Top Chef Canada 2: Episode 2 recap

Chef Elizabeth is a little intimiated by the exacto, as Mike Holmes creepily stares on. Source: The Food Network Canada

If you missed Monday's episode and want to catch up before reading my spoilers, click here.

Is it me or was Mike Holmes -- Canadian pseudo-celeb status notwithstanding -- the entirely wrong choice for a judge on a gourmet cooking show? Case in point: he thought the losing dish was completely improved by dipping it into gazpacho.

The dude did make for some pretty hilarious commentary though, a nice contrast against Lisa Ray's attempts to be THE MOST SERIOUS JUDGE EVER.

I was glad to see my Hamiltonian Gabriell Cruz win the quickfire challenge with a dish that I thought was a just creative enough deviation from Holmes's request for meat and potatoes (okay, we get it, you're a no nonsense contractor man's man who likes tools ya, ya, ya). I thought that particular challenge was quite clever, though, getting the chefs to use actual tools. Part of me thinks it would be a breeze, as an exacto, a hacksaw and a hammer could do pretty much any kitchen biz I could think of, BUT the other part of me that remembers woodshop class thinks I would cut that first part of me off with the hack saw. Eeeek.

Then came the blatant product placement for judge Mark McEwan's own store in the shops at Don Mills. However, it also did make me ask Joe if we shouldn't go up there to check it out one day soon.

This challenge was pretty cool, the chefs dividing into teams to cook meals for 100 hungry Habitat for Humanity volunteers with a $900 budget. And in true Canadian form ----they all got along! They co-operated, they stood up for one another. So un-reality TV though. Gotta love us Canucks and our inability to rival Americans in TV cattiness.

The coolest part of this challenge is that the Habitat site they went to was the very one I myself spent hours putting up walls and doing other very important, construction-y things. And believe me those volunteers deserve a good meal.

So, in this male dominated world of upscale chefs, what team ended up losing the challenge? That's right, the one with only dudes!

The yellow team failed, according to the judges, at pretty much everything --from the over-blended gazpacho with grilled corn and fennel to the grilled B.C. salmon (who BBQs salmon, they asked: West Coasters, that's who) to the bland ("coulda been turkey") harissa pork loin (non) tacos to the brownie that wasn't. The only thing the judges liked was the potato salad, which even Mike Holmes himself probably could have made.

The saddest part is I REALLY liked the chef who got sent home.
Kunal Ghose added some diversity to the mix, from his b-boy hat, to the fact he owns a rad food truck, to his B.C. roots. Sigh.

I must say however, the winning meal prepared by the green team appeared mouth-wateringly deserving. The line up included: potato salad, veggie chili, fish taco on a FRESH tortilla (the green team opted for gasp! store bought ones), chipotle chicken with apple slaw and honey lavender lemonade (Recipe that I will soon be making HERE), and an amazing looking banana mousse with caramelized bananas and oat crumble. Mmmmmmm.

I am crossing my fingers pretty sure a female chef--- likely Elizabeth (winner of this week's elimination challenge and creator of the praised chipotle chicken) or Trista (who won the quickfire challenge last week) -- stands a really good shot at winning this one.