PADMA: Previously on Top Chef.
For this Elimination Challenge,
you'll be cooking with the fish that you caught.
NICK: Pull it. Keep pulling back.
BUDDHA: It's massive.
That's what I'm talking about! Yes!
-Hot-- hot. Hot on your back. -We're now behind.
Everybody's pressed for time.
I'm doing, too, my favorite preparations of fish.
I'm very impressed that you used the potatoes
in many different ways.
Oh, sh--.
You add in all the creativity
and the flavors that make you feel
like you're eating a pastrami on rye and my mind is blown.
If I don't tighten up I'm going home.
I do not want to go home!
The protein was just so dry.
Sarah and Buddha,
you had our favorite dishes of the day.
Nick, please pack your knives and go.
Pack your bags
because we are going to Tucson,
a UNESCO City of Gastronomy.
-ELEANOR: Arizona! -Going to Tucson!
PADMA: Only four chefs remain
to compete in the ultimate culinary showdown.
At stake for the winner,
a feature in Food and Wine magazine.
An appearance at the Food and Wine Classic in Aspen.
$250,000 furnished by San Pellegrino
and the coveted title of Top Chef.
♪♪♪
DAMARR: I came to Top Chef thinking
that it was singularly about cooking and food,
but has been a masterclass in growth
not only as a chef, but as a human being.
On top of that, my loved ones
are sacrificing a lot for me to be here,
and I am hoping to make this worth it
for everyone involved.
If you want to be the best at something,
you have to sacrifice.
Time, family, money,
I have worked my ass off.
It's been a rollercoaster.
Why do I always cry so much? [chuckles]
SARAH: In this competition
I've experienced the highest of highs
and the lowest of lows and everything in between.
I had to go through the brutality
of Last Chance Kitchen.
Being in Tucson certainly feels like
I'm leaving a lot of baggage behind
and I get a fresh start
with a win under my belt.
BUDDHA: Winning the title of Top Chef
has always been a dream of mine.
The fact that we're in Tucson, Arizona,
and we're going to learn about the city of gastronomy,
these are the opportunities that I love
and one of the things in my life
that I'm never going to forget.
-I am... -EVELYN: I am...
-DAMARR: I am... -SARAH: I am...
ALL: The next Top Chef.
SARAH: What's up y'all? We all look so fresh.
EVELYN: I know.
DAMARR: This is huge.
-SARAH: Oh no! -EVELYN: Oh, Lord.
-Chuck it. -Oh, no.
"Welcome to Tucson.
Congratulations on making it to the Final Four.
Meet me downtown at El Charro.
Don't forget your knives. Padma."
We had a two-week break
to get ready for the finals.
So, I spent that time doing a lot of studying
on Native American and Mexican cuisine
because it would suck to come so far
and not make it into the finale.
-EVELYN: Cheers! -We're doing it! Final Four!
[upbeat music playing]
-PADMA: Hello, hello! -Hey!
Good morning, Chefs.
Congratulations on being in the top four
and making it here to the finals in Tucson.
Please welcome local legend,
chef and owner of El Charro, Carlotta Flores.
-Welcome, Carlotta. -Thank you, welcome.
-Pleasure. -Chefs, you are standing
in the country's oldest Mexican restaurant
with continuous operation by one family.
I hope you guys did some research while you were away,
because this is the last Quickfire.
It's going to be a tough one.
♪♪♪
Over the last 100 years,
El Charro has created
some truly iconic dishes here.
Isn't it true that the chimichanga started here?
-Most certainly. -DAMARR: Wow.
-Oh, wow. -But there might be a menu item
that's even more popular than the Chimichanga.
We're most well-known for our carne seca
and it is hanging in a cage to dry.
BUDDHA: Whoa!
SARAH: Is it always hung up there?
-Yes. -That's awesome.
Carne seca translates to "dry meat."
But it's so much more than your typical beef jerky.
And Carlotta and her team are still drying
to meat the traditional way out in the sun.
Is anyone familiar with carne seca ?
I'm definitely familiar with carne seca.
We always have that at home.
I adds a very umami flavor to any dish.
I'm not familiar with it, no.
-PADMA: Not at all, Damarr? -No.
CARLOTTA: Let's take a walk
up the stairs and experience
the real carne seca.
Okay, lower the cage.
This cage has approximately 300 pounds in it,
so when it dries,
that becomes like 150 pounds.
The filet of the beef is cut very, very thin.
And then we take that
and we marinate it in the garlic,
which you can still see it on the meat itself.
Here, take a piece.
We take this beef and shred it.
You can see even the color is different.
And then we add equal parts green chili, onion,
and deseeded Roma tomatoes.
That will rehydrate the meat.
It's delicious.
Yeah, and you definitely smell the garlic.
-ELEANOR: So savory. -All right, chefs,
you've had a little taste of Tucson history.
Now it is your turn.
Of course, Carlotta is providing the carne seca
and it's up to you to make something amazing with it.
