[Guy] It's the finale of the greatest competition
in the food world.
This is what I came here for.
I deserve a fairy-tale ending.
It's my time.
Win or die, win or die.
And only the final four chefs...
are left standing.
Lee Anne Wong!
[audience cheering]
Britt Rescigno!
Chef Sara Bradley!
Antonia Lofaso!
They'll face off in
two of our toughest showdowns in the tournament.
First, "Princess Warrior" Chef Antonia Lofaso...
Six seasons of this.
I went from like highs to lows.
Now I'm here in the Final Four again.
It's like this is like a roller coaster
of Tournament of Champions.
[Guy] ...takes on OC superstar Chef Britt Rescigno.
One week, I get married.
I've put my life on hold.
I put the restaurant on hold
to be here,
right here, to win.
[Guy] Next, op Chef all-star Lee Anne Wong...
It's been a super-difficult year
post fire after my restaurant in Maui burned down.
This would be such a huge win.
This is something that, like, I need.
...takes on the Duchess of Paducah,
Chef Sara Bradley.
So there's a lot of things that pushed me to come
and cook in competitions.
My family, like this is betterment for my family.
They're really proud of me.
[Guy] Then the best of the best will face off
in the most extreme battle of the tournament,
a battle so consequential
that it demands the opinion of a fourth judge,
one of the most important culinary figures of our time,
guaranteed to blow our chefs' minds.
Wow!
-Oh, my God! -Oh, my God!
[Guy] Only one chef is gonna earn the belt,
the title,
and the $150,000 grand prize.
Who will win Tournament of Champions 6?
[audience cheering]
Ladies and gentlemen,
are you ready to meet the TOC 6 inal Four?
She defeated Chef Maria Mazon in the first round.
She outscored Chef Rocco DiSpirito in the second round.
And she slayed "the Dragon Slayer"
Kevin Lee in the quarterfinals.
Chef Antonia Lofaso!
Honestly, like, I can't believe that I'm back here.
It took me almost a year to recover from last year.
Maneet Chauhan!
[Antonia] Losing by one point,
it was just so hard.
This is mine now.
I am not letting anyone take this away from me.
[Guy] She out-cooked Chef Chris Oh in the first round,
defeated Chef Michael Reed in the second round,
and she outscored Chef Kaleena Bliss
in the quarterfinals.
Chef Britt Rescigno!
This is a year of firsts for me.
I'm getting married,
I own a restaurant,
and next, there's only one thing left.
That belt.
It's gonna look really sweet
to have that belt in the restaurant.
[Guy] She scored her first OC 6 victory
defeating Chef Chris Scott.
Out-cooked Chef Jonathon Sawyer, in the second round.
And she beat out Chef Joe Sasto in the quarterfinals.
Chef Lee Anne Wong!
I'm super, super, super-proud of myself.
It's emotional for me
because I've had such a...
[laughs] ...a really difficult year
after losing my restaurant in the Maui fires.
I want that belt, and I want that briefcase,
I think, more than anybody else.
[Guy] In her first round of OC,
she defeated Chef Dale Talde,
beat Chef David Viana in the second round,
and she out-cooked Chef Nini Nguyen in the quarterfinals.
Chef Sara Bradley!
[Sara] This is my first year, and there's a chance
that I might take this whole thing home.
I came in with nothing,
and now here I am,
and I've made it to the Final Four.
And all I want to do now
is win
and blow everybody out of the water.
Chefs, you're just two cooks away
from winning it all.
TOC 6 ill have a brand-new champion!
And once again, that champion...
will be a woman!
Tonight's dishes will be tasted by three culinary greats
and legitimate competition legends.
-I like that. -Now...
for the final battle,
we have an additional judge.
This judge is so celebrated, so iconic,
that I promise you,
you will all be picking your jaws up off the floor.
The question is, who wants to compete first?
Division A and Division B.
Chef Antonia and Chef Britt.
Good luck!
Final Four again, baby.
Let's go!
I mean, this is... this is incredible.
This is the matchup that I wanted,
going up against Antonia.
I want my fairy-tale ending.
She's wanted this since season 1.
Unfortunately, I'm gonna have to take her down.
Tonight, we have two number one seeds.
First, we have the number one seed, Chef Britt Rescigno,
the TOC uperstar
who made the Final Four three years in a row.
This isn't the first time I've had to go
against a number one seed.
I've lost to Maneet a couple of times.
But I did beat Tiff.
So maybe I just even out that score a little bit.
Her opponent, the renowned restaurateur,
last year's runner-up, Chef Antonia Lofaso,
who is coming back for the belt.
I want this this year.
Like, six seasons of this.
I went from like highs to lows
to like basically almost won,
now here in the Final Four again.
It's like this is like a roller coaster
of Tournament of Champions.
All other competitors that are in the top four
have worked for Michelin star restaurants,
have a James Beard,
or have been nominated for one.
And I haven't.
But it doesn't matter,
because I can cook just like anyone else.
Ready.
Are you ready to meet these two culinary warriors?
-[audience cheering] -Then, let's light this up!
She's a three-time TOC emifinalist
and chef/owner of a live-fire Italian-inspired restaurant
in Sun Valley, Idaho.
She out-cooked Chef Kaleena Bliss
in the quarterfinals with an oyster and steak risotto dish
that the judges called...
So bright and inviting.
I'm getting kind of full, and I'm still shoving food in my mouth,
which is always a good sign.
Say ciao to the angry Italian.
It's my time. Let's go.
The one and only Chef Britt Rescigno!
[hip-hop music playing]
Chef, what a meteoric rise it's been.
Yeah.
You got so many things coming up.
Opening your restaurant, getting married,
back in TOC gain at the semifinal--
You know, just all the same old hat.
-Go get 'em. Good luck. -Thank you.
Your opponent...
has also been here before.
-[Toccata and Fugue playing] -She's a Michelin-recommended SoCal restaurateur,
a killer culinary competitor,
and TOC 5 runner-up.
She defeated Chef Kevin Lee in the quarterfinals
with a braised pork cheek and coconut corn puree
that Cat Cora called...
[Cat] Phenomenal.
It just came together.
Chef Antonia Lofaso!
[upbeat rock music playing]
You've both been to the Final Four.
What is different in TOC 6
than it's been in 1, 2, 3, 4, 5?
I'm gonna win this year.
[audience exclaims] Ooh!
Audience, are you ready to see this?
[all cheering]
Let's go to the Randomizer.
Chefs, as you know, the Randomizer will determine
the mandatory details of your dish.
Protein, your produce, your equipment, your style.
And then we threw in a wild card, color.
Make a great dish,
and make sure it's got a color theme.
This is gonna be so good.
Here we go. Go for proteins!
I can't watch.
Orange... purple!
Escabeche.
Lava rocks.
I've only been massaged with lava rocks.
I've never cooked with them.
Sorrel, kohlrabi...
[Antonia] Figs!
[Guy] Figs!
Chicken, fish--
Give me elk.
[Guy] Chicken...
-fish... -[Antonia] pompano.
[Guy] Whole pompano!
Wow.
[Guy] Figs, lava rocks, escabeche and purple.
Purple?
[Guy] But don't worry.
We're going to give you 45 minutes
to prepare your dish.
Good luck. Go.
Whole pompano, beautiful fish.
Line-caught.
It's a buttery, firm, flaky fish.
Figs.
Talk about awesome to work with.
I think that's a big win.
Lava rocks have been used
in so many different cultures to cook with.
Escabeche. This is a great way where you pickle,
ferment with aromatics,
most often with vegetables nowadays,
like, uh, cauliflower, jalapenos, onions and carrots.
And then colors.
We went and found every purple vegetable under the sun.
But they're going to want to really make sure
that they incorporate purple in other fashions.
It's a tough one.
[Antonia] Whole pompano is a beautiful fish.
Great skin on it, very light in texture.
It's such a small fish.
There's not a lot of meat to the flesh.
Kind of like the whole.
On the Randomizer, it says "whole pompano."
I'm gonna fry this whole thing.
I'm just gonna try this real quick.
I wanna see how this happens.
45 minutes goes by very, very quickly.
Frying that tester fish immediately
so that I can get the timeframe right
is really important.
[Justin] Just a tester.
I love the move. I love the look.
Whole fried fish...
let's go!
[Antonia] I'm going up against Britt to make it into the finals.
She has shown so much consistency.
It's incredible.
But Britt has actually never made it past the Final Four.
And it's not gonna happen today.
Not on my watch.
What's the plan, Chef?
I'm gonna make, like, an Italian style escabeche.
I'm gonna do like a giardiniera pickle with it
with some cabbage juice.
I am doing poached pompano, escabeche style,
with a tostada,
purple cauliflower, purple carrots and cabbage.
