-Clock starts now. -Go chefs.
Killing adrenaline, already.
We went zero to a 100 real quick.
[Ted] Let me break down how this is going to go.
The baskets will set the tune.
Guys, these are great ingredients.
I'm feeling good.
Gummy pickle. I do not know what this one is.
We got a game plan.
I think he has bitten off more than he can chew.
[Marc] Thirty minutes to solve this culinary puzzle.
-[Maneet] Come on, chefs. -Cool baby, let's go.
If your dish doesn't cut it...
-How you doing down there. -I'm doing awesome.
Whoo!
...you will be chopped.
[theme music playing]
[Sydney] My vibe in the kitchen is dancing like nobody's watching
and cooking up the storm.
I'm an executive Sou chef
at La Soupe at Cincinnati, Ohio.
La Soupe is a non-profit organization
foods that otherwise go into landfills,
we repurpose it into meals for the community.
My culinary training comes from
half a decade in fine dining.
What sets me apart is my big bold flavors...
[indistinct] that'll make me wanna go.
...and internal ambition.
My passion and drive did not get me here to fail.
[Matthew] As a yacht chef, you gotta think who you're gonna feet
you really never know what's coming,
This is the Chopped kitchen, it's nothing.
I'm a private chef, based out of Los Angeles, California.
My style of cooking is Asian with an American flair.
As a private chef I've been able to go to land,
to see and be a yacht ship.
Working on a yacht entails elegance,
and perfection.
Everything needs to be spot on and no flaws.
Gorgeous.
I'm super competitive and I'm ready to win.
[Austin] I grew up watching Chopped it was a dream of mine to be here.
I'm a private chef
for Chesapeake Chef Service.
My style of cooking is
fresh seasonal...
Ooh, baby.
I try to embrace my roots from a small farm town in Pennsylvania.
There is, uh, I learned cooking with my grandparents
and a put a modern twist to it.
I just got married
so I plan on using the money that I win from Chopped
to put it back into my family.
I never thought I'd be here, but I'm confident that I'm here for a reason.
[Vicky] I'm calm, cool, connected
when it's time to kick butt that's who you get.
I'm just bringing some island flavor.
Originally from Haiti
I started in the kitchen, but went on in becoming a private chef
and now I own my own business.
I'm a mother of three.
And my plan is to be the next Chopped champion.
And I'm here to show that bad ass mom's argue to win.
It's about to get hot.
Hi, chefs.
-Hi, chefs. -Hello.
-Hi, guys. -Welcome to the Chopped kitchen.
[Austin] So exciting seeing the judges.
Very surreal and it's kind of overwhelming.
-Hello, chefs. -[Matthew] Hello, hello.
-Hi. -Let me breakdown how this is going to go.
There are three rounds, mandatory mystery ingredients for each course,
if your dish doesn't cut it, you will be chopped.
-Well it's not gonna be me, so... -I'm not yet chopped.
But you'll be in great shape is you happen to like
whatever is inside these.
Dig into the appetizer baskets.
-Hmm. -Oh. It's cool.
-Gummy pickle. -[Ted] Now this sounds like Chopped.
Gummy pickles and you've got to combine those with popcorn shoots...
Some shoots.
I do not know what this one is.
[Vicky] Popcorn shoots are similar to I would say,
sweet corn.
Little spice.
[Ted] ... honey sriracha and scallops.
-Scallops. -Love this.
Scallops are one of my favorite things to work with
and I cook them just perfectly every time.
[Ted] twenty minutes on the clock.
Time starts now.
-Go chefs. -All right.
-Here we go. -[Maneet] go, go, go.
I'd kill that adrenaline already.
[Ted] Maneet, Marc, a special guest has joined us.
The winner of Food network's first tournament of champions
chef, Brooke Williamson.
Thank you so much. It's lovely to be back. I always have fun here.
So chef are you down with this first round basket?
I'm a thousand percent down.
The gummy pickles don't even throw me off
you could do a fun vinaigrette with those.
These are great ingredients,
very excited about scallops.
They make a great appetizer
you could go crudo,
or you could sear them and get them a nice
sear on them, but I don't want them over cooked.
[Matthew] Working on yachts, I've got a lot of experience with sea food.
And the honey sriracha,
I see that and I instantly think a honey sriracha reduction
with seared scallop,
with a popcorn shoot gremolata.
To get the gremolata started I'm gonna break down this gummy pickle
in rice wine vinegar
to give it that sweetness that it really needs.
I add popcorn shoots,
and cashews for the gremolata
because it'll go perfect with the scallop.