The winner of this Quickfire will get an advantage
in the Elimination Challenge.
-The last before the finale. -No pressure.
You have 30 minutes. Better get shredding
because your time starts now!
Let's do it!
[upbeat music playing]
Evelyn, what you got in the pot?
-Carne seca and grits. -Sounds delicious.
I was raised with carne seca.
So I'm just trying to make not what I was raised on.
I immediately think of my mom.
I already hear her, like, "The pan better be hot.
It has to be enough oil.
And you have to toast that carne seca
before you do anything else to it."
But since I know this product, my brain goes,
"Well, how can you change it? Step out of your comfort zone."
-What are you grilling? -I have Guajillo
and Ancho chilis going on right now.
And how much of that are you putting in there?
-[Buddha laughing] -No-- Ha. So funny! This guy.
How are you using your carne seca ?
So, I'm going to be reconstituting
a little bit of it, tomatoes and chili
I'm gonna have a little bit of fun with it.
I'm going to make it look like the tostada
just fell onto the plate upside down.
Sarah, you ever cook with beef jerky?
Yeah. Jerky is like a pretty popular thing in Michigan.
SARAH: My fiancé got his first deer last year,
and we broke it all down ourselves and we made jerky.
So I'm basically going to make a carne seca gravy
trying to kind of celebrate flavors
that go well with venison,
so blackberries and corn.
And then I found morel mushrooms over there,
which are, like, a Michigan magic ingredient.
[dramatic music playing]
Damarr, how are you feeling about time?
I feel all right.
This is a first time experience for me.
So, I know I'm going to focus on trying
to do something simple that will hopefully
be respectful of the ingredient.
Oh, that was cool.
Carlotta mentions how they cook down
with tomatoes and re-hydrate that way,
so I'm gonna try to follow that.
SARAH: 16 y'all!
Make, like little tostadas.
Make it any hotter.
I like things to look creative and imaginative.
And by doing this upside down tostada
it's going to look like this hidden surprise.
Ten minutes guys!
[rock music playing]
SARAH: I would really love
to have an egg on this dish.
But we shall see.
I feel like my dish is very weird
and I'm very concerned that they're going to eat it
and go, "What's wrong with you?"
Sorry all, pine nuts everywhere.
Evelyn, how did your grits turn out?
-Delicious. -So you're going
to win pretty much?
DAMARR: I grill some avocado
and kind of use that as my base
and dress that with this carne seca vinaigrette.
And after the last challenge--
It was definitely some serious missteps.
It wasn't your best day.
I could definitely use an advantage.
You have five minutes left, chefs.
[tense music]
I try my tortillas to see if the texture is correct
and it's not.
They're not as crunchy as I thought they were.
[dramatic music playing]
BUDDHA: Three minutes!
Not that great,
but I got something to put on the plate.
[tense music]
Time's up.
Hands up.
Utensils down.
Hi, Sarah.
I made for you a carne seca gravy
over polenta with a soft egg.
We obviously have jerky in Michigan, where I'm from.
Venison most frequently, which is pretty lean.
I love those morels.
-Oh, they're the best. -Very interesting dish.
-Thank you. -CARLOTTA: Thank you.
-PADMA: Hi Damarr. -I made a grilled avocado
with carne seca vinaigrette
and then fried tortillas and grilled corn
that I also seasoned with the shredded carne seca.
Why did you choose to grill an avocado?
Over the flame it kind of makes the texture
a little crispy on the outside,
but you still get that creaminess.
-Thank you. Damarr. -Thank you.
-PADMA: Hi, Buddha. How are you? -I'm very good, thank you.
This is a tostada that fell upside down.
So it's a carne seca, some guajillos
and some chipotle mixed with some tomatoes,
cueso, some goat's cheese with avocado,
and then the tostada itself.
The goat cheese gives the carne seca
a little bit of a gaminess.
That's good. Hope it's good.
-Definitely smoky. Thank you. -Yeah.
What did you do for us today?
It's creamy grits with Guajillo
and carne seca and a chayote relish.
CARLOTTA: Does it have lime?
-I put [inaudible] on there. -That's very nice. Thank you.
Thanks.
Huh, that was a feast.
CARLOTTA: I think overall, you really did
some different interesting dishes.
There were a couple of dishes
that were less successful than the others.
Buddha, I loved what you did,
but the tostada itself
was a little bit greasier
-than I thought it should be. -Okay.
Damarr, the avocado,
having done what you did with it, was very good.
Unfortunately, it could have used some texture.
The good news is that both of you,
Sarah and Evelyn did really great.
Well, Sarah, it was so different.
I want my chefs to taste it.
Flavors that I would have never thought
would do so well.
Evelyn, I loved your dish,
and I will tell you one thing.
I will start working with grits now, more and more.
Thank you.
Carlotta, who won this last Quickfire Challenge?
[dramatic music intensifies]
-Sarah. -[applause]
Sarah, you just won yourself
an advantage in the Elimination Challenge.