I'm gonna get started on my escabeche sauce.
Escabeche can be turned into almost any cuisine.
You basically need a bunch of acid,
a little bit of fat and some beautiful herbs.
I've also juiced some of the figs,
which actually added a little bit of viscosity and sweetness.
The key to this is it needs to be acidic.
-Sour orange. -[Tiffani] Sour orange, got it.
-And balsamic. -Balsamic, heard.
When given purple,
you hope that something like this comes out.
[bell dings]
Seven minutes down,
thirty-eight to go.
[audience cheering]
[Britt] I know I want to make a tostada
out of fresh corn flour tortillas.
[Tiffani] Chef, do you make a lot of tortillas?
-Oh, yeah, tons. -You do?
-No. -[laughs]
[Britt] I've never done this before,
but I think it's really important
to always push yourself.
And Antonia makes me want to push harder.
Let's test this baby out.
Oh. I mean...
Hey, hey, hey! What's up?
Joining me, our Michelin-recommended chef,
the wildcard himself, Chef Justin Warner.
And award-winning restaurateur and the TOC 3 hamp,
the one and only "Sweet Tea," Chef Tiffani Faison.
Tiffani and Justin will help explain our chefs' moves
and present their dishes to the judges
during the blind tasting.
We are also joined by Hunter Fieri,
who will be talking with our chefs behind the scenes,
and Sir Simon Majumdar,
who will get the judges' take on our semifinal challenges.
[Antonia] My tester was perfect.
This is what we're doing.
-Talk to me. -So, um...
I'm gonna do the whole fried fish.
So I'm gonna do-- I know.
Having traveled a lot throughout the Caribbean,
literally, like boats would pull up into the sand,
whole fish would come out,
throw it into the fryer and escabeche the whole top.
It's good.
So I'm gonna do a whole fried pompano
with a ton of vegetable escabeche,
purple cauliflower puree.
This is literally like what Xea's grandpa used to make.
-[Justin] Yeah. -It was like a porky escabeche.
My daughter's grandfather is Jamaican,
so it's very much in my wheelhouse.
It's very much like flavors that I'm familiar with.
And where are all these going to fry?
They're gonna fry in my fryers.
Do you think it's gonna be able to fry in time?
I'm gonna fry in time. I'm starting right now.
I'm gonna pull them out, I'm gonna let them rest,
and then they're gonna go right back in
at the very, very end
and get nice and crisp.
-Like, a baby's bottom. -Right?
[Guy] Well, there's not a lot of time in general.
I mean, she's going for it. Here's the thing.
She can only fit one fish in each fryer.
[Antonia] This can't be my last cook.
Like, this has to be the cook that gets me into the final.
If I'm gonna go for it,
it's gonna be to fry a whole fish.
Twenty-eight minutes.
[Tiffani] I think I know the answer to this,
but what's our level of experience with lava rocks?
-Zero times. -Zero times.
Same, Chef.
For my escabeche poached pompano,
my tortilla is just gonna add
an awesome texture into my dish.
So I'm gonna cook my tortillas first
to really set them.
What's the idea with the tortillas?
What-- what-- Is this...
[Tiffani] Right there. So we got a little puffy tacos
-sort of like tostada situation. -Okay.
[Britt] And then I'm gonna bring it over to the fryer
and get it nice and crispy,
and hopefully it'll give it that little puff
that I'm looking for.
-That's good. -[Tiffani] All right.
[Britt] A little like puffy taco action.
Mmm! Oh, my God. Oh, my God, that's so good.
Winning OC, to me, is everything.
I am so proud of where I'm at in my career right now.
I'm opening my first restaurant
with my fiancee.
I have worked super-hard.
And I feel like having that belt
and the championship behind me
would really just take me to the moon.
[Tiffani] The caramelization on those figs is bananas.
[Antonia] The first two pompano out of the fryer,
they look amazing.
I've taken in a whole fried fish
and I'm frying it in appliances
that aren't really meant to have whole fish in them.
[Justin] What's the plan with the carrots?
-Uh, to escabeche them. -Got it.
[Antonia] Because this is a fried fish,
the escabeche comes from highly-vinegared
and pickled vegetables.
I'm back in the Final Four.
How many more times do I have to do this?
Like, for real.
Like, how many more times do I need to be almost there?
[Guy] Now, to make the competition as fair as possible,
the judging is done in a blind tasting.
The judges don't know who cooked what
or who's even competing.
The judges will be scoring the dish based on taste,
use of the items on the Randomizer,
and plating.
The chef with the highest score
will move on to the final round.
And the other chef will be eliminated,
thinking about TOC 7.
[Tiffani] This fish is one of my favorite fish.
Really creamy, really buttery, really sweet.
Also just hard to break down.
She makes you work for it.
It's got such a huge rib cage.
I mean, just a big body and everything else,
and just a tiny, little filet.
[Britt] And I'm gonna get that working skin side down
on my lava rock.
I'm gonna use the fish bones and water.
[Tiffani] So fish stock, essentially,
and just put in purple pea flowers.
They start blue, and then when you add acid,
they become purple.
Which Chef just did.
[Britt] All right, back to the pompano.
All I'm looking for
is that skin to get a little bit charred...
[Tiffani] Lava rock grilled pompano. Who knew?
...because that beautiful acidic pea flower broth
is gonna finish cooking my fish.
[Tiffani] Oh!
This is escabeche.
Seventeen minutes, chefs. We have seventeen left.
[Justin] What did I miss in that pot?
[Antonia] Cream, coconut,
chili.
That's some purple puree.
Where are we with lava rock?
Anything so far?
Uh, nothing yet, but, uh,
we've got some resting in the oven,
and I think we're about to see it.
[Antonia] Then I take the purple onions
and just let them roast.
[bell dings]
[Justin] What's the plan for the figs, Chef?
I'm gonna grill some of them on the lava stone.
The only time I have ever used a lava rock
is like in a massage.
I need lava rocks on the back of my neck right now,
I'm so stressed out.
There are 10 minutes left to be played.
Ten minutes.
[Britt] Giardiniera is like a spicy pickled vegetable.
So I'm gonna take red wine vinegar,
a little bit of sugar, some salt,
and add some chili crisps to that.
I'm gonna get that nice and hot
and pour it right over my vegetables.
Final Four for the third year in a row.
I am so ready to get into that finale.
Chefs, five minutes! Five to go!
Five to be plated.
[Britt] I'm gonna plate my tortilla on the side
because I don't want it to get soggy.
I put down my escabeche vegetables.
Giardiniera.
I'm hoping that the judges see
how I intentionally made everything purple.
Then I add in my purple cabbage escabeche sauce.
Next, my beautiful poached fish,
escabeche style.
Sixty seconds.
[Antonia] I put a little bit
of that coconut lime cauliflower puree down,
a little bit of purple cabbage with the purple onion
with those perfectly-roasted lava rock figs.
Then I put my fish down.
I am taking this today.
[audience] Five, four, three, two, one!
That's it!
Semifinals of Division A and Division B are done.
I just did a whole giant fish.
I was like, "Let's just drop this in the deep fryer."
Oh, my goodness.
Forty-five minutes goes by quick.
I hope it's good.
[exhales]
Please.
I am not playing it safe right now.
Like, I'm not taking any chances.
[sighs] Ah, man.
[producer] How do you feel?
I feel really good.
I mean, it screams purple.
Everything on my dish is purple.
I even tinted my fish purple.
Our TOC udges have been
waiting in their trailers for the blind tasting to begin.
One of the legendary titans of Bobby's Triple Threat,
Top Chef inner,
and TOC's ery first champion,
"B-Dub" Chef Brooke Williamson.
Brookey's here.
It's so nice to see her as a judge.
She deserves it.
What a G.
Acclaimed restaurateur, Chopped udge,
-TOC 2, TOC 5... -Oh, they're bringing all the champs back.
-Maneet! -...the champ, the "Dancing Spice Queen"
Chef Maneet Chauhan!
Yes, Maneet!
Oh, I love to see Maneet so much.
She's judged me quite a few times, too.
And last definitely not least Top Chef inner,
James Beard finalist,
and TOC 4 hamp,
-the one and only Chef Mei Lin. -Mei Lin!
I love this.
That's a fantastic panel.
Guys, I want to be on the wall.
I want to be with you.
Take me with you.
Here we go.
Randomizer gave whole pompano.
The produce was figs.
Equipment was the lava rocks.
The style was escabeche.
And the color that needed to be recognized was purple.
And here to present to you is the one and only wildcard
Justin Warner.
Judges, this is whole crispy escabeche pompano.
It's accompanied by a medley
of pickled and purple ingredients.
