit up like yesterday’s Christmas tree. Don’t hold back because this week we are making our own show: Top Judge on Top Chef!

Sit with me at Top Judges table: I love it when they get real accomplished chefs such as John George, Daniel Boulud, Jose Andre, Eric (Kicked me off) Ripert and Andre Soltner. As a contestant you can’t help but learn and appreciate the feedback from these legends. Of course it’s also great to see the big celebrity chefs such as the Martha Stewarts (awful and slightly scary) and the "Dancing Chef,” Rocco DiSpirito (overplayed on the show but mad skills). Those I can’t stand are the local chefs from the location the show is being shot, the ones who get their shot at fame and really put forth their own agenda. These judges usually show up in the early episodes that don’t have as much impact on the final results. A few I have in mind are the Maria Frumkins, aka the “Queen of Tarts,” Michael Schwartz (who?) and so many more I can’t think of because we don’t know who they are.

I must say that I really look forward to more of Toby Young’s hilarious lingo and movie references. When one of his compliments to Stefan is “This dish reminds me of being in a wood cabin all alone in the middle of the Alps,” you can’t help but say, “What the f*** is this guy talking about?” Another great one: “This dish reminds me of British actors in a comic role in an American movie upstaging the lead actors,” and the Tom Cruise in his cameo role in Tropic Thunder comment had my hairy knuckles slapping in the air at those apple-bottom jeans! (Come on, I had to give it a shot!) I am a Toby Young fan and he wins this week’s elimination for me. The one knock is that it's obvious he is not the one pulling the trigger here — he wanted to keep Eugene.

Now Jean-Christophe Novelli, or "French guest judge," was overshadowed and really quite dry and boring. Really no desire to tune into Chef Academy.

Alright now it’s your turn bloggers, let’s hear your thoughts on the judges who have graced our beloved Top Chef.

Congratulations to most of the bloggers who agreed it was time Eugene and Melissa got the “boot.” Not wanting to sound to harsh but I really wanted a triple elimination, with Carla going home also. She’s real sweet but her commentary — and her voice — is starting drive me mad like Russell Crowe in A Beautiful Mind (I Toby Young’d that one ... ).

Bonus on your commentary this week: When complimenting our crushing your judges use Toby Young-style references… Get creative and have some fun…

A quick power ranking:

Stefan: “The villain” is taking this game over! “Run circles around Hosea” ... “Against my taste buds” ... “I’m French” ... “Green Vomit” ...

Fabio: We still love the Italian Stallion even with undercooked lamb. ... Roast it and wins.

Hosea: Wallflower this week

Radhika: Even with a weapon of mass destruction, I really am starting to like her.

Jamie: I can’t believe they are not calling her out on this scallop fascination. I think she is a better cook then Hosea and Radhika but I dropped her down because of the constant scallop thing. I hate it when a contestant wins and doesn’t get a prize (like me). Maybe they should send her on a scallop-harvesting adventure?

Jeff: Come on, he got the Tom Cruise cameo comment ...

Leah: I love balsamic also. ... Fried food family-style, not so much.

Arianne: I’m still not buying into it.

Carla: So sweet but now sugar.

Melissa and Eugene: Same arguments week after week finally send you home. “When the booze is gone it’s time to move on.”

Cheers!

Also take some shots at “Mama Malarkey Macaroons”: I can take it ... Until next week with Hung ...

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