I've never won a Quickfire before.
So to leave Houston
on an Elimination Challenge win
and to come to Tucson with a Quickfire win
feels like a win sandwich.
Please welcome a chef
who kept me well-fed last year
and who lives right here in Tucson,
Maria Mazon!
-Hi Maria, welcome back. - Hola, bienvenidos a Tucson!
I see you met the legend.
The biggest shoes to fill here in Tucson
in the southwest in Arizona.
[dramatic music playing]
Chefs, if you didn't know already,
Tucson is part of the Sonoran Desert,
the most biodiverse desert on the planet.
With nearly 3500 species of plants
and a thousand species of bees.
Love bees!
The Sonoran Desert is also home
to over 300 species of cactus,
including the Salado,
which only grows right here in this desert.
But in addition to cacti, the Sonoran Desert
is home to the only native pepper
of the United States, the chiltepin.
For your final elimination challenge here in Tucson,
we'd like you to make two dishes,
one sweet and one savory.
You have to feature cactus in one dish
and chiltepin in the other.
This is definitely a hard challenge,
and I really do not envy you right now.
I don't know anything about cacti
and the chiltepin is something that's new to me.
I'm just hoping there's something
I can relate to in there. Just like the carne seca.
Maria is going to take you to Mission Garden.
And the work being done there is what helped Tucson
gain the World Heritage City of Gastronomy title.
There you'll be provided with a variety
of cactus and chiltepin.
Tomorrow you'll have access to a fantastic pantry
and three hours to prep and cook.
And, Sarah, because you won the Quickfire Challenge,
you'll have an additional 30 minutes of cook time.
You are just one cook away
from the finale
and the prize of $250,000,
furnished by San Pellegrino
and of course, the title of Top Chef.
-[sighing] -No pressure.
[Buddha laughs]
All right, Maria,
I leave the chefs in your hands.
Don't worry. I got them!
Come on, guys. Vámonos!
[gentle music]
Here we go, guys.
Welcome to the Mission Garden.
We have our friend, Jesús,
and he is the guru
that makes all this happen.
This place here basically represents
the origins of Tucson, as we know it.
In terms of archeology, we have evidence
of more than 4000 years of continuous agriculture
in this very spot where we are standing.
So, you get the penca right here.
This is the nopale.
Of course, we got the pitahayas,
the prickly pears, the green and the red.
JESUS: Let's start with the green ones right here.
And you can feel free to spit out the seeds.
-Tastes like cantaloupe. -The barrel cactus.
They look like little, tiny pineapples.
Try the rind, it is very lemony.
That will give you a really nice twist
into a lemony dish.
MARIA: This is our caviar, the chiltepin.
This will knock your socks off. Go ahead.
[Damarr coughs]
There's no crying in baseball, papi.
DAMARR: You know, a lot of chilis have that
kind of fruity back of the mouth heat.
This kind of has like a front of the mouth heat
which is very quick.
-I like it. -MARIA: We need to move on.
Grab what you think you need for the challenge.
And remember, sharing is caring.
I've been doing a bit of research
on these ingredients,
but I've never actually seen them in real life.
The raw nopales is a mixture between sorrel and asparagus.
JESUS: We're here in the Mexican garden.
We would have fruit trees, mulberry trees,
grapes, pomegranates, ornamentals.
SARAH: I see figs. I see quince. I see tomatoes.
I see so many herbs.
JESUS: Corn, squash, and beans.
The famous three sisters.
SARAH: I am trying not to get distracted.
The challenge is still the chiltepin and the cactus.
Ay, Dios mio.
Although I'm the only one who has cooked
with cactus and chiltepin chili.
I can't feel comfortable, like, "Oh, yeah, know it."
Like, no, still a competition.
These other chefs who have never worked with it
are going to be super creative
because they've never seen it any other way.
As you can see, the possibilities are endless.
Yeah, truly.
MARIA: Don't overthink tomorrow.
Enjoy it. Soak it all in.
I actually have tons of respect for you guys,
and you're now part of my family.
-Thank you so much! -Adiós. Buenas noches.
-See you tomorrow! -Andale! Adiós!
Look at this pile of cacti.
Even though I don't love cactus,
I want to know more about it.
And I'm going to use my 30 minutes to adventure.
Maria said dried [indistinct] were, like, hard to work with.
I'm going to see about candying them.
A lot of what I know about food
is because of my parents' passion for food.
I wouldn't keep bees if my dad didn't do it first
and I wouldn't know as much as I do
about mushrooms and fungi and fermentation.
I want to get these green chiltepin pickled,
turn them into a chimichurri.
I've decided to keep my savory dish
as my chiltepin dish.
I'm going to make chiltepin chimichurri over grilled lamb.
And I'm going to keep my cactus in the sweet dish.
They're like sesame seeds, I love sesame seeds.
As Padma knows, when I got sent home.
I used too many of sesame seeds, so.
-Hi! -Hi!