The figs were grilled on the lava rock
and then accompanied by
a raw yet acidulated preparation atop the fish.
They're eating a lot.
Did they not eat breakfast today?
To get to the semifinals and the finale,
you need to take big risks.
And I am loving how gutsy this chef was
to take the whole pompano and to deep fry it.
Right? It takes time. It is beautiful.
The cook on this fish
reminds me of crispy skin pork.
-Yeah. Yeah. -Like a chicharron.
And that is a very, very good thing.
Well, I guess I'm going home.
The escabeche is probably my favorite part.
I love the acid with the pickled chilis.
However, I'm not getting that much purple.
I was expecting
a lot more purple just thrown at you.
What?
The cauliflower puree
kind of creates this dipping sauce.
And the balance of the figs that are perfectly roasted
against the balance of that acid
makes this dish so craveable.
I don't know if they like it.
All right, judges. Thank you very much.
Your scorecards are in front of you.
50 points available in taste,
40 points available on the use of the Randomizer,
and 10 points of plating.
I don't know.
I don't know how they judge.
[exclaims nervously]
serving the whole pompano was really, really smart.
Wildly smart.
I'm just excited to see what they're gonna say about mine.
I know I hit purple.
I got all four champs together at one time.
Is that awesome or what?
Judges, chefs, fellow belt baddies,
in front of you,
you have pompano escabeche
with a purple veggie escabeche,
a fresh purple sauce of cabbage and fig,
and a fresh masa tostada.
Look how cute my little tostada is.
[Tiffani] The lava rocks were used to roast the pompano
before it was finished in the escabeche of the purple pea flower.
I mean, they can't stop eating it.
When I think of escabeche or an escabeche,
I want these tart flavors.
These are bright.
I've got to comment on the tostada.
It is so crisp.
-It is such a beautiful-- -Yes!
You can hear the crackle of it.
It is absolutely amazing.
And I think that texture is required for this dish.
There's still this tiny, little bowl of perfection
in so many ways here.
-Um, there are some really incredible bites to be had. -Wow.
This doesn't sound good.
If I am going to nitpick, I don't see whole fish here.
-That's fair. -And I do want that skin to be a little bit crispier.
Wow, what a stunner.
I love the purple figs. I love the purple cauliflower.
It's purple in your face.
I lost.
I do have to say that my pompano was undercooked.
-Yes! -It was a little raw in the center.
-And... -Hmm.
I wish that the skin was a little bit crispier.
Thank you, judges. Thank you very much.
-All right... -I am not walking into this confident right now.
Winning TOC s everything right now.
One week, I get married.
I've put my life on hold.
I put the restaurant on hold...
to be here, right here, to win.
I'm proud of myself.
I don't want to go home.
Pull me out of purgatory!
Pull me out of TOC urgatory!
We're inching closer to the finale tonight.
Let's bring 'em back out.
Chef Britt Rescigno!
Chef Antonia Lofaso!
Amazing.
Mmm. What an honor.
Chefs, in the final evening of TOC 6,
that opening battle was money.
Ladies and gentlemen...
-We have an exact tie at 82 each. -No!
Ladies and gentlemen...
-We have an exact tie at 82 each. -No!
There's one deciding factor that takes place in a tie,
-and that is... -Flavor.
...that taste will prevail first.
One chef scored a 41 out of taste.
One scored a 40.
However, one scored a 9 out of plating.
The other scored an 8.
Ladies and gentlemen, the winner of the semifinal battle
between Chef Britt Rescigno and Chef Antonia Lofaso is...
Antonia Lofaso!
[audience cheering]
Wow!
One day.
[exhales]
This is not even the beginning of the end of Britt.
This is just stoking the fire
and throwing maybe a cup of gas on it.
-100%. -Ladies and gentlemen,
the one and only "Angry Italian."
[audience cheering]
You did awesome.
Thanks.
-Love you. -Love you.
Britt! Britt! Britt! Britt! Britt! Britt! Britt!
Man, that was tough.
[sniffles]
I need a second.
[crying]
[exhales]
It's like all this emotion that you just hold on to.
[exhales] Okay.
It's hard. This is the hardest thing.
You put everything into it,
and sometimes it doesn't work out.
It just felt like it this year.
It really felt like it.
My dear friend,
you are returning to the finals of TOC!
[audience cheering]
[Guy] In there! Right?
-Going back, baby! -[screaming]
"The Princess Warrior" Chef Antonia Lofaso!
Wow!
Okay, that was close.
I would just like to say I want to celebrate,
but that was really close.
I mean, here's the thing. I was not coming back.
This feels like full vindication.
[sighs]
-I did it. I know. -Amazing cook.
Obviously, like, me frying a fish,
I know I took a big risk. I was nervous.
I mean, you crushed it.
You're back here again. Second year in a row.
How you feeling? You feeling--
I'm feeling warmed up, and I'm ready for the final.
-You're ready to go? -Let's go.
One semifinal left.
Are you ready?
-[audience cheering] -Let's bring it!
We have the number five seed, Chef Sara Bradley,
a seasoned culinary competitor who has been unstoppable
in her first year in the OC Arena.
It's my first time on TOC, and here I am.
I'm like... I'm in the semifinals.
Like, here I am, just two cooks away
from getting that belt and getting that ring
and that big old briefcase of money.
Her opponent, wow, number three seed,
Chef Lee Anne Wong,
who has taken down three powerhouse chefs
to make her way into the Final Four
for the first time!
It's been a super-difficult year
post fire after my restaurant in Maui burned down.
This would be such a huge win
for myself, my family, my staff.
Um, for me.
This is something that, like, I need.
I've been without primary income for a year.
So that money would buy us time.
So there's a lot of things that pushed me to come
on national television and cook in competitions.
My family, like this is betterment for my family.
The 2-year-old has no clue what is going on.
She keeps just saying, "Mommy's on a work trip."
The 5-year-old, she knows what's going on,
but you don't want to give too much away
because the 5-year-old loves nothing more
than to spoil a secret.
Um, you know,
I've been speaking with my husband and everything.
He's holding it down at home.
Yeah. They're really proud of me.
All right. Let's go do this.
All right.
Are you ready?
Then, let's light this up!
♪ Come and get some! ♪
[Guy] She's a two-time Top Chef runner-up
with an award-winning Kentucky restaurant and bourbon bar
serving up Southern cuisine combined with
the flavors of her Jewish and Appalachian heritage.
[upbeat hip-hop music playing]
[Guy] She out-cooked Chef Nini Nguyen in the quarterfinals
with a dish that the judges called...
Really elegantly done.
This chef nailed the Randomizer.
[Guy] Make some noise, for the Duchess of Paducah,
the one and only Chef Sara Bradley!
-[screaming in joy] -[audience cheering and applauding]
This has been a whirlwind.
It's like one of those movies where you don't know where that cowboy is from,
and he just rides in,
-and just starts shooting the place up. -[mimics gunshots]
And then just rides out.
I'm gonna try to, like, ride out into that sunset. Like, all the way.
But another one of the people that I'm a super fan of...
She's a James Beard semifinalist for best chef
with acclaimed restaurants in Hawaii and Japan.
And she beat out Chef Joe Sasto in the quarterfinals
with a bamboo-steamed duck breast
that Ming Tsai called...
Executed perfectly.
Put your hands together, the one and only Mama Wong.
Chef Lee Anne Wong!
Chef, you've got it all. You've been there, you've done that.
I've never been here.
Well, I was just getting ready to say that.
I want it pretty bad this year.
It's been a rough year, and I'm here to win.
I want to go home with a belt and a briefcase.
-Got a lot to prove. -Yeah.
I think they both have a lot to prove.
Let's take it to the randomizer. Right this way.
Protein, produce, equipment, style, and the wildcard color.
Because you are in the semifinals,
we're giving you 45 minutes.
Forty-five minutes to cook. I'm a giver.
All right, here we go! Audience, help me out!
Protein.
[groaning]
Color goes to...
Back in black.
En papillote.
Perfect.
[Guy] Turmeric leaves.
Sorrel.
Abalone, elk, chicken.
-Chicken! -[audience cheering]
[Guy] Blue Silkie chicken, sorrel, turmeric leaves, en papillote, black.
-Any questions? -Are you being serious?
It's the semifinals of TOC VI. Let's go.
[audience cheering]
We've never seen this in TOC.
Blue Silkie chicken. A little bit more like duck than it would be chicken.
But the crazy thing is this blue, vibrant skin.
Sorrel is a very tart, acidic herb.
It's got similarities that you'd find in spinach.
They've got to use the turmeric leaves as a piece of equipment.
They can wrap it and steam it, they can wrap it and bake it. Whatever they wanna do.
En papillote means to cook in a package.