All right, cook faster.
If I win the 10,000 dollars today
I am going to travel South America.
Super excited to try all the good food in Peru and
go to Machu Pichu.
[humming]
[Austin] Feels crazy to be here in the kitchen.
Growing up watched the show every week.
Austin, how are you doing?
Pretty good, I got a game plan.
There's a lot of sweet flavors coming from the basket ingredients.
So, my idea is to go with a Arugula and Frisee salad.
Kind of cuddle all of that sweetness.
With seared scallops and a honey sriracha vinaigrette.
The popcorn shoot has kind of a sweet taste. Whoo!
I want to do something different so I decided to fry them.
I'm coming for that 10,000 dollars and losing is not an option.
Popcorn shoots these are microgreens.
-It's reminiscent of a wheat grass. -Yeah.
Flavor is very much like butter popcorn.
-Mmm-hmm. Yeah. -It's really really kind of warm.
I can see a nice little salad with that popcorn shoots in there
might be nice.
-Vicky? Do you have a plan in mind? -Yes.
[Vicky] I am going to go a little bit island curry
and a salad.
I'm going to make radicchio popcorn shoot salad
I'm also going to use my popcorn shoots to make a vinaigrette.
And make seared scallop with a curry pickle sriracha reduction
The way we season our food is at the heart of Caribbean cuisine.
I grab some garlic powder, onion powders,
some smoked paprika and curry powder.
With the gummy pickle that's a little bit sweet
but that's very dill forward.
Scallops are tricky, they go from undercooked to cooked real fast.
I see the scallops I immediately wanna go for a ceviche.
I know it's healthy,
The 2016, I was 263 pounds
and I dedicated myself back into cooking healthier and
-I kind of turned my life around. -Sydney how are you doing?
I'm doing all right, chef.
[Sydney] I'm gonna make a ceviche.
ceviche literally means cooked in acid.
With the ceviche I really want savory forward.
And these ingredients lend themselves to the potential of being really sweet.
Unless that you really push the heat.
Jalapeno.
I grab jalapeno, I grab ginger, some orange juice
lime juice, lemon juice
The spice and the acid together will cook the scallops.
I tasted the mixture.
It's a little too acidic.
I need to add some of that sweet gummy pickle,
the popcorn shoots in there as well to counteract and balance it.
And a little bit of the honey sriracha to get it going.
I absolutely love chaos, so let's go baby.
-Ten minutes to get this done chefs. -[Maneet] Whoo!
-Let's go baby, let's go. -[Maneet] Come on, chefs.
When I taste the gummy pickle it has like a briny dill flavor.
The gummy pickle, the flavor is really artificial and it's really, really sweet.
You could accentuate that flavor by putting that into a vinaigrette of some sort.
[Austin] My first thought is to use it as
a sweetener in the brines of my honey sriracha vinaigrette.
[Marc] Matthew looks like he's got a really nice sear on his scallops.
Scallops you just sear them really quick then you get a really nice caramelization.
So that you can really bring that crunch.
-Vicky how your scallops look? -They look nice.
Nice sear.
I need to make sure that my scallops were cooked through.
Vicky's scallops have been in the pan for a long time.
And now she's put them in the oven.
I think they're gonna overcook.
Vicky, how you doing down there? How your scallops look?
They look nice, nice sear.
-I think they're gonna overcook. -I agree.
[Ted] Just five minutes to get it done.
[Maneet] Come on, chefs.
-Chefs, let's go, let's go, let's go. -Holy hell.
[Brooke] Sydney is just now cutting into her scallops
And it looks like a rough chop.
It doesn't look like she's taking the care that I would want.
I am in a massive rush.
So, I'm just chopping really fast.
Lemon juice, lime juice, orange juice will cook the scallops.
I'm gonna make some fresh corn tortillas for my ceviche.
I'm gonna fry my chips until they're golden brown.
[Marc] Two minute warning here chefs.
Make sure you get your plates to start plating.
[Matthew] I'm gonna plate scallop in its shell to give it a more elegant look.
On top of my scallop goes my gremolata.
The pickle in here gives it a really nice, sweet little flavor.
And then I have my sriracha reduction that goes around the shell.
A little sriracha Asian mix right there.
I'm feeling g very confident and I'm thinking I can move into round two.
[Austin] I'm open to wow the judges with flavor right off the bat.
Scallops are looking great, so I have to use them with toasted cardamom.
And it kind of gives a little citrusy element.
-Vicky, how you doing down there? -I'm doing awesome, thank you.