-Oop! -Oh, God!
-Oh, Lord. -Behind you.
DAMARR: Jesús and Chef Maria,
they were so excited about the ingredients,
it's kind of infectious. So, I really just kind of
want to not only showcase the ingredients,
but be respectful of them,
I've studied cactus and kind of learned how to clean it.
By learn, I mean I YouTubed it.
SARAH: How do you feel about using the cactus?
I think my approach is really to sub out ingredients
that I would use normally.
So, I'm going to make a barbecue sauce
with the chiltepin and the prickly pear.
I'm thinking that's going to go really well
with a pork that I can glaze it with--
with beans and it's full of, you know,
these Sonora ingredients.
Anybody actually using the nopales?
I don't think I am.
EVELYN: I mean, it's essentially the star of my first dish.
Growing up eating nopales,
we always see it in a very humble way.
You really don't see anybody really trying to highlight it.
-BUDDHA: What are you making? - Nopal Relleno.
I've never done it with nopale, so I figured
trying to do something different with it.
First, we've got to clean them.
You know, it's another thing that I learned from my grandma.
Abuelita, por favor.
If you've been with me this whole time,
do not leave me today.
BUDDHA: It's so funny because, like, this dish
is actually inspired by my dad.
Even though he's a Chinese chef,
he made tom yum, I learned that from him.
That dish really sings, it's like a lot of chili.
And that's where the chiltepin is going to come in.
A tom yum really does showcase a pepper.
So I'll be using chiltepin
throughout the whole dish of the tom yum.
It's going to be in the broth.
It's going to be marinated in the calamari noodles.
It's going to be in my pickle.
And then with the cactus I'm making a cake
with a dried solara fruit ice cream
and a prickly pear snow.
DAMARR: Buddha, what you got going?
I'm making my cactus ice cream.
I'm going to use a barrel cactus.
You know, that's got all those beautiful seeds inside of it.
-DAMARR: Yeah. -Very similar to vanilla bean.
I pick up what you're putting down.
If I'm knocking on the door you better be answering.
[Damarr laughs]
-DAMARR: Thank you. -SARAH: I love cactus.
Yes, I do. I love cactus, how about you?
BUDDHA: Sarah, what are you working on at the moment?
I'm getting my ice cream base going.
For my dessert I am making a cactus tart
with cactus caramel
and saguaro bud ice cream.
I'm treating the cactus like a fruit.
Oh, God damn it!
Can I get a mop?
[whispers] God damn it.
I no longer have any interest in using this churner.
If it were my call,
I'd light it on fire right now.
-Buddha. -Sarah.
How generous are you feeling right now?
-Not very, but-- -How do I use liquid nitrogen?
-BUDDHA: Add it in. -Just add it in?
BUDDHA: Yeah. Just use your intuition.
-Don't overthink it. -Too late.
Hey Chefs. How's it going?
-Hey, Chefs. -So you have various cacti.
Yeah, so, I'm kind of focusing
more on the prickly pear side of it.
I'm going to do a barbecue pork steak.
I'm going to make barbecue sauce
with chiltepin and a prickly pear.
-With some braised red beans. -Okay.
And then for the dessert side,
I'm going to make a prickly pear cake.
Okay. Well, if it's anything like your carrot cake--
this is the best carrot cake I've ever had.
-Thank you. -KRISTEN: So, you do desserts
and you feel comfortable with that?
No, I know like three desserts
-and sometimes getting it right. -Sounds good.
-Hello, Sarah. -Hi, Chefs.
-You made it back. -They can't get rid of me.
I'm doing a cactus tart with a saguaro ice cream.
And then I'm going to do
a grilled lamb with chiltepin chimichurri
and a vinaigrette made from chiltepin.
This is like lightly dried off the bush.
-So they come out looking like-- -TOM: Oh, my God, yes.
And then these are the pickled version.
I'm going to use this for the vinaigrette
and this for the chimichurri.
-That's all you have. -It's all I need.
-TOM: All right. -Thank you so much.
-Hey, Chef. How you doing? -TOM: Good. How are you?
Last Elimination Challenge.
Got to bring all that I got, you know.
Game face on the whole time.
TOM: So you're going all out here?
-BUDDHA: Yeah, you know. -What are you making?
So, first course is going to be a tom yum.
I think basically the best way to showcase chili.
And then, for dessert,
I'm going to do everything cactus.
I'm going to be doing a prickly pear snow as well.
-TOM: Okay. -That first challenge
I remember you and I also remember what you made--
Have you made a dessert with beef before?
-It's my first time. -[chuckling]
And it really stood out.
So I'm really excited to see what you do today.
-I'll see you later. -TOM: Sounds good.
-KRISTEN: Get going. -TOM: Hey, Evelyn.
-Hi Chefs. -How's it going?
So I have some experience with nopale.
Although I know how to use it I kind of want to use it
in a different way than what I'm used to.
