It's loud, it's crass, it's chaotic.
-I'm ready to eat. -Whoo!
This says drag brunch.
-[man] Drag queen, drag chef. -It is bananas good.
-Sauteed I slay, baby. -I got a wig, y'all.
[man] It all has to be extra.
Whoo! Lord have mercy.
♪ Can I get a taste of that slay? ♪
This is tens, tens, tens across the board for me.
[woman] I am bringing all the razzle-dazzle.
And it looks delicious.
Girl, I'm going to serve it. You ready?
Avocado toast up.
You know, brunch is great, but drag brunch,
that's the best you can do.
I'm the executive chef at Dreamland in Seattle, Washington.
All of the food at Dreamland is over the top.
It's comfort food and there's always gonna be
a southern twist on it.
The restaurant is madness during drag brunch.
The queens bring intensity of feminine energy,
people having the time of their life and eating food.
You can't beat a drag brunch.
I'm going to put as much of my spin and flair into it
as I can, and my best is hard to beat.
[Chris] No one does drag brunch like I do. We sell it out every month.
It's what I do.
I'm the executive chef at Flamingo Resort in Santa Rosa, California.
I love classic French, but drag brunch is chaos,
and everything that we put on the plate reflects that.
It all has to be extra. It all has to fit that environment.
Nothing is gonna get in my way.
I've done massive events for thousands of people,
and I've worked in 15-seat Michelin-starred restaurants,
so I can run the full gauntlet.
[Corey] Drag queen, drag chef. This was made for me.
I am the co-owner and culinary director
for CC's Kitchen in Louisville, Kentucky.
I am actually the embodiment of our food at the restaurant.
I am big and boisterous.
Everything I do tends to be over the top.
These other chefs have no idea what's coming for them.
It would be really best if everybody just stayed out of my way.
Flames everywhere, everybody. Flames everywhere.
Drag queens are the gateways to happiness.
A little fairy dust, a little sparkle.
Ooh, baby.
That's the magic right there.
I am the executive chef and founder of International Market,
and I'm also the face of Suzy Wong's House of Yum.
This is Suzy Wong's Drag Brunch. Happy brunch, everyone.
[crowd cheering]
So my style of cuisine is primarily Thai,
but at a drag brunch.
I'm there to give you really approachable,
fun food, just disguised with a whole bunch of glitter.
Cheers!
With all the sparkle and the shine,
I still have the chops in the kitchen.
Honey, it's not your day because I've come to slay.
-Hello, chefs. -Hey, Ted.
So breakfast, lunch, and dinner are great,
but brunch is next level.
And to take it from fine to fabulous,
-why not make it a drag brunch? -Indeed.
-Absolutely. -[Ted] How do you feel about that?
-Saute, I slay, baby. -[all cheering]
Now, how can you have a drag brunch without a drag queen?
Here to help us celebrate this special competition
is cookbook author and performer extraordinaire,
-Miss Ginger! -[all cheering]
Oh, my God!
[Arnold] Ms. Ginger is a very well-known drag queen
in the drag community.
Fabulous!
Seeing her is great, but then again,
I'm competing, and she's judging me.
-Thank you. -Drag queens have no filter.
Now let's see what's in this first basket.
Let it rip.
Open them up.
-Oh. -Oh, hell yeah.
-Oh, heck yeah. -Great.
[Ted] And you have an espresso martini.
[Miss Ginger] Oh, yes.
-[Ted] Avocado. -Avocado.
Easy peasy.
[Ted] Pork belly.
-Oh, this is the best. -[Chris] Okay.
Oh, this feels fantastic. Come on now.
-Ta-da! -[Ted] And peanut butter and jelly pancakes.
I was going to make pancakes, but they're already in the basket.
We got this.
Twenty minutes to make gorgeous appetizers.
Clock starts now.
Here we go.
[Tiffani] Yes, chefs.