I know that my scallop was ready but I didn't realize that
they might have gone a little bit too long.
Vicky's scallop might be a little overcooked, but they definitely...
like they have a lot of flavor on them.
Chefs, one minute left.
[Maneet] That's not a lot of time.
Oh, my goodness.
You guys, Austin's salad looks kind of nice.
The salad kind of needs extra texture.
So, I put toasted almonds on top.
-Twenty seconds. -[Marc] You have twenty seconds.
Swinging down behind.
[Brooke] Come on, come on, come on.
-[Marc] Come on, chefs you gotta get this done. -[Maneet] Come on.
-Ten, nine, eight, seven -Come on chefs,
-you got this. -six, five, four, three
[Ted] two, one. Time's up.
Please step back.
[Matthew] I honestly feel really confident,
my flavors are really wired together, my scallops are cooked really nice.
Um, I feel really good about my dish honesty.
We went zero to a hundred, real quick.
I feel damned man,
let's go I'm ready to make it to round two. Let's go.
Chefs, you have arrived at the chopping block.
Your introduction to Chopped began with
gummy pickles, popcorn shoots, honey sriracha and scallops.
First up, chef Vicky what did you make?
Today I made, seared scallops with a curry pickle sriracha sauce
and you have a radicchio popcorn shoot salad
with a popcorn shoot vinaigrette
I'm from Haiti, so although we don't do curry
I just pamper off the pickle a little bit with the curry.
The salad that you have created is delicious.
The sweetness from the popcorn shoots
go very well with the bitterness radicchio.
I do think that the gummy pickle curry
there is too much gummy pickle.
The seasoning of the scallops is really nice.
But it shouldn't have gone in the oven.
-When you seared it, you should have just taken it out. -Yeah.
Also the curry powder is not cooked through and through.
So it's raw.
The curry is definitely grainy.
But I do like the flavor that you got an actual scallops themselves.
Okay, thank you.
If you hadn't used the bitter greens,
I think that vinaigrette would be too sweet.
-But I think Maneet's right, it's very very well balanced. -Thank you.
Scallops is slightly overcooked but I really appreciate the salad.
The salad is really refreshing. You embraced the flavor of the popcorn shoots.
And I'm really enjoying it.
-it's actually my favorite part of this whole plate. -Yeah, thank you.
Chef Austin, what did you make?
For the first round I made a seared scallops
with a arugula and frisee salad.
And there's where you have this gummy pickle in there.
Gummy pickle, honey sriracha.
[Marc] And sriracha, you put almonds in here too?
Yeah, I felt the salad needed a little crunch.
[Marc] I'm not sure if that was a great idea
and the one I got felt like it needed a little bit more.
Toast it a little more.
But I do find it very interesting
the way you fried the popcorn shoot, I like that,
that flavor is good. It's this pickle thing that just keeps coming through.
That's sort of throwing me.
I'm looking for that crunch,
which I think you were hoping to get by deep frying the shoots
but that did not work as a crunch factor.
I do like the vinaigrette a lot.
Arugula and the bitter frisee, great combination.
[Brooke] My favorite part of this whole plate is this vinaigrette.
I taste that gummy pickle
but I do want a harder sear on these scallops,
they feel a little bit too translucent.
And if you happen to win the ten thousand dollars, what are the plans for that?
I just got married there weeks ago...
-Congratulations. Wow. -Thank you, thank you so much.
Talk about being a newlywed.
-So, it's been a really awesome few weeks. -Whirlwind.
So, um, I'd really like to be able to pay off the wedding first and foremost.
and [chuckles] put the rest into, uh, family's future.
Next up, chef Sydney.
Today chefs, I made for you a ceviche
traditionally lots of citruses.
Where do you work chef?
I work at La Soupe, it is a nonprofit organization
we take foods that would otherwise go in landfills
and we produce meals for the community.
That's beautiful.
Love the idea of a ceviche.
There are some really smart moves that you've made over here.
I do think that this could have used a lot more flavor.
And the scallops are very haphazardly cut.
Okay.
And it need to heat as well.
-True. -That sriracha we
we tasted it and it was not very...
I put jalapeno, I did put a little ginger
-but I probably could have put a little more. -Yeah.
Push the flavors.
[Maneet] You gave us something crunchy on the side.
But as soon as you took it out, this needed to be hit with salt.
I actually... I have plenty of seasoning on my chips
and I can't stop eating them, they're delicious they're perfectly fried.
This definitely reads appetizer to me.
I appreciate the popcorn shoots.
I love the fact that you've separated yourself
from the other chefs by doing a cold preparation.