-Okay. -For my first course,
I'm doing a Nopal Relleno and for dessert,
I'm making a sour orange curd,
and then I'm doing a prickly pear granita.
So I was able to meet you guys on, like, day one.
I feel like my food has definitely changed a lot.
I'm excited to taste the evolution of Evelyn.
Yeah. For sure.
-Good luck. -EVELYN: Thank you.
All right, chefs, everything looks great.
Looking forward to a fantastic meal.
-DAMARR: Thank you. -BUDDHA: 30 minutes.
SARAH: Damarr, how are your beans?
DAMARR: A touch more cooked than I'd like.
30 minutes ago my beans were still crunchy,
but things change very quickly in a pressure cooker.
Damn it...
Now they are soft and broken.
At this point in the competition
every little minor mistake can send you home.
What the [bleep]?
DAMARR: I decided to make a purée out of the beans.
Figure I'd add prickly pear as well.
Plan B is to turn these overcooked beans
into bean purée.
But now I think I'm going to have to
to quickly clean some nopales.
So, it still feels like a full dish
and not pork with two purées and a slaw.
God damn it.
There's only today's cook standing
between me and the finale.
More than ever now it's important to be flawless
Jesús made cleaning this look a lot easier.
PADMA: It's so beautiful here.
Oh, that's fun for yesterday.
Afternoon, everybody.
It's quite nice.
PADMA: Well, I want to welcome everybody.
This is our first dinner in Tucson,
and it's also last supper before the finale.
Thank you, everyone, for being here.
Five minutes.
[dramatic music playing]
[clock beeps]
DON: Excellent.
PADMA: Looks beautiful.
GAIL: Hi, guys.
TOM: What are we having?
So it's a Mission Garden tom yum.
-TOM: Wow. -Like this?
Yeah, go. The whole thing.
I'm using the chiltepin peppers.
Jesús gave us a great tour of the garden
and wanted to bring the garden to the plate as well.
Tom yum usually has a lot of aromatics inside of it,
and this one's got sour orange,
lemongrass from the garden
dumpling that's wrapped in a turnip,
Calamari noodles, silken tofu.
And then jumbo prawn.
PADMA: Have you ever used this chiltepin before?
No. It's the first time,
-but definitely not my last. -Hey, Sarah.
Hi. I tried to balance my love
of everything we saw at Mission Gardens
with the chiltepin.
I wanted to celebrate the chiltepin
in a couple different ways,
so I made a vinaigrette
that is tossed on the grape salad
from pickled chiltepin.
And then there's the dried in both the chimichurri
and in the smoked yogurt on the bottom.
And what is the crunch in your dish?
I used bread to kind of soak up
the chiltepin vinaigrette,
and then the grapes themselves will have a crunch,
they are Mission grapes, so they have a delightful seed.
For me, that is a pleasant texture.
All right, chefs, you have one more dish.
-Good luck. -Thank you.
Thank you.
This is, like, the silence of really good food.
Because no one is talking. Everybody's eating.
These two dishes are extraordinary.
-Yeah. -They really are.
PADMA: What did you think of Sarah's lamb?
I'm not a lamb person,
but I really enjoyed Sarah's dish.
Every texture played a part in how you tasted the chiltepin.
This is outstanding. It's elegant.
I could tell that she's a gardener.
We had these grapes hanging
on the plant and she spotted them.
And I think they do very well.
That moment of pop from the grape
adds so much to balance the textures of the dish.
I like the yogurt, because it really helped
balance out that chiltepin, each.
I think Sarah absolutely nailed this dish.
And what about Buddha's tom yum?
I love Buddha's dish. I love the point of view.
I love the elegance, the refinement,
the layering of flavors.
I think he really incorporated
the chiltepin pepper really nicely in this.
My mouth, my tongue is still warm
and glowing and throbbing just a little bit.
RENE: I love it. It's just very well-balanced.
You got the lemongrass, we get the ginger,
we got that chiltepin in there.
Trying to make sure everything's ready
-for that first course. -DAMARR: Oh, God.
Overcooking the beans caused me to lose time.
Coming down behind.
I'm really just rushing to kind of
caramelize the barbecue sauce to get in the oven.
Hopefully it'll caramelize in time.
They look like rellenos.
That is two...
Feel like it's as good as it's going to get, right?
[clock beeps]
-Thank you. -Thank you.
I see a big smile, Evelyn. What did you make?
I'm always happy. I'm cooking.
So what I've made for you today is a nopal relleno.
So took inspiration from a chili relleno.
And then I really just wanted to highlight the nopal
as the star of my dish.
And then I made a purée of shrimp
with some of the herbs we found
at the garden yesterday.
On top, you have some raw nopal
with some fresnos, some green chiltepin,
and then some of the marigolds from the garden as well.
-It's hot. -EVELYN: Yeah. There's a
chiltepin chili oil as well.
-Damarr, tell us what you made? -I made a pork shoulder
that's been glazed and barbecue sauce
made with prickly pear and chiltepin.