Okay, I'm excited. Let's get down with this brunch.
-I'm very excited about this. -Yes.
Hi, honey bunny.
-Hi, there. -How are you doing?
I'm behind you.
[Ted] Tiffani, joining you, the fabulous Miss Ginger
and Italian food authority chef Gabe Bertaccini.
We're here. We're queer. We're hungry.
All right.
Can we talk about drag brunch?
Well, on Sundays, you know, everybody's still
a little tipsy from the night before.
And you want a later start to your day.
But then you also want to replenish your body
with as much delicious food as you can.
Drag and food, like, the two of those things
have given me my voice and given me my power.
I have a cookbook.
It is called Southern Fried Sass.
And everything from the chicken to the gossip is juicy.
-[Tiffani] Oh, we love it. -[Ted laughing]
[Jenn] Brunch at a drag show, you can go a little harder
than you can on just a regular day.
Oh, and those berries. Can't waste those.
I am bringing all the razzle dazzle I got.
-Chef Judd. -Yes, sir.
What are you making, sweetie?
I'm making a peanut butter and jelly pancake fritter
with a chocolate espresso, avocado mousse,
and a candied pork belly.
-[Gabe] That sounds amazing. -Yay!
Oh.
Oh, she's sweet.
I'm going to use the avocado and the espresso martini
to make a chocolate mousse.
[Miss Ginger] I love avocados because they're so buttery.
It's such a good substitute, you know, if you don't want
to be completely, like, off the rails
with your butter and fat.
Mm.
[Chris] Avocados are obviously a brunch staple,
so I'm gonna caramelize my avocados.
I'm hoping this is gonna be something
that'll help me stand out from my other competitors.
[Gabe] Chef Chris, what are you making?
I'm making a caramelized avocado and espresso martini glazed pork belly.
Oh, whoa.
A caramelized avocado?
I've never had a caramelized avocado before.
I think it's a play on grilled avocado, which is kind of fun.
[Chris] At Flamingo Resort, we host Drag Brunch
on the first Sunday of every month,
and it's loud, it's crass, it's chaotic,
and the food is just another part of the show.
And so you have to do something big and bold
and over the top, just like the Queens.
I came here to win, and these other chefs
better sashay out of my way.
I know I can do something creative with the pork belly,
and my mind immediately goes to the tacos.
I'm making a pork belly taco.
[Gabe] This basket looks really good.
I mean, all staples of any drag brunch.
Not only you have espresso martini,
but I'm excited about the pork belly.
That was my name when I was a dancer was Pork Belly.
[Gabe] This is actually fully cooked.
My favorite way to eat it is cut it, pan sear it.
Okay, let's get a little more heat on you, little baby.
All right, chefs, you're down to 14 minutes here.
[Corey] I'm making an avocado crema by mixing my avocados
with lime and Mexican crema.
-Cut. [bleep] -[crew member] Cut.
I've cut myself worse than I ever have in my entire life.
I cannot believe how fast it is already bleeding.
-I stabbed the end. -[Tiffani] Corey has cut himself.
-What? -Like, there's cuts and then there's cuts.
It's not stopping even with pressure.
[Corey] I'm in really big trouble.
We have twin flames that just happened.
-Whoo! -We're all flaming today, honey.
Yes.
That's kind of a typical drag brunch.
Lots of drama and lots of flames.
-Chef Arnold. -Oui, oui, oui, baby.
Are we slaying, honey? What are we doing?
Slaying, saute, I slay like I said.
[Gabe] Listen, we saw the ketchup, we saw the flames.
What are you making right there?
I'm doing a spin on a very brunchy
panzanella salad with a twist.
-[Tiffani] We love that. We love that. -With a twist.
[Arnold] I'm making an heirloom pancake panzanella salad with
avocado yogurt and a curried tomato pork belly bacon jam.
I'm gonna use the pancake as my bread.
[Chris] Peanut butter in between each layer.