Typically done with parchment paper.
And then black. [exhales]
My randomizer was a gift in comparison to this.
-Tiff. -Congratulations. Welcome.
Thank you!
We end up with blue Silkie chicken, and I'm from Kentucky.
What do you think I'm gonna do with it?
I'm gonna fry it.
[Tiffani] What are you thinking?
[Sara] Nashville hot fried chicken.
Whoa!
What's the steamer for, Chef?
[Sara] Throw in the en papillote.
So I'm doing crispy Silkie chicken,
en papillote potatoes,
and a Silkie schmaltz chili oil.
I'm just getting 'em warm while I work on some other stuff.
Lee Anne and I, we're playing for our family, for our communities.
The matchup is gonna be so strong
because we both have a desire to make people's lives better
by being here and cooking and winning.
[Lee Anne] We get the randomizer of the ages, right?
Most people would run away screaming in terror.
I was trained classical French,
so I wanna do this dish, like, truly en papillote.
We're gonna do French-Asian today.
I am making "black" Silkie chicken and dumplings en papillote.
In order to actually make this successful,
I need to prepare every element
that's gonna be in this
before I can even start building my papillotes.
But you know what? I've made it all the way to the Final 4.
I wanna risk it all.
Time is ticking away.
[Sara] I mean, the blue Silkie chicken is an interesting breed.
It's super lean, the legs are where most of the meat are,
and it's not even a meaty bird at that.
I'm gonna make a Silkie schmaltz chili oil to drizzle all over the top.
[Tiffani] This is smart. Those chickens have no fat,
so Chef just went and got schmaltz.
So chicken goes into the schmaltz...
-Which is chicken fat. -Chicken fatsies.
This is gonna be the base for my Nashville hot sauce.
Real smart stuff.
[Justin] Chef, what's the plan?
[Lee Anne] I'm making a blue chicken stock.
The pressure cooker is awesome for making stock like that.
Get as much flavor as possible.
I wanna really get this sort of concentrated jus
that is just pure chicken flavor.
Okay.
Very little meat on here.
And take the thighs and make a mousseline out of it.
I add a little bit of garlic, a little ginger, some butter, some cream,
and a big handful of sorrel to make this sort of paste that I am going to spread
between two pounded, seasoned blue Silkie chicken breasts.
So the Silkie found its way into the pressure cooker to make the stock.
The breasts have been trimmed up, separated, and pounded.
Over here, we have a leg meat mousseline.
[Guy] And this is gonna go into a turmeric leaf?
[Justin] Probably a new turmeric leaf, yeah.
-[Guy] And steamed? -[Justin] Yeah.
Yeah, this is a wild one, man. I'm stoked.
[Lee Anne] Sara is a killer chef.
This is her first time in the game, and she's badass.
But I'm here to represent my community, my family.
It's a really big deal to me. [voice shaking]
I was like, "Stop crying. Don't be that person."
[Tiffani] The hallmark of Nashville hot chicken
is that most of the heat is contained in fat.
It's then poured over the chicken once it's fried.
It keeps the chicken crispy, as opposed to weighing it down.
[Sara] I have pushed really hard to change the way people think
about the culinary scene in Kentucky.
Sometimes we get overlooked.
But a stage like this? Amazing.
[Tiffani] Chef, talk to me en papillote.
[Sara] En papillote, I am gonna do these blackened potatoes.
Papillote just means "in a pouch,"
so you can do it many different ways.
These potatoes are gonna end up in the turmeric leaves
with a little bit of blackening seasoning.
This randomizer is hard.
-This is a hard randomizer. -It's a tough one.
And they have 17 minutes left.
Crazy, what goes down in 45 minutes.
What's the next move, Chef?
[Lee Anne] I want to make some super-quick dumpling dough.
I mixed it with some activated charcoal,
and I wanna make these little black flour dumplings.
[Justin] Chicken and dumplings, Chef?
[Lee Anne] Chicken and dumplings, baby.
[Justin] When that boils, it's gonna be jet black.
She's cruising.
[Tiffani] Blackening seasoning in the chicken flour.
[Sara] A key to really crazy crispy chicken is to let it sit in the flour.
And that buttermilk almost makes, like, a wet batter.
Then you dredge it again right before you fry it.
You can get almost, like, a double crust.
With the feet on, I like it.
Ash is working.
Ash gives a really nice flavor
especially when you have something that's super fried.
It goes well with the bitter.
I have two little girls at home, it's impactful.
Like, watching Mommy on TV and seeing what she's doing.
You know, my children can't come back in the kitchen and watch me hustle and cook.
There's fire and knives.
But they can watch it on TV, and I really want to make them proud.
There's sorrel, basil, and scallion in there.
What's up, Double O Justin?
The breast is going in this double papillote action.
[Lee Anne] I'm gonna add just a handful...
Six, seven pieces of dumplings.
And this is gonna be steamed or baked?
In 13 minutes, yeah.
[Lee Anne] You have a stapler?
Find me a stapler from the office, please.
-[Sara] That's scary. -Right?
What's she gonna staple over there?
[Lee Anne] The tricky part about it is I can't open it back up,
I can't check it to see if it's okay, if it's cooked.
So I am taking the risk of all risks.
This is win or die. Win or die. Big risk.
Chefs, this is the final ten minutes. Ten to go.
[audience cheering]
It's me, waiting on the clock, hoping my chicken is cooking.
You're playing the clock, right?
I am playing the clock right now.
I don't want to present this super refined dish
that has no reference to papillote whatsoever.
I actually wanna serve them en papillote
just to show them my bravery.
[Guy] Nine minutes. Nine minutes to be plated.
I believe this might be the first time that Darius, who runs our front office,
had his stapler absconded to be used in a cooking competition.
Put that over in the Smithsonian.
[Tiffani] Water, Chef? Or...
[Sara] Just water. I'm gonna just make a little sorrel.
Sorrel is one of my favorite ingredients.
It grows wild all over my property.
I know that it's gonna impart acid to the dish.
With a little bit of olive oil, salt, fresh turmeric leaves,
and a lot of fresh sorrel leaves.
Now I'm gonna build my sorrel salad.
So I grab my sorrel leaves
and I toss them with a little bit of black garlic molasses,
and I think these plums will be really delicious.
I just want a few fresh elements.
Now what's the plan, Chef?
Make a little sauce to be poured tableside over the papillote.
I open the pressure cooker. It's rich, it's reduced, it's concentrated.
And so I add a little bit of shiro dashi,
a little bit of smoked shoyu, which is soy sauce.
That's nice. Sharp.
My intention is to burn these turmeric leaves to ash.
Literally.
Turn my sauce a little bit black.
Six minutes.
[Lee Anne] After my restaurant burning down last year in Maui,
it's been kind of bleak, it's been a hard year.
So to get here has just been so great.
I'm emotionally overwhelmed to be here,
and, yeah, I wanna take it all the way.
I want that belt, and I want that briefcase,
I think, more than anybody else.
[Justin] Ash jus, Chef? Oh, my goodness gracious.
I'm gonna let that chicken go right to the last second. Yep.
[Guy] Four minutes!
Potatoes en papillote?
Potatoes, turmeric leaf, papillote.
-[Guy] Got it. -[Tiffani] Mouthful.
Pretty presentation.
[Sara] The next thing I put on there is a little bit of that sorrel sauce.
And then I'm dusting my entire fried chicken with my sorrel ash.
Big minded things. People here... Wow.
[Sara] My time away from my family
and my time away from the restaurant,
I want those to all pay off.
So I'm taking that belt home.
[Lee Anne] I am nervous as hell.
I'm taking huge risks because I don't know what's in the bag.
Knowing that it only had 10 minutes in the oven,
and the heat had to penetrate the bag,
the turmeric leaf, the sorrel leaf, to get to the meat.
My big fear is that I'm gonna serve
a dish that the judges are gonna push away and say,
"I can't eat this, it's inedible, the chicken's raw."
That would be a huge fail.
-[mouthing] -[audience] Five, four, three, two, one!
[audience cheering and applauding]
Chef Lee Anne Wong, Chef Sara Bradley, job well done!
[exclaims, laughs]
I can get past Lee Anne right now,
then I just have to get past Antonia.
God, I hope none of it's raw. I hope none of it's raw.
Whew! That was a good one.
I did my best. I hope I'm not serving raw chicken.
All right, here we go.
Ladies and gentlemen, let's welcome back our judges.
All of the TOC hamps...
Of course.
Oh, my God.
Oh, my God!
TOC I, hef Brooke Williamson.
TOC II, TOC V, aneet Chauhan.
TOC IV, ei Lin!
These are gonna be the toughest judges here.
Because they've been through it.