I also made a pikliz
that has chiltepin in it as well.
Underneath there is grilled nopales
and then there is a red beans purée
underneath as well.
What is the sweetness, is that the prickly pear?
Yes, I just replaced what would normally be
more ketchup and brown sugar.
There is prickly pear cooked down in the barbecue sauce,
and there's chiltepin as a spice--
used the chiltepin as that.
All right. Thank you both.
-EVELYN: Thank you. -DAMARR: You too.
Let's start with Evelyn's.
My first bite, it was, like, [inhales]
Which I-- I like it. I-- it's my high.
-Yes. -The creativity
of how it's rolled and wrapped and how she incorporated
both chiltepin and the nopales
made me feel creatively inspired,
but also familiar at the same time.
And I think she really went out of her way
in creating something very different, elegant.
I've never had a relleno like this,
but I could have used
a little bit more chiltepin in here.
Damarr's pork is beautifully cooked,
not a whole lot of sort of chiltepin flavor in this dish.
It's kind of mild.
It was so cool to see
this hearty Southern dish, right away,
but at the same time, you realize that,
"Oh, there's prickly pear in here."
I think Damarr's prickly pear
barbecue sauce is fantastic,
because of that sweetness you get,
but it just feels completely separate
from the other elements that he made.
It doesn't feel like he thought about them all
and how they played together.
EVELYN: They seem happy,
-you know, you can never tell. -Sh--.
BUDDHA: This episode is sponsored
by liquid nitrogen.
I'm going to be using liquid nitrogen to make a snow.
I've actually never done that before.
It is one challenge before the finale
and I'm here to push myself.
DAMARR: Sarah, how are you feeling?
SARAH: I don't know.
Buddha's dessert looks like it was made in a museum.
I feel like this ice cream
is kind of a nail in the coffin for me,
so I'm going to be triaging these tarts to service.
Things turned out well.
SARAH: They're going to have to walk so fast, dude.
[clock beeps]
Looks beautiful, Buddha.
-TOM: This is crazy. -GAIL: Yay!
SARAH: I'll start with mine.
On the side of the plate,
I just wanted to show you guys
the little saguaro fruit that's dried.
And so that was kind of my inspiration for my dessert.
I turned the husk that grows around it
into the ice cream,
and then I folded the seeds
from the cacti into it.
The tart itself is made from cactus
and the caramel is made from cactus.
-PADMA: Buddha. -I have variations
of cactus with cream.
On the bottom, we have the saguaro,
it was milled and formed into the cake.
I then have a barrel cactus relish as well.
I've also taken the seed from the barrel cactus
and put it into the ice cream,
almost like vanilla beans.
And then I've done a prickly pear snow to go on top.
-Thank you. -Thank you so much.
Sarah's dish. This-- it's a sticky, you know,
sweet bowl of goodness.
PADMA: I feel like a child.
A little too saucy for me.
It's unfortunate that ice cream melted.
This is called June and that flavor is all over that dish.
The way she ground some of the seeds,
it gave the flavor to me.
This tastes like saguaro to me.
PADMA: What do you think of Buddha's dessert?
I love the colors. Just attractive.
And this is one of the colors of this region.
Just pulls me in right away.
The fruit, I think, is a superstar.
Everything on Buddha's plate
really showcases the fruit itself.
And that was the whole point.
I did not find a whole lot of prickly pear flavor in it.
Thought that the cream
could have used a little bit of infusion
of the actual prickly pear or some zest.
I think it suffers from being too cold.
You know, when you freeze
the prickly pear with liquid nitrogen,
it gets so cold, it dulls the flavor.
If the judges don't like it I really couldn't care.
I like it.
-Three minutes. -Heard.
Cutting some grapes.
Can't wait to finish this plate.
-[chuckles] -Go talk to the judges.
-Yeah, right? -It's been a long day.
It's crazy to think this challenge
boils down to two ingredients that I grew up eating.
That's what's standing between me and the finale.
[dramatic music intensifies]
-[clock beeps] -That's all she wrote.
All she wrote.
PADMA: That's beautiful, wow.
Oh, I can smell it.
-Hello. -Hi there.
Damarr, why don't you go first? What did you make for us?
A prickly pear cake.
It's glazed with prickly pear as well.
On top there is a buttermilk cheese, saguaro fruit.
And then I did some frozen mango with pomegranate seeds.
-PADMA: Evelyn? -For my dessert,
I went for a sour orange and sweet lime curd.
On top some meringue with saguaro pods,
prickly pear granita.
And then I also have some quince
tossed in a little bit of Chile pequin sugar.
-Thank you both so much. -Thanks so much.
I think the actual cake on Damarr's plate,
definitely has a beautiful, subtle flavor
that I wasn't familiar with,
and then realized I was tasting the cactus.
First thing I look at as a baker, is pigments,
how can I combine that to get an expression
of the Sonoran Desert? He did this.
Damarr's cake, there's something about it
that makes me wanna go back and back and back.