You gotta be kidding me.
Peanut butter and jelly pancakes is a new one for me.
Maybe it's something I'll try out with my daughter
down the line, but I'm gonna try and make
a buttermilk beurre blanc and try to turn it into something savory.
[Gabe] Usually brunch, you have people that like savory
and then people who like sweet.
Out of four chefs, only one took this sweet route.
Right behind you.
[Jenn] I'm gonna use my peanut butter and jelly pancakes
to make fritters.
-May I share your fryer with you? -Yes.
I want the fritter to get a lot of texture in the exterior.
Ooh!
Espresso martini, that is like the epitome of
a brunch cocktail.
I throw the avocado, yogurt, a little bit of spice,
salt, sugar, pepper, and I blend it up.
All right, go, go, go, go.
All right, chefs, five minutes to get it done.
-Five minutes. -All right.
-Ooh. -It's really tough for Corey
to have lost this much time in a tiny little 20-minute round.
Yep.
[Corey] There's so much adrenaline coursing through me,
and I haven't even had a chance to show everybody what I'm capable of.
But I am going to make sure that I get all of
those ingredients on the plate.
I am going to be the next Chopped Champion,
and nothing is going to get in my way.
Behind, behind. Coming through, swaying through, sashay, saute.
-Whoo! -Work, baby, work!
All right, chefs, five minutes to get it done.
Five minutes.
[Corey] With five minutes on the clock,
I take the espresso martini and turn this into a glaze
just for the pork belly.
[Chris] I've used all my basket ingredients,
but there's no crispy element, mind you.
I decide at the last minute I'm gonna crisp some
panko breadcrumbs and have kind of a seasoned breadcrumb
over the top.
All right, chefs, you're coming up on four minutes here.
Four minutes is one long drag number.
It's about a ballad.
Chef Arnold, wait. What are you making right there?
I have a little frisee salad with pickled capers.
I'm also going to grab some beautiful heirloom tomatoes.
Almost there. Just keep pushing. Keep pushing.
Got to do something to transform
the pork belly, so I add some of the berries to kind of
bring the acidity up and tie it in with
the peanut butter and jelly pancake fritter.
Whoo! Jenn has pork belly in the pan,
and it looks delicious.
[Miss Ginger] I love when it's nice and crispy on the outside.
-You like it. -You stick your teeth in it.
-It's like a marshmallow. It's so soft. -Soft.
[Ted] One minute left on the clock, chefs. Let's get it done.
[Miss Ginger] Oh! One minute, oh!
Did somebody turn up the heat in here all of a sudden?
Whoo, honey.
I thought that back-to-back drag brunches was intense,
but this Chopped kitchen is absolutely way over the top.
Right behind you, sweetie.
She forgot her bowl. Rookie.
Right behind you, honey.
[Tiffani] Chef Corey's working with his glove on.
He seems to be moving at a good pace
-and making decent decisions. -Thank you.
How many minutes we got left?
I don't know what to do with these pancakes,
but I got to figure it out right now.
So I'm putting them in a blender with some half and half
to make peanut butter pancake mousse.
-All right, make sure your plates are good. -Let's go.
-Taste everything. -[Miss Ginger] I want it to be pretty.
Sprinkle some glitter on top.
[Arnold] Oh, my God.
Girl, give me some of that eye shadow.
-I knew something was missing. -Pass it over.
Chefs, don't hesitate. Get your food upon that plate.
-10, 9, 8, 7, 6, -[Gabe] Come on, guys.
-[Miss Ginger] Come on. -Let's go.
-[Ted] ...four, three, two... -Don't let me down.
...one.
-Time's up. Please step back. -[all cheering]
Let's go.
Excuse me.
-How you feel? -Good. Wow. Gorgeous.
It's such a bummer that Corey got a cut.
Oh, my God. That's a lot of blood.
-Yeah. -How you doing this, Jenn?