Yes, chef.
And finally chef Matthew what have you made?
I have made a seared scallop.
with a popcorn shoot gremolata
and a honey sriracha glace.
I was going for more of a small bite for an appetizer
um, trying not to over fill you guys
What inspired this dish for you, chef?
I travelled South east Asia twice
and I really wanted to bring what I've learned to your plate.
Matthew, this is a beautiful dish.
It's... It's delicious.
[Marc] I like the whole composition, the scallops cooked perfectly,
but I think seasoning, it just needs salt and it needs salt in here.
Is it an appetizer? Is it an [indistinct]
Yeah... a little tapas, you know.
I love the idea of the cashews.
But the unroasted cashews is the problem.
[Brooke] Did you taste the gummy pickle?
I do, I just get that brininess to it.
Which I think works with the fish sauce.
So good job.
I appreciate that, thank you very much.
Okay, three of you will have a chance to learn from your mistakes
in the next round.
Over cooked is a little worse than under cooked for a scallop.
So, Vicky's gonna be chopped for over cooking her scallops.
I feel a little shaky, but that's okay because we all have harsh critiques.
Whose dish is on the chopping block?
[Ted] Chef Sydney, you've been chopped. Judges...
Sydney, you picked something that was very difficult, getting a...
a ceviche right is tricky.
Unfortunately, we felt the scallops were cut haphazardly and under seasoned.
We had to chop you.
Thank you so much for the opportunity.
I should have cared for the scallops a little bit more.
Thank you.
I had an opportunity and I came and I tried to conquer it as best as I could.
[Ted] Chef Vicky, chef Austin, chef Matthew,
collect yourself for a thrilling 30 minutes in the Chopped kitchen.
You got this.
-We got this. -We got this.
Got it.
Second basket.
Open it up.
[laughs]
And you'll be making entrees with lasagna soup.
-Baby turnips. -Are these turnips?
[Ted] Turnips.
[Austin] Turnips have a great peppery bite
it's one of my favorite vegetables to work with.
Cutlet veal, nice.
[Ted] ... Veal cutlet
Crispy onions, sick.
[Ted] ... and crispy onions snacks.
I got some ideas already rolling through my head.
Crispy onion snacks. I'm gonna use those to bread the veal cutlet.
I think I know where I'm going.
[Ted] Thirty minutes to solve this culinary puzzle.
Clock starts now.
Yay, go chefs. Go, go, go.
Good lasagna soup. I instantly think I need to make it into a sauce.
And I instantly think pasta.
I'm making fried veal...
with some puttanesca sauce.
I add capers and olives to give it that puttanesca look.
Anybody got crushed red pepper?
Red pepper flakes to just add some heat.
At first I didn't wanna compete.
I was nervous about who I was gonna go up against?
-Woo-hoo! -And my competitors are not making it easy.
But I'm really good at what I do
and I wanna prove that I got what it takes to be a champion
and take home that ten thousand dollars.
[Vicky] Veal cutlets. For this round
I am hoping to show more of a creole ancient flare.
I am making crispy onion veal cutlet with seared turnips and creole sauce.
Any creole sauce is tomato based.
So, I'm using the lasagna sauce to make the creole sauce,
some chicken broth, add some orange juice, some sauteed onions with some tomato paste,
and I added some pepper flakes.
I'm very confident that I will showcase my talent.
Chefs, 40 minutes left on the clock.
-[indistinct] -Feeling great.
Based on the judges critique I need to really tighten up some of those techniques
that I made a miss in the first round.
I'm making mushroom and olives stuffed veal cutlet.
Roasted turnips,
herbal potatoes,
crispy onion and lasagna soup,
red wine reduction sauce.
I'm thinking that the crispy onion,
it kind of be a thickening agent for my reduced red wine.
The challenge of the basket is going to be the lasagna soup.
It's got so many different layers to it.
It's got your ground beef, your noodles, the ricotta and parmesan.
-Vicky, what are you making? -Some onion crusted veal.
[Marc] The veal cutlets are actually so thin,
you don't wanna over cook them, you just bread it and quickly fry it.
When you're breading something, you're breading it because you want the texture.
With the crispy onion snacks,
the chances of it disintegrating is-- is really high.
[Brooke] Vicky and Matthew are both breading their cutlets.
But Matthew went a traditional breading,
flour, egg and breadcrumb,
whereas Vicky went straight breadcrumb.
That extra layer that Matthew has
is gonna protect the veal.
[Matthew] I wanna fry the veal cutlets.