That, for me, is a major win.
-I think I'm all right. -I think it went well.
What did you think of Evelyn's dessert?
I really love what she did with the saguaro meringue.
Eating meringue, when I was a kid,
I remember just my grandma making it,
and I love that about this dish.
Evelyn finally gave me that beautiful punch of color
that I was waiting for someone to give me on the plate.
I thought it was creative, innovative.
Evelyn did something that I've been doing
my whole career as a Mexican chef.
Trying to showcase that Mexican cuisine is elegant.
I think was really subtle. It was a nice dessert.
These are very, very good dishes.
All the desserts today were pretty damn good.
TOM: I feel like a prickly pear.
[all chuckle & laugh]
[dramatic music]
BUDDHA: I think everyone did really good.
We definitely are a group that makes it happen.
I feel proud about cooking nopales.
I made good tasting food.
I had so many tragedies happen today.
I can't believe I put food out.
-What's done is done. -[chuckles]
Yeah.
[dramatic music playing]
♪♪♪
I have to say,
you guys knocked it out of the park.
Every single dish was just a standout,
and it's no surprise.
I mean, you've come this far
because you're really skilled at what you do,
and it really showed today.
Evelyn, let's start with your first savory course.
You showed us an elevated, elegant,
fine dining version of a relleno that was beautifully executed.
-[sighs] -Thank you.
TOM: You completely reimagined it.
You honored the ingredients really, really well
and put together a really tasty dish.
That felt like you.
But it also felt like
you were really pushing yourself today.
And that's what we want to see
at this point in the competition.
Talk to me about your dessert.
I'm familiar with the prickly pear,
but it's very subtle flavor,
so I wanted to do different versions of it.
I love this dessert. I thought it was surprising.
It really exalted the prickly pear.
Texturally, it was fantastic to eat.
Thank you. I think it came to me in the middle of the night.
It had just so many layers of goodness.
You should be very proud of that one.
Thank you.
-Sarah. -So, for the first dish,
she tried to celebrate chiltepin.
That lamb was just a vehicle for all the flavors
that I wanted to kind of present today.
-I hate lamb. -Oh, no.
But it was, by far, my favorite dish of the evening.
Oh, wow. Cool.
The chiltepin chimichurri was super tasty,
and the lamb was just cooked beautifully.
I've never said that in my entire life.
It's one of my favorite proteins.
I have never seen a salad done that way,
which I thought, you know, set it apart.
Thank you.
Let's talk about your dessert, Sarah.
Woohoo. My dessert gave me hell today.
I have ice cream all over me.
It was not a great ice cream day for me.
I agree, if the ice cream were colder,
and you were using liquid nitrogen,
so I'm not quite sure how it wasn't cold.
-I just-- I panicked. -TOM: But that's it.
I love the way you worked the ingredients into this dish.
Damarr, how was the day for you?
There were issues and me falling behind.
I feel like the first course, I kind of rushed plating.
I was definitely running around today.
Damarr, what I loved most
is how you took those ingredients, and said,
"Okay, I'm gonna do it my way, and here we are."
I thought the barbecue sauce was absolutely delicious.
-We wanted more. -GAIL: You were so smart
in the way you used the prickly pear.
Putting it into your barbecue sauce
was fantastic,
but everything felt a little bit separated.
The pikliz was a great vehicle
for you to really showcase the chiltepin,
but in the form that you gave it to us,
shredded so fine, it didn't represent itself,
or be a vehicle for some of the things
you could have highlighted.
The dessert, I thought, was delicious.
I loved the crumb on your cake.
I loved the little pops of texture and seed in your cake.
The textures of the cheese and the pomegranate
and that amazing crispiness of that figgy bud,
I think was-- was really smart
and it all worked beautifully together.
You actually baked.
It's great to see you have confidence to do that.
-I really enjoyed it. -Thank you.
-Buddha. -Yeah, the last one.
Hearing all these good comments, I'm sweating.
You used that chiltepin in the most striking way.
Every bite had a punch of heat and so much flavor.
Such a nice interpretation of using the chiltepin.
The broth itself was just wonderful.
-Thank you. -I mean, the dumplings.
I'm going to have to figure out how to make those one day.
It's really, really beautifully done.
Thank you so much.
That dessert, you could tell it was the hand
of a very experienced, technically savvy chef.
But I wanted a little more intensity
and concentration of flavor.
I feel like you manipulated the ingredients
in so many incredible ways.
But I didn't get the juiciness of the fruit.
For me, as that cake warmed up,
you really did get the texture
and that draw from the cactus itself,
and it was really, really beautiful.
We have a hugely important decision to make.
This is the last Judges' Table before the finale,
and one of you will not be continuing on.
[dramatic music playing]
-All right. -Okay.
What do you want to drink?
[Evelyn chuckles]
That was the most confusing Judges' Table
I've ever been a part of.
I hate it when everyone
is so bloody good in a challenge.
-DAMARR: I'm going home. -I don't know.