Okay, in my mind, it had a little more razzle dazzle,
but it tastes nice.
I am glad that I at least got all four ingredients on the plate,
even if my arm is bleeding, so.
Chefs, you have arrived at the chopping block.
You had to work with an espresso martini, avocados,
pork belly, and peanut butter and jelly pancakes.
Chef Corey, this is going to be a pork belly
on a corn tortilla with a avocado crema,
a peanut butter jelly pancake mousse,
and espresso martini caramel sauce.
Drag brunches are a lot of fun.
That's really what I built my business around.
We built up one of the top drag brunches in the United States,
number nine in the nation, number one in Kentucky.
Chef Corey, the use of the avocado is so delicious,
and the fattiness up against the crispiness of the pork belly,
really smart.
And putting the tortillas on the grill with the pork belly,
that's giving this nice, fatty, porky char.
The creatinity of a taco, it's amazing.
That espresso martini sauce that you reduced down,
it just seized up.
When you pair the espresso martini with the berries
and the peanut butter, I think you went a little bit too sweet.
The berries are nice. They're pretty.
But, you know, as Coco Chanel always said,
before you go out the door, remove one item.
But the avocado is my favorite thing on the dish.
It's absolutely delicious.
Next up, Chef Jenn.
I've made for you today a peanut butter
and jelly pancake fritter,
chocolate espresso martini avocado mousse,
and a raspberry candy pork belly.
[Ted] So where are you working now?
Right now, I'm the executive chef at Dreamland
in Seattle, Washington, home of Dreamgirls Drag Brunch.
Hey!
Chef, for you to go into this avocado chocolate mousse,
that is not where usually people go to when they see an avocado.
That's the best part of the whole thing.
That's so delicious.
-Thank you. Thank you. -It's wildly delicious.
[Tiffani] It is bananas good. The avocado keep the chocolate
from being too sweet.
The espresso martini adds the sauce with the pork belly.
So delicious.
Everything together just works.
Let's talk about the fritter. The texture is great.
I just want more peanut butter.
I disagree with some of the things that you said
because this is tens, tens, tens across the board for me.
Yes, I love that.
The fritter is absolutely perfect.
When you take just a little dollop of the mousse
and put it on top, it's a perfect bite for me.
-I love it. -Honey, I'm too close to menopause for you
-to give me all these feelings. -[all laughing]
Well, you're giving me all these feelings, too.
Honey, I'm falling off the bone.
That feels so good.
-Thank you. -So is your pork, honey.
Oh, thank you so much.
Next, we go to Chef Chris.
So I made a caramelized avocado with espresso martini
glazed pork belly and a buttermilk pancake sauce.
The plating isn't much to look at,
but when you get a little bit of that pork belly
with that avocado, with that sauce,
it's like a perfect bite.
I love the pork belly. I think it is so delicious.
It's candy. I can't stop eating it.
And I really like the avocado
and how beautifully caramelized it is.
But there's no anchor to this.
If this is an appetizer, what is it?
I agree with Tiffani. What is it?
You know, is it an appetizer? Is it a main?
Is it, like, a brunch dish?
As perfect as I think the bite is, I do agree that
it could use something like a crostini underneath it,
-Yeah. -but I still really love the bite.
-Thank you. -All right.
-Finally, Chef Arnold. -For today's performance,
-I made for you... -Yes!
...an heirloom pancake panzanella
with an heirloom tomato salad, avocado yogurt,
and a curried tomato pork belly jam.
Chef Arnold, I...
love this.
It's sort of sophisticated avocado tomato toast.
-[Miss Ginger] Your plate is gorgeous. -[Arnold] Thank you, doll.
And every single bite is so delicious.
You actually developed some really interesting
and different flavors in the dish.
But, you know, some of them don't go together.
The ketchup, really all you taste is ketchup.
I do wish that I could taste the espresso martini
-just a little bit more. -More is more.