Judges, tonight, the chefs were granted
the blue Silkie chicken, the sorrel, turmeric leaves,
in style, en papillote, and the wildcard color was black.
Chefs, you have a crispy Silkie chicken
with Silkie chicken schmaltz chili oil.
That is accompanied with blackening spiced potatoes
on turmeric leaf papillote.
A sorrel, basil, and turmeric leaf puree.
A salad of raw sorrel leaf and black plum.
Damn!
Okay. [exhales]
She did a lot of work.
This is a really well thought-out plate of food.
The en papillote has provided so much flavor to those potatoes.
And the chili oil is balanced out by its friend sorrel,
that is providing the acid in the form of sour grass,
which is so beautiful with all of the flavor on that chicken.
It's crunchy, it's luxurious.
There's some really smart cooking on this plate. It's really impressive.
[exhales]
Apparently, Brooke likes it.
There's this bright green over here,
and there are these purple potatoes right over here.
It really accentuates the black smoke right over here.
I think it's really smart.
I really appreciated the chef's approach to the Silkie Chicken
because the prized meat on this bird is the thigh.
The chef cooked it to perfection, it's nice and crispy.
For me, I needed more of that sorrel.
I think I only got, like, three leaves of it.
That's all I put on there.
And I could have used a little bit more of that sorrel sauce
because it gave the dish a really the insane balance
between the greasy fry, the chili oil,
and then the acid coming through from the sorrel.
Great. Judges, thank you.
Remember, on your scoring cards here,
we have 50 points available in taste,
40 points in the use of the randomizer,
and 10 points in plating.
Oh, my God.
Well, she did well.
I feel good about it, but, you know, I don't know what Lee Anne did.
Judges, you may use the scissors or simply tear the papillote,
and the sauce is to be added to the dish that you find inside.
This is Silkie black chicken and dumplings en papillote.
The Silkie chicken was butchered.
The accompanying parts were used to make the sauce that accompanies.
That is an ash jus.
The breast was removed, it was pounded,
and then filled with a mousseline of leg and sorrel.
This is, like, really nerve-racking.
Obviously, this chicken was cooked before it was put into the en papillote.
What?
This entire chicken was cooked in here?
-[Justin] Yes. -Correct.
-[Brooke] From start to finish? -Raw.
-Yes. -Raw?
[Guy] And the mousseline.
Wow!
I'm sorry, that just blew my mind.
Really? This is perfectly cooked.
Like, this almost seems impossible.
-[Lee Anne] Whoo! -And it's delicious.
Phenomenal use of en papillote.
This jus sauce, it is delicious.
The flavors over here are great.
I do think that the use of the sorrel in the mousseline
is such a great idea.
It gives it that tartness, which Sorrell gets to the party,
and that just really elevates the dish.
And the fact that the chef has also wrapped the Silkie chicken
with the turmeric leaf gives another layer of citrus.
The idea of en papillote, the chef did it twice, which is really smart.
However, my chicken is eating a little bit dry.
Pour some more sauce on it.
My dumplings, I appreciate that they're black,
but it's a little dense, they're a little bit gummy.
[sighs]
Thank you, judges. Thank you very much. Let's go to the scoring cards.
I feel bad that the dumplings were imperfect.
At least I didn't serve them raw blue Silkie chicken.
I don't know as to who gets that one.
Okay, let's do it.
Let me get my security blanket on. Let's go find out.
-Chef Sara Bradley! -[audience cheering and applauding]
-Chef Lee Anne Wong! -[audience cheering and applauding]
If it was easy, everybody would be doing it.
That was not easy.
A score of 85 to 83.
The winner is...
A score of 85 to 83.
The winner is...
Sara Bradley!
[audience cheering and applauding]
[Guy] Wow!
Lee Anne, all that you've been through in battle in this last year,
and for you just to even come back
and compete with us was a blessing.
Any final words besides, "Yes, Guy, I will see you next year"?
Yes, Guy, I will see you next year.
-That's what I wanted to hear! -[Lee Anne laughing]
Lee Anne Wong! Thank you! Love you.
Come on.
All right. Going home.
I needed this.
It would have been nice to go home with a belt and briefcase,
but I did my best. That's all I could do.
I'm gonna come back next year, I'm gonna do this again. Let's do it.
Who's at home watching right now?
I've got my daughter, Lula, who's five, and Hazel, who's two.
My husband, my folks, the entire restaurant.
They don't know it. I know it right now,
but we're shutting down that night and we're throwing a party, right?
You are shut down right now and you are watching it.
Yes. And, like, my home family, my work family,
my Paducah family, I love y'all.
So I'm gonna try. I'm gonna try my damnedest to bring this home.
-There's almost a tear in there. -I know.
-Chef? -Yeah.
-You are in the finals of TOC VI! - Sara whooping]
It's so good!
-Love it. -There it is! Number 5 seed.
So what I want you to do is relax,
go back to your trailer, take a little chill.
-Congratulations. -Thank you.
Thank you.
-Great job. -Thank you, Chef.
-There she goes! -Thank you, guys!
Oh, my goodness!
It's like your legs are a little bit weak.
-How are you feeling right now? -Oh, my God!
-Cloud nine? -It's crazy.
First year, and you are now in the finals against a veteran, Antonia.
Antonia is scary.
I was so impressed by the flavor of that chicken leg.
The sorrel ash as the spice on top of the Silkie chicken was incredible.
[Sara] Whew!
[grunts]
Oh, my God.
That is like...
For a second, I thought I was gonna, like...
I don't know, like, my knees dropped.
I was like, "All right, okay."
And now, look at this [bleep].
Like, this is crazy.
This is wild.
Ladies and gentlemen,
when I say that I have really saved the best for last,
these two are the best, and this is the last battle of TOC VI.
[Sara] I've been watching OC since it started.
You know, I've always thought, like,
"I want to go on that show, but how do you get noticed enough to come on?"
You know.
So I worked really hard to get here.
But Antonia has been doing this for six years.
She has a lot of experience in this kitchen, and she's the 1 seed.
When I get in there, I know that my stomach's gonna be, like, right here.
But that is what really...
That's what makes me a better chef.
It's what pushes me.
'Cause I don't wanna lose.
[Antonia] This has been an emotional journey,
this has been an exhausting journey,
this has gone on for too many years.
I was so close last year.
This year, it is gonna be different. It has to be different.
I came here with so much adrenaline, anxiety, fear...
Because I did so well last year.
I need to take it a step further.
Like, I need to win this.
Are you ready for the final two contenders of TOC VI?
Then let's light this up!
♪ Come and get some ♪
[Guy] After working in MICHELIN starred restaurants
in New York and Chicago,
she returned to her Kentucky hometown,
where she turned an old freight depot
into the freight house, restaurant and bourbon bar.
She's a two-time Top Chef runner-up,
Chopped: All-American Showdown grand champion,
and the very first chef to earn the title of...
The very first Chopped Legend.
[Guy] Give a big Kentucky holler for the Queen of Paducah,
the one and only Chef Sara Bradley!
[audience cheering and applauding]
Whoo!
That's what I'm talking about.
Chef, coming in as a rookie to TOC,
never having set foot in the arena...
And make it all the way to the finals.
What does this mean if you were to win TOC VI?
I wanna win this to show everybody
that you can be from a small, little town and you can get what you want.
You can do it.
-Chef Sara Bradley. Awesome. -Thank you.
-Thank you, guys. -Well done!
Your opponent.
She went from selling corn dogs at the mall
to working as a chef at Wolfgang Puck Spago,
becoming a high-profile restaurateur
with three acclaimed restaurants,
including the MICHELIN-rated DAMA.
Antonia, has racked up over 25 culinary victories.
She went all the way to the OC V championship battle last year,
losing to Chef Maneet Chauhan by only one point.
The one and only Princess Warrior, Chef Antonia Lofaso!
[audience cheering and applauding]
Chef, you have been in it from the beginning.
-Couple highs and lows through a couple of TOCs. -Mm-hmm.
What is it to finally win Tournament of Champions?
There's just something about winning
the $150,000, the belt, the sign, that just has validation.
So much validation.
Like, everything that I've done over the course of the last 22 years, matters.
Well, I'll say this to you, you are the real deal.
Ladies, one final time at TOC VI...
Chefs, to the randomizer!
[groans]
Chefs, tonight, in this final battle,
I'm gonna need you to prepare five of your dish.
Okay.
Because there's a fourth judge that is arriving.
Got it.
[Guy] Special delivery.
One of the biggest names in the culinary world.
-Feel good? -No.
Well, let's get to it then. Protein, produce, equipment, style,
and a wildcard envelope.
Chickadee chow!
Oh, my God, the envelopes are back.