It would go perfect with a pasta.
-[Maneet] Matthew deep frying the veal is a great idea, -[Brooke] Yeah.
because it'll be in and out.
Austin is going ahead and stuffing his veal.
He wants to roll his mushrooms inside of his veal.
I think he's bitten off more than he can chew,
because he's gotta get this in the oven.
[Matthew] This dish is coming together in a great direction,
but I have to figure out a way to use the turnips.
The best way to do that was to mandolin them,
and put them in the fryer.
[Brooke] Turnips are really underrated.
They have this peppery, almost radish-y flavor.
They kind of take on any flavor that you give them.
Chefs, five minutes to get it done.
Turnips, I seasoned them and I seared them.
I'm bringing potatoes to the party,
because I know my creole sauce is gonna be pungent,
and I need something to taper it off.
Being in second round feels great,
but third round,
that's the ultimate goal.
Not going home for no salt.
[Austin] Moving forward in this competition
would mean everything so far has paid off.
Getting to the final round
is just such an accomplishment,
and I just hope that my veal is properly cooked.
Less than a minute to go.
[Maneet] In the first round,
Vicky gave us scallops which were overcooked.
So she has to keep an eye out
to make sure that she's not overcooking
the veal in this round.
[Ted] You got 20 seconds.
[Matthew] This is my first time frying turnips.
I don't think I have enough crisp,
but I have to get them on the plate.
This basket doesn't come together like the first basket.
So I'm feeling a little bit more frantic.
[Ted] Pull those plates together now, chefs.
-Ten, nine, eight, -[Maneet] Come on! Let's go!
[Ted] seven, six, five, four, three, two, one.
-Time's up! -[all applauding]
[Vicky] I brought my creole flavors,
so there's nothing crazy going on in the plate.
I'll let the ingredients speak for themselves.
[Matthew] I'm worried about the fried turnips a little bit.
Hopefully, they got a nice crisp.
But we'll see what happens.
[Ted] Chefs, your second basket contained lasagna soup,
turnips, veal cutlets and crispy onion snacks.
Chef Vicky, what do we have?
I made for you a crispy onion veal cutlet,
with seared turnips, mashed potatoes,
and a creole sauce.
[Maneet] Where do you work now?
[Vicky] I'm a business owner.
I own one of the largest commissary kitchen in South Florida.
I also own a-- a ghost kitchen model called Gumbo Twist,
and I teach at my former university.
-So just-- just food jobs? -How do you have time to be here?
-No, and I have three kids, so, yes. -[Maneet] Just, yeah. Oh.
The toughest of all jobs.
So I'm here for all moms. [laughs]
You can have a family and you can move forward
and follow your passion.
What inspired you to go in this direction, chef?
In Haiti, we use a lot of spicy food.
I wanted to bring in my culture
with the creole sauce.
Your creole sauce,
I'm loving it.
Oh. [sighs in relief]
There's so much flavor.
I love all the spices that you added.
Great cooking going on over here.
The crispy onions on top of the veal
gives a depth of flavor to it, which makes it so yummy.
Delicious.
The turnip has been cooked perfectly.
The mashed potatoes are-- are fine.
I don't know that you needed them.
My issue with your veal
is that the breading really kind of fell off.
It's not adhering to the actual meat.
It doesn't keep it's crispiness.
It's a little bit soggy.
The flavors are there.
Uh, you see the--
there's a lot of oil coming out.
-I got some actual lasagna pieces in my sauce. -[Vicky laughs] I know.
Snuck in there.
You kept this pretty simple.
Turnips, I agree, absolutely delicious.
Uh, nice composition.
Thank you.
[Ted] Next, we go to chef Austin.
[Austin] I made for you a mushroom and kalamata olive stuffed veal cutlet,
a crispy onion and lasagna wine reduction sauce, [chuckles]
roasted turnips and herbal potatoes,
and a fresh salad with rugelach.
Growing up in a small farm town in Pennsylvania,
we let fresh, local vegetables shine.
Turnips with potatoes,
it's like a German match made in heaven.
This whole dish is very bright.
Your turnips have a nice bite.
They could've used a little-- a bit more caramelization.
But I do love the flavor of it.
I just think the veal is massively overcooked
in some areas,
and sort of undercooked in other areas.
[Marc] Definitely two different cooks on it.
I love the flavor you got in there.
I just think that you needed more time to go to do this properly.
How'd you make this sauce again?
[Austin] Crispy onions and the lasagna soup.
That was kind of like, the thickening agent for my sauce.
It must be the crispy onions.