-More is more. It's drag. -Yeah.
[Chris] The judges were tough but fair.
Honestly, I maybe went a little too simple,
and since this is Drag Brunch, I need to be a bit more extra.
[Corey] I definitely do not feel safe right now.
I'm super frustrated.
There's so much more I can do, and I hope I get
the opportunity to stick around.
So whose dish is on the chopping block?
Chef Corey, you've been chopped.
Judges?
Chef Corey, you cut your fingers at the beginning of the round,
and it really cost you.
The sauce you made with espresso martini
really took the dish to the sweet side,
and so we had to chop you.
Well, it was a really good time to be here.
Best of luck to all of you.
-Thank you, Chef. -Thank you, Chef.
-Thank you. -Good luck to you.
I did not put out a dish that represents my skills,
but I did make it here, and I'm really proud of that.
Chef Jenn, Chef Chris, Chef Arnold.
Second basket.
Open it up.
-Oh, my God. -What the hell is going on?
-[Jenn] What in... -Okay, love it.
[Ted] All right, you've got a rainbow steamed cake.
Ah! [laughs]
What is this layered mess?
These are the gays of our lives.
-[Ted] You also have skirt steak. -Skirt steak, okay.
Okay, I can work with that.
[Ted] Eggplants.
And it wouldn't be drag punch without eggplants.
Yeah.
-Oh, brother. -And sausage gravy.
[Ted] Sausage gravy.
We're going old school brunch on that one.
-Fierce. -[all laughing]
Thirty minutes to strut your stuff again.
-Clock starts now. -Okay, let's do it.
Let's go, guys.
-Come on. -[Gabe] Come on.
[Ted] Judges, drag brunches have really been exploding
in popularity all over the country lately.
Why?
Why not?
-[Tiffani] You know where drag brunch started, essentially? -[Gabe] Where?
In the late 1880s, the formerly enslaved person
started dressing up, performing, serving food, and having alcohol.
-[Miss Ginger] Yeah. -But the word drag comes from
heavy costumes that queens were dragging them through,
carrying their costumes and dragging their garments through.
Oh, my gosh. She's so dense.
The biggest challenge for me is that cake.
-It tastes pretty nasty. -Yeah.
-No, that's not her look. -But it's sweet.
It's a little coconutty almost.
The texture and the taste is a very dense version
of a dessert from Thailand.
Chef Arnold, what's going on in your kitchen?
-I'm gonna take all of these flavors... -Okay.
-...and turn it into beef and eggplant laksa. -[Gabe] Mmm.
A little curry, a little noodle. You know, I'm South Asian.
They've got some flair and spice.
I'm gonna wake you up this round.
All right.
[Tiffani] The idea of doing laksa is very smart.
Laksa is typically Southeast Asian stew,
and it has a ton of curry flavors in it.
This rainbow cake, it is made with rice flour
and coconut milk.
Six layers of colors.
They don't taste different. They are all the same flavor.
Oh, my God.
It works. It's good.
The issue with this cake is not the flavor.
-[Arnold] Oh, my God. -[Tiffani] It's the texture.
It is gummy.
Oh, my God. It's like gum.
[Jenn] This rainbow steam cake, I'm gonna melt it down with
a little hot water to make a marinade for my skirt steak.
[Tiffani] So skirt steak runs along the bottom of the cow,
really high cooking, high heat, very quickly,
and then cut it against the grain.
-Jenn. -[Jenn] Yes, sir.
-What are you doing there? -[Jenn] I'm working on some
kind of steak, a little fried eggplant.
I'm going to make a marinated grilled skirt steak
with skillet potatoes, fried eggplant,
and a sausage gravy hollandaise.
This is drag brunch. We've got to take it up a notch.
Drag brunch gives people an opportunity
to really celebrate their authenticity.
And they may not have that opportunity Monday through Friday
in their regular life.
Going into round two, Jenn obviously killed it.