-Are there good things in the envelopes, too? -No.
-No? Okay. -[audience titters]
Styles tonight. Retro and modern,
breakfast and dinner, hot and cold.
-So that would mean two separate dishes. -Right.
In total...
-Ten plates. -Thank you so much.
One-hour cook, winner takes it all.
Let's make it happen. Give me some noise.
[Antonia] I can't watch.
[Guy] Ooh, there's the hot and cold.
-Ugh. -[sucks teeth]
[Guy] Two envelopes.
A sausage stuffer. Not bad.
Really? For hot and cold?
Huitlacoche. Everybody likes a little mushroom fungus.
Beef. Ostrich. King crab.
Beef!
There you go!
Wagyu beef, huitlacoche, sausage stuffers, hot and cold.
And then the two envelopes.
I was like, "Oh, this is great."
And then I was like, "No, we have no idea what the two envelopes are."
Hunter. There he is.
Oh, hello, chefs.
-Hello. -[Hunter] Hi.
-These are opportunities. -Thank you.
You get to each come down and grab one.
I'll take two. I got two little girls.
-[Guy] Okay. -[Antonia] And I'll go one, because--
-Are you sure you want that one, though? -[Antonia] Oh, God.
Number one always looks the best,
-but maybe it's not. -Ugh. I have one child.
She has two. That's where she went.
-I was like, "Fine." -For the girls. For the girls.
Go ahead, chefs.
What you'll find inside
is descriptions
that you must fortify your dish with.
[Guy and Sara] "Sticky. Spicy."
I want you to decide the rules of the game.
We decide if we want the hot to be spicy,
or the hot to be sticky, or the cold to be spicy,
-or the cold to be sticky. -Correct.
Here, let me have it.
-So this is for the hot pick, okay? -I like this.
-[ladies speaking indistinctly] -This is amazing.
-All right, for the hot. -Which one is going to be the hot?
-Spicy. -[Guy] Hot and spicy!
Cold and sticky.
And this all starts in three, two, one, go.
[intense music playing]
[audience cheering]
Wagyu beef.
Rich marbling, makes it super tender.
Huitlacoche is a fungus that actually grows in corn.
It gives a smokiness, a sweetness
to adding it to dishes.
It's really fun to work with.
Sausage stuffers, we know what they do.
Hot and cold.
Cold doesn't always mean cold like ice-cream cold.
It's cold as in less than a body temperature.
And then the two envelopes,
it's going to be hot-spicy, and cold-sticky.
[Antonia] Sara Bradley has
an incredible resume.
She is well-versed in competition.
I know what the finale feels like.
That is my edge on Sara.
I've been here before.
I know how fast that hour goes.
But the randomizer gets harder and harder
every single year.
By far, this is the hardest I've ever seen it.
Chef Antonia is setting up the meat grinder.
You know, oftentimes you don't want to know
how the sausage is made
but it looks like we're going to get a masterclass.
[Antonia] The most challenging part
of the randomizer this time
is that we have a piece of equipment
that literally only does one thing,
and that's stuffed sausage.
Whatever dish I'm thinking about,
needs to include sausage.
I make sausage all the time.
I make sausage in the restaurant.
I do it for events.
I know how to make sausage.
And any of you who make sausage at home
know that it's not that quick.
And not made with Wagyu beef.
Monster.
Wagyu beef is a beef from Japan
that is marbled with so much fat
because the cows are literally fed sake
and massaged.
I understand completely why it's in the finale.
Do I want to make sausage out of it?
No. [chuckles]
I'm going to actually just do the full sausage.
So I'm going to do two things with it.
It's going to be like a bangers and mash but...
-sort of Latin-inspired. -[Justin] Okay.
Sausage itself is going to be very spicy
to accomplish this spicy card
that I got from the randomizer.
Then I'm gonna do more of a seared beef salad.
[Justin] Okay.
[Sara] I've been getting by
with just very few ingredients.
But this last cook against Antonia is
really gonna push me to have to use more.
I've gotta get up two different plates
and I want them to have different flavor profiles.
I'm going to make this a little bit spicy.
It's going to be a sausage on top of a masa dumpling.
The hot dish, I'm going to really embrace
the corn aspect of the huitlacoche.
I'm planning on making chochoyotes,
which are little dumplings.
I'm going to have the huitlacoche broth
to poach them in
with a Wagyu huitlacoche sausage.
For my cold dish, I'm going to make
a Wagyu ribeye huitlacoche tartare.
So I know that one of the first things I want to do
is get this sausage started.
[Tiffani] Chef Sara has her tenderloin.
She's grinding that with huitlacoche,
a good amount of spices.
[Sara] I'm definitely going to try to work
some heat into there.
Looks like you're familiar with A5. Used it a lot?
Not a ton.
-Real expensive, that stuff. -Yeah.
-[Tiffani] Yeah. -I love just chopping it up
and putting it through a meat grinder.
[Tiffani laughing] Yeah.
[tense music playing]
Wow, literally neck and neck.
-[dings] -Like a race to see
who finishes their grind first.
[Justin] This is weird, but yeah.
TOC's eird.
[Guy] Oh, somebody's made sausage.
I can't believe you're making us do this.
-[Justin] What have we got, Chef? Egg water? -A little white vinegar.
[Justin] Okay, white vinegar.
White vinegar and an egg.
So I'm using egg to kind of act as a binder,
because there's nothing that's going to hold
this wagyu together.
Just give it a little nice bind,
a little creaminess.
[Justin] 49 minutes.
So in the hour that I have to cook
two dishes
with all the other elements
of the randomizer,
sausage is being made.
I have the hog casing
-which is the bigger casing. - dings]
[Antonia] Once it's connected, you just got to keep it wet,
and one hand presses
while the other hand just kind of guides it into the casing,
and then you just kind of flip it,
and then you make sausage.
I mean, Chef, I got to tell you.
I know you've made sausage. That's beautiful.
-Those are gorgeous. -[Antonia] I'm Italian.
Of course I've made some sausage.
Sausage.
[audience whooping and cheering]
[audience chanting "Antonia"]
[Antonia] Got the sausage!
[Sara] I worked in a butcher shop
and made sausage every day
for years.
There's too much fat in it.
I know what you need for sausage,
and you don't need as much fat as Wagyu has in it.
I decided to add some breadcrumbs.
and hope that they will absorb some of that fat.
[Guy] Oh, she's made sausages before.
That little wet-in-the-hand technique is it.
[dings]
[Tiffani] Chef Sara's done this before.
This has come out really nicely.
-[Guy] Happy-happy? -[Tiffani] Yeah.
[Tiffani] Blast chilling it, really smart.
Typically, when we make sausage,
we like, give it a little hang time
before we cook it in the casing
so that it gets really used to, like, its environment
and it grills nicely.
This is a great, quick way to do it.
[Sara] So for my cold dish, I'm going to do
a beef tartare.
I love the texture of wagyu ribeye.
And for the tartare,
I think it will give it a little more body.
Um, some huitlacoche.
It's going to go in there.
I also chop up some fresh huitlacoche
-to mix in with the tartare. - dings]
[Sara] Add a bunch of lemon oil and salt.
Once I'm happy with it,
back in the blast chiller.
[Guy] You have got 40 minutes left.
40 to go.
[Justin] Potatoes, salted water, understood.
[Antonia] If I'm going to do a sausage,
I'm going to just like,
go for a version of bangers and mash.
Bangers and mash is, like, a classic English pub food.
A perfect banger, which is a style of sausage,
and mashed potatoes.
And it usually has some kind of like jus or gravy with it.
-[Justin] Rendering over here? -[Antonia] Yeah.
So I take all the fat rendering
from all of that Wagyu,
and I throw in a little bit of beef stock
and a little bit of veal stock.
And I just let that come together.
Then deglaze the mushrooms with it.
[audience cheering]
The bangers and mashes are hot.
-What's our cold? -Uh--
Colder, you're going to get, like, um,
basically, like, a cold beef salad,
like, almost like a Thai beef salad.
We're going to make the beef, like,
seared, sticky, sticky, sticky,
glaze all over it. That's where I'm at.
So the beef has to be sticky, right?
It's going to go in there for a second.
It's going to get the glaze on it.
And then it's going to go back in.
So I've got soy sauce,
a little bit of sesame oil,
some rice wine vinegar,
and some sugar, and some chili crisp.
[Guy] Chef, how are you feeling?
-[dings] -[Antonia] Very good.
-Frying them again? -Mm-hmm.
[Guy] One more fry, one more crisp. Got it.
[tense music playing]
[softly] Hot!
Grilling corn with the husk on does a couple things.
One, it allows the husk to give the corn
sort of like a richer, deeper, nutty quality.
It also allows the corn to steam inside of its husk.