It's giving it a little weird texture.
-It's like a little-- little graininess. -Grainy, yeah.
[Maneet] Flavor wise, great.
Execution wise, you faltered in a few places.
Thank you, chef.
[Ted] Finally, chef Matthew.
[Matthew] This would be a fried veal,
with a puttanesca alla vodka sauce.
Career highlights for you, chef.
I was the team chef for the Florida Panthers.
I worked for the Four Seasons
in Denver, Colorado, for four and a half years.
And then from there, became a yacht chef.
Travelled all around the US.
And now, I have made my way into the private sector,
and well, I have the most unbelievable clients,
and I'm really grateful for that.
Puttanesca and vodka sauce together,
the mixture is not really working out that great.
I think you should've just stuck with one direction on this.
I think you were just really heavy handed
with the cream here.
It feels like a rich, heavy bowl of food.
Which is interesting, because the--
the fried veal feels like the lightest element on the plate.
Turnips, I actually found them to be light and crisp,
and-- and fun.
The veal is delicious. The breading, great.
[Marc] Breading, it's nice and flavorful.
But from the-- your first round,
I really thought you were gonna get something a little more elevated.
It was really tough to put those ingredients together.
You could-- you can sort of tell.
[Brooke] And maybe that's not fair.
Maybe you don't hold someone to a higher standard
-because you know what they're capable of. -[Maneet] No, no-- well.
-You do. You do. -[Brooke laughs] You--
Which two chefs have advanced to the next round?
We'll find out soon.
[Matthew] I breaded my veal really well.
Flavors are off a little bit, sometimes it happens.
[Vicky] Yes, I had a few technical stuff,
but I'm feeling awesome.
I was just not super familiar with cooking veal,
and ultimately, I get a little worried.
As we move along in this competition,
another chef must be left behind.
So, who's dish is on the chopping block?
Chef Austin, you've been chopped.
Judges?
Chef Austin, you gave us a really ambitious dish,
and we applaud you for that.
Unfortunately, the unevenness of the cook
gave us some pieces that were overcooked,
and also some pieces that were undercooked.
And then your sauce
which contains two of the basket ingredients,
the consistency was gritty,
and we just couldn't get past it.
And so, we had to chop you.
Thank you.
Pretty bummed right now. [chuckles]
But I'm gonna take the mistakes that I made,
and try to focus on what I can improve.
[Vicky] It's very close that I could win $10,000.
I'm feeling so proud of myself.
I represent moms, I represent women of color,
I represent women in the food industry.
[Matthew] There were some mistakes made in the entree round.
Going into the dessert round,
I'm gonna focus on plating, texture and flavors.
I'm ready to take this home to South Florida.
I'm ready for you.
Let's see if you're fired up about what's in these.
Get in to your dessert baskets.
-Ah. -Ah, let's go.
All right.
[Ted] And you're looking at a bento cake...
Honeydew?
We have some honeydew.
[Ted] ...honeydew melon,...
[Matthew] I see the honeydew melon,
and I'm instantly thinking, I'm making a sorbet.
Pretzel salt?
[Ted] ...pretzel salt,...
Spicy mango ice pop.
[Ted] ...and spicy mango pops.
It's gorgeous.
Remember, presentation, taste and creativity all count.
[Vicky] These four ingredients for the dessert round are very challenging.
I'm a little bit worried.
Your 30 minute round starts now.
-[all applauding] -[Maneet] Yay, good job, go, go, go!
[Brooke] I love a good dessert round.
[Ted] Judges, that bento cake is adorable,
the honeydew looks ripe,
but is there a dessert in this basket?
That is the trick of the basket.
The four individual ingredients
are beautiful ingredients by themselves.
And these two chefs will have to connect the dots.
I'm feeling good.
I feel extremely relieved that I didn't get chopped.
It was really tough to out those ingredients together.
You could-- You can sort of tell.
I have to redeem myself.
[Marc] Matthew was so far ahead in the first round.
Head and shoulders above everybody else.
But then, when it came to main course,
Matthew, you know, I think he faltered.
[Maneet] Vicky took the entree round,
and Matthew took the, uh, appetizer.
[Matthew] For my dessert,
I'm making sweet honeydew sorbet,
and a raspberry spicy mango pop sauce.
I dig that flavor, that's good.
Hey, Matthew, what are you making?
[Matthew] Raspberry compote for my raspberry sauce.
I reduce down the mango, and I add raspberries.
It's tasty.
[Maneet] So, these bento cakes apparently,
are the current rage right now.