I think I could be on the bottom, for sure--
Everybody had flaws.
I mean, overall, I think, it's the nicest table we've had.
Yeah.
I think there's certainly an argument to be made
for each of these chefs to get into the finale.
I see a sense of understanding of the ingredients.
I think that was the most exciting thing about today.
They clearly took inspiration from Maria and Jesús,
and they took it to heart.
Buddha's Tom Yum was a great vehicle
-to showcase the chiltepin. -So balanced, so beautiful.
-I mean, the dumplings. -Buddha had my favorite dish,
but his dessert needed a little bit more flavor.
Evelyn's nopal relleno was absolutely beautiful.
The flavor of the chiltepin
in her shrimp bisque was fantastic.
I would eat that dish over and over again
and enjoy it over and over again.
She has a respect for that product already,
but I was glad to see that she could step away
from that and do something different.
She took it to the next level--
Even when they're, like, "Oh my God, delicious."
I'm like, "But I could have done this, this, and this."
I still don't think it was nearly
as good as Sarah's was.
Use of the cactus and the chili was on par
with any three star Michelin dish that I've ever had.
I thought it was that good.
GAIL: I keep going back to it.
Herbaceous and well-seasoned,
the layers of flavor, the smoked yogurt.
Sarah's dish, for me, was definitely
the highlight of all of them,
But I can find things
that I would improve on Sarah's dessert.
I had a ton of fun cooking today,
but I definitely had a rough day.
Damarr's pork dish just didn't rise
to the challenge.
And I don't think that Damarr
went as deeply as he could,
in exploration of the chiltepin in that pork dish.
And that is really
what the crux of the challenge was.
-Right. -It was really lost.
You could not taste it
in the barbecue sauce or in the pikliz.
I don't know, it just sucked that I was kinda
rushing plating on the first one.
I shouldn't have tried to make something
that the usually takes me two or three hours to make.
I loved Damarr's cake.
TOM: Yeah, Damarr's dessert was better than the savory.
GAIL: It was.
I personally think
that Evelyn's dessert was the best dessert.
I almost doubled my friend group.
-EVELYN: Aw! -Oh, that's so cute!
I quadrupled mine.
[Sarah laughs]
This far in the competition,
we didn't see a whole lot of mistakes,
but it seems to be one dish
that just didn't come together.
Okay, I think we have our final three.
Let's get them out here.
♪♪♪
Chefs, tonight's decision was a really difficult one,
but we do have a winner.
Tonight's winning chef delivered two exceptional dishes
that had a lot of story and heart,
but also used the two ingredients
in a really wonderfully creative and delicious way.
And the winning chef tonight is...
♪♪♪
Evelyn.
[all clapping]
[emotional music playing]
Congratulations, Evelyn,
that means you are going to the finale.
-Oh my God! -SARAH: Cue crying.
I made it!
I'm just so grateful for this.
You know, to win this with nopales.
I mean--
-[sniffling] -[al laughing]
This win is definitely not just for me.
It's for my family.
It's for all the Mexican-Americans out there.
-Muchas gracias. -Gracias.
Please step to the side.
Doing it, girl!
Oh, my God.
You know, chefs, you come here,
and one thing that we tell you, it's going
to be really, really difficult.
But the great thing about going through it,
you've learned probably more about yourself,
why you cook, and why you've chosen this profession.
Unfortunately, one person's going home,
but you didn't lose.
You gained so much more.
♪♪♪
Damarr, please pack your knives and go.
-Thank you. -PADMA: I'm so sorry, Damarr.
Can we sandwich?
It sucks to be eliminated so close to the finale,
I mean, winning was a serious possibility.
We're not going to let go.
But there are some errors made that cost me.
-Thank you so much. -Thank you.
It's such a pleasure, man.
I've had many hardships and challenges
in my life that have forced me to grow.
You're incredible.
And now Top Chef is another one of those things.
Before this, I spent a lot of time doubting myself,
and I think my confidence has grown tremendously.
♪♪♪
PADMA: Next time on the season finale of Top Chef...
Congratulations, you've made it to the end.
[all cheering]
PADMA: Each of you'll be making the best meal of your lives.
BUDDHA: Look at this. Oh, yeah.
-Oh, Stephanie. -Oh, my God.
SARAH: That's Eric Ripert I just sh-- myself.
This menu is really about full utilization.
I'm hoping winning is a symptom of passion.
The leaves are changing color on the plate.
Just like Central Park.
I've got a massive arsenal
that still hasn't been touched yet.
EVELYN: Oh, my heart is pounding.
I've come this far to cook this food.
And this is my chance. Beautiful.
It's very funny.
I actually learned this from Chef Ripert.
Oh, yeah?
Anything you're cautious about right now?
-All the things. -All of it.
♪♪♪
-Wow. -This is incredible.
Stunning.
Wow. I mean, this was unbelievable.
If you are the future of our industry,
we're in really good hands.
You are Top Chef!
♪♪♪