So I grab some masa,
and I'm going to make chochoyotes.
They are like, little dumplings.
So I mix masa harina, hot water, and salt.
I can knead that with my hands.
Since corn has no gluten in it,
you don't have to worry about overmixing it.
It's kind of crazy to battle against Antonia right now.
I've watched her for years. I've looked up to her.
And now I'm standing across the stage from her,
cooking in front of 150 screaming fans.
And if I want that prize,
I'm going to have to take out Antonia.
-What else is in this, though? -[container clinking]
It's chicken stock, veal stock,
the huitlacoche,
and then the masa, I think, is just blooming in that, right?
It's like a huitlacoche stock.
-Huitlacoche stock. -[Sara] Yes, sir.
Okay.
-[Justin] Going shopping? -[Antonia] Yep.
Oh, it's heavier than I thought.
[Justin] Chef, I saw you taste the huitlacoche fillings.
[Antonia] Um, I mean, it's good.
It's basically nice and mushroomy.
I've always put huitlacoche
in sort of the mushroom family.
Like, I like to use it in butters.
I like to use it in creams.
-So I'm going to put it into the cream... - dings]
[Antonia] ...for the mashed potatoes
and just try to make, like, a perfect potato puree
with huitlacoche in it.
[Justin] Huitlacoche cream, let's go.
[Antonia] I also know that I want to make
a huitlacoche mayonnaise to go onto the cold beef salad.
So here's the thing.
Last year, I lost by one point to Maneet.
I was emotional all year about it,
even when it aired
and I watched it all over again
and lived it all over again.
I've watched my parents cry when they watch it.
Even my friends and my daughter,
they feel the pain.
So to go all the way to the end again
and not come home the champ
would be,
honestly, soul crushing.
25 minutes left to go. 25!
[audience cheering]
[tense music playing]
Yeah.
I get a little nervous about the quality of the sausage.
It is way too soft.
A little bit of struggle with the sausage.
So much fat in the Wagyu.
Just so much fat,
it starts to meal out a little bit.
It just doesn't perform like normal sausage.
[Sara] You know, I'm hoping that maybe
they'll firm up a little bit in the oven.
I want to win this one.
I want my daughters to be able to cheer and clap
and see Mommy just dominate.
I don't want them to see me almost dominate.
I want them to see me win.
This is my fifth round with Chef Sara.
First time I've seen her, like,
even remotely break a sweat.
[audience cheering]
My friends, this is the moment you've been waiting for.
It's the final battle of the night.
The crowd's going wild.
The chefs are going wilder.
And we're going to see some culinary magic
and a brand new champion.
Chef, look how much fat rendered out of those
-and how beautifully crisp they are. -I know.
They came out good, right?
[Guy] Justin, give me some update, buddy.
[Justin] Yeah. Sausages have landed.
I repeat, the sausages have landed.
[Guy] So we have sausage on the hot.
What do we have sausage maker on the cold?
-[Justin] Nothing yet. -I'm doing a sausage vinaigrette.
-Sausage vinaigrette? -Mm-hmm.
[Guy] So it's a sausage vinaigrette
-going on the Thai salad? -Yes.
And she also gets to check the temp.
So it's like a cased larb.
So you get the...
[Justin] Let's go.
[Guy] I'm sorry.
Someone just punched me in the "Hi, I'm obvious" face.
[Antonia] Here's the thing. When I take the sausage
and I chop it up,
I'm like, "Oh, the texture on the inside isn't
really what I want it to be."
It almost feels mealy.
So I am stressing a little bit.
Like, the sausage vinaigrette works
because it's with a little bit of olive oil
and vinegar and the corn.
So all of it works together.
But the whole sausage
on the sausage and mashed potato dish
is scaring me a little bit.
I really hope that it's not a problem for the judges.
This last battle is not only a culmination
of the last four cooks
that got me here,
but of my 17-year career in culinary competitions.
It is so close,
I can smell it.
[tense music playing]
[Tiffani] Tartare is diced and in the blast chiller.
-Tartare? -Oui.
Oui.
-Oui, hef. -[with a drawl] We got to try that.
[Sara] So normally, tartare has
a nice egg yolk on top of it.
Wagyu already has enough fat in it,
so I don't think it needs the fat of the egg yolk.
-I'm going to make a sticky puree... -[Tiffani] Okay.
-...to go with my tartare for my cold dish. -[Tiffani] Yep.
She's making, like, a sticky sauce
with dried cherries, dried apricots,
and dates that are in the water right there.
[Sara] Put a little fresh Huitlacoche in there,
water, and sour orange.
I'm going to let that cook down,
and then I'm going to puree it
to make this kind of sticky glaze.
-I think I started this journey out... - dings]
wanting to just
not make a fool of myself.
But now I feel like the weight is gone,
and this is for me.
I want that belt.
I want that ring.
I want that money.
I want that banner.
Oh, I want it all.
Ten to be plated, hot and cold!
[Justin] Huitlacoche cream,
that is the base that's going in right now
of those riced potatoes.
[Antonia] There should be more fat
than there is potato, right?
More cream, more butter, more sour cream.
That's what I want for these mashed potatoes.
Like, you're going to need to eat them with a spoon.
Huitlacoche in this?
[Antonia] Yes.
[tense music playing]
Winning this would be so validating.
[sighs] Can I tell you
what the most devastating thing would be?
Sara coming in here for the very first time
and taking this win from me.
It's not going to happen.
Is that for our tartare, Chef?
-Yeah. -Okay.
[Sara] So if I'm going to make something sticky,
it needs to have something that it sticks to.
Toast.
Butter and just a little bit of sugar to make it sweet.
[Tiffani] Ooh.
[Guy] Ladies and gentlemen,
this is the last five minutes of Tournament of Champions VI.
-Last five minutes! -[audience whooping and cheering]
[Sara] So I'm trying to attach the horn
to the sausage stuffer.
I'm planning on passing the tartare through it
to really get it emulsified
and get it, like, nice and together
and in love with each other.
As I'm trying to get that horn on,
I'm realizing that I'm wasting too much time.
I know there's a huge risk
in me not having used the sausage stuffer
-in both dishes... - buzzer sounds]
[Sara] ...but it is going to take
quite a bit of time to plate these dishes.
So I have to just move on.
Ooh, I hear the plate grab.
[Guy] There's a lot of work to do on both sides.
They have to make five plates of each
because we have an extra judge showing up,
a very special judge.
And as I will say, the eagle has landed.
I've spoken to the eagle,
and we are ready to launch.
[Antonia] So for my hot dish, I have my black plates.
I spoon my huitlacoche mashed potato
down in the center. The texture's perfect.
I place my sausage down.
And then to finish, I have the veal demi-glace
with mushrooms
that kind of gets poured right over the top.
Very simple and straightforward.
This is kind of my move.
I do seemingly very simple food,
but I elevate it and show great technique.
So for the beef salad,
-I've got Napa cabbage finely, finely shaved. - dings]
Thai basil. I have mint.
I have chives. I have cilantro.
I've got a little swoosh of the huitlacoche aioli.
And that salad with the sausage vinaigrette
right on the side.
-[Justin] Sticky sauce. -Sticky sauce.
I'm bringing the stickiness
through that glaze over the beef.
[Guy] Three minutes!
[audience cheering]
[Sara] I start plating the tartare.
There's not a lot of components to this dish,
so I really want to make it look beautiful.
Look at that. How gorgeous.
[Sara] Next, I put some of this sticky glaze on top.
So they're going to mix up the thing
and then stick it to the crouton.
-Ooh. -Two minutes.
Two to go.
Caliente, hef.
For my hot dish, I start by plating dumplings.
I carve into my sausage. I taste it.
I'm not super happy with the consistency.
This is the first time in this competition
I have put something on the plate
that I wasn't 100% "stand behind it."
I know it's the best I can do.
[Tiffani] Spicy, Chef. Oui, hef.
[Sara] The hot dish had to be spicy,
so I'm finishing it with a little bit of fresh serrano...
-[dings] -[Sara] ...chili powder, and cayenne.
Spicy.
[audience] Three, two, one.
-[Guy] That's it! -[audience cheering]
[Guy] What a final battle!
I, like, still don't even know what happened.
Someone's going home the champ tonight.
Thank you so much!
[exclaims] That was awful.
That was hard.
Hardest cook, probably,
yeah, that I've ever had.
[Antonia] This game is so hard, you have no idea.
Y'all are messed up.
I'm gonna lose this again, I'm not coming back, really.
Two times in the finals, that's it. [chuckles]
Oh, God, let this be over.
[tense music playing]
You cook so good to get to the end,
and then... I mean, there was just...
Yeah.