It's just a plain vanilla cake
and a buttercream icing all around.
And they can be put in bento boxes.
Bento boxes are lunch boxes.
[Matthew] I have to use this bento cake somehow.
So I use the white chocolate ganache
in my raspberry sauce.
Let's go, baby!
[Vicky] This is the third round, and I'm so close,
and I'm just feeling ecstatic.
I just need to bring it.
I'm making toasted bento cake
with a mint honeydew sorbet, and spicy mango custard.
Vicky's charring her melon.
[Marc] I was seeing that.
-Grilled melon in a dessert? -[laughs]
[Vicky] Grilling honeydew melon
will bring out the caramelized sugars of that honey dew,
uh, to give it another depth of flavor
with the custard.
I take my pops and I reduce them.
I add some cream, some milk and rum.
That's just how we do desserts in the Caribbean.
[Ted] Twenty minutes left on the clock.
[Vicky] The spicy mango pop is already full of flavors,
that I just had to add some milk and reduce it.
Cornstarch, cornstarch.
With some cornstarch, I'll make a eggless custard.
[Matthew] For my honeydew sorbet,
and I'm peeling my honeydew,
blending it up with some agave.
and getting it into the ice cream maker ASAP.
[Vicky] With the honeydew melon sorbet,
if you add some herbs like mint,
a little bit of simple syrup,
that will go a long way.
Matthew makes it to the machine before me.
If I can't get that sorbet into the machine,
that's a big compliment.
Now, I'm a little bit worried.
Vicky, it almost seems like she's unravelling right now.
-Ten minutes to get this done, chefs. -[Maneet] Whoo!
$10,000 on the line.
I don't know what I'm doing.
-[Maneet] Vicky. -[Vicky groans]
She's unravelling right now.
[Ted] Matthew has gotten into the ice cream machine first.
[Vicky sighs]
Now Vicky also wants in there.
Battle of the ice cream machine, love it.
Looks like Matthew's sorbet-- Looks like it might've worked.
[Matthew] It's perfectly done, so I get it in a bowl,
and get it right into the blast chiller.
[Vicky] In time for me to plate,
I need about six to eight minutes
to get my sorbet in.
[Ted] She could make that sorbet in about six minutes.
Not a lot of wiggle room for her.
I'm feeling real good. [chuckles]
I know that I need to add something to the plate.
So I'm gonna make a blueberry compote.
I get my blueberries in the pan,
end up adding some maple syrup and my pretzel salt.
[Brooke] Pretzel salt is just that, right?
It's salty, it's crunchy.
It has a great texture.
Two minute warning here, chefs.
All four ingredients on the plate!
For the texture,
I'm going to make graham crackers pistachio crumble.
I'm adding my pretzel salt and the raspberries as I grind it.
[Maneet] Chefs, $10,000 on the line!
Ten, nine, eight, seven, six,
five, four, three, two, one.
-Time's up. -[all applauding]
[Vicky] I added some pistachio for crunch.
The cake, the sauce.
So hopefully, it comes all together.
[Matthew] I got a little bit of sweet, a little salty.
And a little bit of creamy,
with that cake mixture, and the-- with the raspberries.
I think it's the perfect dish for me to take home the win.
Chefs, inside your dessert basket,
you found a bento cake, honeydew melon,
pretzel salt and spicy mango pops.
Chef Matthew, what do we have?
Today I made for you a sweet honeydew sorbet
with a mango raspberry sauce on the bottom,
with a little bit of that cake mixture.
I just kind of got a lot of good flavors in there,
to really just balance out the dish.
And where's your pretzel salt?
[Matthew] The pretzel salt is in the blueberry sauce.
I think what you've created, it's-- it's lovely,
it's refreshing, reminds me of summer.
With the honeydew sorbet,
the amount of sweetness that you added in this
is just enough.
Even the way you've used the spicy mango pops,
that saltiness,
and the saltiness of the pretzel salt.
What's missing in this is something you put your teeth in.
I mean, it's a-- it's--
it's a sauce, a sauce and an ice cream.
It's not really a dessert there.
There are some really interesting flavors going on.
[Brooke] It's like, a really well-balanced,
-pretty palate cleanser. -[Matthew] Yes.
-[Brooke] A course I might get before dessert. -[Matthew] Okay.
And the berry flavors sort of take over
the flavor on the entire dish.
Understand, thank you.
Chef, what have you learned about yourself today?
Everything that I've done today has been just...
ups and downs,
and I really just was trying to push out my dessert
and make it the best I can be for this last round.
I was going really hard,
I got-- that sorbet right in.
And it just seemed to work out for me.
Finally, chef Vicky.
On the spoon, you have your honeydew sorbet,
with a spicy mango custard.
I toasted my bento cake,
and added a graham cracker pistachio crumble.
I am so glad you decided to last minute use that ice cream machine.
Because this sorbet has so much beautiful flavor.
With the mint and the honeydew,
it's really refreshing.
It's probably my favorite part of this whole plate.
To me, I'm not sure what you did with that cake
that turned it into something else.
Uh, feels like, a slightly toasted slice of cake.
There was not much I could do with that but to toast it.
There's not enough transformation in the cake,
and you know it yourself.
Custard with the spicy mango pops is delicious.
But there's too much cornstarch in it.
It's not a custard, it's completely set.
It's a pudding.
You should've sold it as a pudding then, right?
-You called it a custard. -Pudding, oh, man.
[Marc] I do agree, the sorbet is good.
It's got nice flavor.
But, um,
tough round.
Chef, what did you learn about yourself today?
I think I've reached a pinnacle of my career,
where everything that I was told I couldn't do,
I've done.
Every time you tell me no, I hear "Yes."
So, to represent women, to represent moms,
I've learned that I can do whatever I put my mind to.
-So, yeah. -[Ted] Great.
Remember that all three courses count.
Thank you, chefs.
Judges, let's go way, way back to gummy pickle appetizer.
Matthew probably did the best job with that.
He did one little scallop.
It was perfectly cooked.
And his flavor's very complex.
It was a very well-balanced dish.
It was also very focused, right?
The cookery was good.
[Maneet] Making the cashew gremolata by using the popcorn shoots
was such a great idea.
On the other hand,
we had Vicky who have us scallops,
-which were just overdone. -Yeah.
[Maneet] And then the sauce that she made
with the gummy pickle,
that was challenging.
Heading into the entree round.
We were so surprised with what Matthew served us.
A bowl of pasta which was confused.
It was going in the puttanesca direction,
and then decided to get, uh, alla vodka along with it.
It felt heavy.
It felt like it needed some form of freshness.
[Maneet] The deep fried veal was the only good thing
on the entire dish.
Nicely seasoned, nicely cooked, crispy.
He gave us what he promised.
Of course, the rest of the dish,
I think he let us down.
I was a little confused by Vicky.
She made her veal scallopini,
and she coated it with those onion crisps, right?
Didn't quite get that.
I did find her veal a little bit sort of greasy, though.
It was greasy,
but the flavors that she created were delicious.
The way she had gone and toasted the turnips.
There was caramelization on the turnips,
which was amazing.
-And the creole sauce. -The turnips were delicious.
The creole sauce that she made from the lasagna soup.
-That also was amazing. -[Marc] Oh.
I got a little piece of lasagna in my creole sauce,
-which is a little weird. -[Brooke] That was a little weird.
But the seasoning on it was-- was very tasty.
And then when we head into the dessert round,
and both of them struggled.
Matthew probably was a little bit more successful
in creating a cohesive dessert.
But also, Vicky had a lot of flavor in her sorbet.
Uh, Vicky's sorbet to me, sort of stole the whole show.
So, judges,
have you figured out which meal you liked the best?
For sure.
[Matthew] What could keep me from the win,
would be my entree.
My entree was slacking a little bit.
[Vicky] My flavor profiles were there,
and my dessert was more of a dessert-like than just a [indistinct]
that will tick it.
[Ted] So, who's dish is on the chopping block?
[dramatic music playing]
Chef Vicky, you've been chopped.
Judges?
[Maneet] Vicky, in the first course,
the scallops were overcooked.
And the sauce that you made with raw curry,
did not work at all.
The second course was your strongest course.
But using the onion snacks as a breading,
was not a effective use of that ingredient.
And so, we had to chop you.
Thank you for me, I had a blast.
I'm very humbled by this experience.
-Thank you, chefs. -[all applauding]
[Vicky] My family is gonna proud of me, regardless.
My boys are gonna see me as their hero.
"Hey, my mom was in Chopped."
They still have the bragging rights.
So, nobody loses. [laughs]
And that means, chef Matthew Rolnick,
you are the Chopped champion.
-Thank you so much. -[Maneet] Woo-hoo!
-[all applauding] -[Marc] Good job.
[Maneet and Brooke] Good job.
It feels absolutely incredible.
I won my dream show.
I'm going to South America!
[laughs] I'm gonna experience Peru,
and get that Latin flair.
I'm a winner,
and I have what it takes to be a champion.