I'm disappointed in myself, though, 'cause, like,
you know,
you want to do good.
I don't know. Maybe I did do good.
Maybe I'm just being too hard on myself.
[sighs]
I know I'm being dramatic about it right now,
but the texture on that sausage is so wrong.
The sausage is not nice.
It's like soft, it's not firm.
[sighs]
Bigger pieces of the sausage
could be a little bit different in the center.
I don't know, maybe it'll set up.
Maybe going second is making me feel good.
Ladies and gentlemen, I've asked the chefs
to give us a pound of flesh and two quarts of blood.
They have made a commitment
to being here at TOC VI
and give us everything.
So the only way I can show the respect
and pay it back to them,
by bringing you who I feel
is probably one of the greatest authorities in food
we've had a chance to know.
Oh, no. Who's this?
[Guy] She turned her local catering business
into a culinary and lifestyle empire
that endured over four decades.
Her game-changing daytime show
taught America how to cook
and how to host with style.
And along the way,
she took home 18 Emmys!
18 Emmys?!
The one and only
Martha Stewart!
[audience cheering]
-Oh, my God. -She's the most iconic female entrepreneur
on the planet.
[exclaims]
Thank you.
[whistles]
She's eaten everywhere, all over the world.
Oh!
Someone that everybody aspires to be and recognize
-is you. -Thank you so much.
So, Chef, thank you so much for being here tonight.
-It's a pleasure. -[audience cheering]
-Thank you so much. -Thank you.
I'm as nervous as the contestants. [chuckles]
I can't even right now.
You guys have Martha Stewart here? Are you kidding me?
[Guy] For the final battle of TOC VI,
the chefs had to work with Wagyu beef,
huitlacoche.
For their equipment, they had a sausage stuffer.
Their style was hot and cold.
We took the fifth wheel and offered them envelopes.
They were lucky enough to choose spicy and sticky.
They chose to go hot and spicy,
cold and sticky.
The first dish, which would be the dish to your right,
that is our glazed sticky beef salad.
The sausage stuffer was used to craft the sausage
in the sausage vinaigrette.
That was made with the Wagyu tenderloin.
You'll see the huitlacoche butter mayo blend,
which is to the left of the salad.
Onto the hot dish,
the spicy Wagyu sausage and huitlacoche mash.
So the tenderloin was cubed,
ground with the serrano, white vinegar, and egg.
[Justin] Then sent through the sausage stuffer.
That's smart.
Starting with the cold dish,
this is my type of salad.
I love mint. I love Thai basil. I love chives.
So that trifecta really made this dish stand out.
[Brooke] This beef, to me, is not only perfectly cooked,
but it's perfectly coated in that seasoning.
I'm so impressed
by how much work went into this.
[Maneet] The sweetness of that fresh corn
plays so well
with the smokiness of the huitlacoche.
It's a wonderful combination.
I do want a little bit more stickiness
on top of the Wagyu.
Oh, God.
Lovely salad
with a very nice vinaigrette flavor.
Delicious.
And then, I can't imagine this is just bangers and mash.
[all laughing]
Well, it is, right?
-Well, it looks like it, but it doesn't taste like it. -[Brooke] Yes, yes.
It tastes really, really delicious.
I still have my grandma's sausage maker at home.
The sausage, which is so beautifully fashioned,
and they're tender
and very, very tasty.
I think it's very impeccably flavored.
I love this reduction of the juice of the beef.
This is so tasty.
I am blown away and glad I'm not competing this season.
-[audience laughing] -Because this chef has shown
some mad skills.
If there's something that I would say
about this dish
is, um, the sausage is coming across as slightly dry.
I get salt. I get umami from the huitlacoche,
an impeccably stuffed sausage.
I could maybe use a touch more heat in there.
You say serrano,
and I feel like I could use a touch more serrano.
[sighs]
The fact that you can make a potato puree
this smooth, this luscious,
is pretty incredible.
-Ugh. - Guy] Thank you very much.
Remember, 50 points available in the taste,
40 points available in the use of the randomizer,
10 points in the plating.
I feel better. I feel a little better.
On your right, let's start there.
This is our cold and sticky dish.
We have a hand-cut wagyu and huitlacoche tartare
with sticky date jam, kumquats... and mint.
Chef would like you to mix it up
and stick it on the crouton.
And the sausage stuffer?
There is not.
Not on the first dish, Chef.
Not on the first dish, okay.
What?
She didn't use the sausage press
in the first dish?
At all?
[sighs]
[Tiffani] Dish to your left, chefs,
is a hot and spicy wagyu and huitlacoche sausage.
This is served with huitlacoche chochoyotes,
fresh corn, mint, serrano, and cayenne.
My favorite is the cold dish.
I think this is a very well done steak tartare.
Nicely hand cut.
I like the combination
of the jam mixed with the Wagyu beef.
I could eat that in a restaurant
with no trouble whatsoever.
You don't often find a Wagyu in steak tartare.
And there's something that's so luxurious and silky
about how that eats.
I love the fresh herbs in there,
and there's so much flavor.
Seems like they really like it.
I just wish that the chef had
used the sausage stuffer in some way on this dish,
because this is an absolute exquisite dish.
The crouton was probably one of my favorite parts
of the tartare.
It really added that nice textural relief.
Going on to the next dish.
I love chochoyotes,
and this is a really, really smart play
in utilizing the masa with the corn,
with the huitlacoche.
[Maneet] The broth is delicious,
and I really just want to go and have,
like, spoonfuls of that.
[Brooke] It's giving me a lingering heat
that I appreciate,
'cause it's sort of in-your-face heat.
The sausage, unfortunately for me, is not as... textured.
It's more mushy than the sausage we had previously.
Ugh.
[softly] Yes.
Nice.
She didn't say anything I didn't know.
Okay, maybe we're not out yet.
Judges, thank you very much. Thank you.
[audience cheering and applauding]
I had a lot of positive,
more negatives, probably, than Antonia.
[Antonia] Like, I'm having flashbacks of last year
of, like, hearing good things, but then, like, not winning.
I'm exhausted.
I'm exhausted!
I've been on Tournament of Champions or six years!
I've been here for six years!
Chef Sara Bradley!
[audience cheering]
Chef Antonia Lofaso!
[audience cheering] [man whooping]
One chef scored 82
in the final round.
The other chef scored
88.
[audience cheering]
[Guy] Ladies and gentlemen...
[audience clapping stops]
the winner...
of Tournament of Champions VI
is...
[suspenseful music playing]
-Antonia Lofaso! -[audience cheering]
You did so good.
You did good. I'm so happy for you.
You did so much to deserve this.
You're did a great job. So good. So good!
[audience cheering continues]
[crying]
[Guy] Chef,
I want to talk to our super freshman.
First time in TOC,
walk through four competitions
like you had been here since season one.
-You're amazing. -Thank you. Thank you.
-[whoops] -Thank you, Chef!
Thank you. Thank you.
[audience cheering continues]
It doesn't feel so bad to get second place.
She beat me, fair and square.
Uh, and I'm really happy for her.
[audience cheering]
First and foremost, thank you to you guys,
'cause every time we come out here and you clap,
it gives so much energy.
And it's really, really, really amazing.
-So thank you. -[woman] We love you.
Thank you.
[Guy] Ladies and gentlemen,
Antonia...
was not coming back.
And I wasn't going to push her.
She knew my opinion and my position.
[exhales deeply]
[Guy] And two weeks before the competition closed,
she called and said,
"I'm in."
I don't know many people in my life
that I see work as hard,
that are as dedicated,
that are as focused.
And Chef, you have come in here,
you've won five in a row,
and you are the new TOC hampion.
-Give it up! -[audience cheering]
[Antonia] This journey has been so long.
I was not coming back.
It is the hardest competition I've ever been a part of,
and I have finally won it.
Having my daughter see me persevere
through six seasons of it to finally win,
it is so validating.
The TOC VI hampion,
the Princess Warrior,
-Antonia Lafaso! -[audience cheering]
[Antonia] And the truth is,
because I know how bad it felt
to lose all of those years,
to be so, so, so close,
it makes this moment that much sweeter.
[Guy] And to help you celebrate,
let's bring in the rest of the TOC hamps!
[audience cheering]
[ladies squealing]
[Brooke and Antonia laughing]
The Princess Warrior has her fairytale ending.
Look at it. It's so...
I'm so happy.
I feel like I'm forgetting something.
That's right.
Our friends from State Farm
would like to present you...
-[Antonia exclaims] -[Guy]...with $150,000!
-[audience cheering and applauding] -[Antonia exclaims]
So there you have it, ladies and gentlemen!
I will see you next year.
Keep an eye on it.
TOC VII oming your way!
[audience cheering]