Both of my competitors are very talented,
but she's definitely who I'm on the lookout for.
This is a drag rush competition,
and I need to just be more extra and not play it so safe.
Chef Chris, what's going on, my friend?
I'm making eggplant two ways.
So I'm going to caramelize one, and then I'm going to do,
like, a charred and sweet eggplant puree using my cake.
And then we're going to do a little chicken fried steak
to go with that since we've got gravy, because why not, eh?
[Gabe] Well, talk about eggplant. It's a tricky vegetable.
There are two issues.
One, it absorbs any sort of liquid or fat
that you're putting it in.
And then second, if you don't cook it properly,
it just doesn't taste good. It tastes bitter.
Give it to me. Give it to me.
I had my first child at 18, and then at 22,
I had my second.
Having two kids and working a full-time job and also going
to culinary school was difficult.
So I want to take this win back for my kids
who believe in me so much.
-Just under 10 minutes, chefs. -Come on, guys.
-[Miss Ginger] Ooh. -[Gabe] Pull it through.
Put some hustle in your bustle.
Let's see what happens.
I'm looking at this sausage gravy,
and I think sausage gravy hollandaise.
Hollandaise is the glue that holds brunch together.
I love sausage gravy. It is a staple in my house.
It's a staple in the South.
I like to make mine spicy.
[Chris] So I'm making my chicken fried steak, and I realize
that the fryer is definitely a hot commodity.
Jenn, let me know when you're done.
I just need another, like, minute.
It's easier for me to just get a pan with oil going.
But I'm not getting the sizzle in the bubble,
so I decide to turn them up a little bit.
[Gabe] Look at Chris' station. Everything is burning.
That is the literal definition of hot mess.
It is messy. It is too hot.
[Chris] I'm not thrilled about this, but I'm running out of time.
I'm just going to have to figure out a way to make this work.
With any laksa, there's usually a noodle component.
So my plan is to fry rice noodles.
Ooh. I got a wig, y'all.
I got a wig.
Oh, well, I hear some commotion.
[Tiffani] We have a wig coming out of the fryer.
[Ted] All right, chefs, five minutes to get it done.
-Oh, my God. -Ah.
Behind, chef. Sorry so much. Sorry. Thank you. Love you.
I'm so focused on getting my stuff done
that I forget about my beef.
Oh my gosh.
You know, if I get a quick flash fry on it,
I can add it to the dish.
The tension right now, they're all trying to finish.
Chef Chris, I think he's struggling a bit
with the frying of the steak.
[Tiffani] One of the interesting things that's happening here
in the feel of this kitchen is often what happens
behind the scenes at drag brunch.
In the front of the house, it is all tutus and tiaras.
In the back, we are freaking out.
Really, I always say the best show at a drag brunch
is backstage.
Come on, guys.
[Gabe] Chef Arnold, finish up. You're giving me a heart attack.
Come on.
[Ted] All right, chefs, second round winding down.
I cannot.
[Ted] Ten, nine, eight, seven, six,
five, four, three, two, one.
-Ah! -[whoops]
-[Ted] Time's up. -Yes! Come on.
-Lord have mercy. -Great job, chefs.
Nice job.
How was it so much shorter? It seemed shorter.
-[Chris] It did. It really did. -Did it not seem shorter?
What? Honey, yes.
I really had to dig deep to figure out what to do
with these ingredients to make a cohesive dish,
and I hope that comes through.
I never want to see that cake again in my wide life.
[Arnold] Oh, my gosh. This is, like, major hard.
-I'm schvitzing. -[all laughing]
Chefs, for the entree round, we gave you a rainbow-steamed cake,
skirt steak, eggplants, and sausage gravy.
Chef Chris, please tell us what you made.
So I made a fried steak and eggs with eggplant
two ways and gravy two ways.
The eggplant is caramelized eggplant with a little bit of
Brussels sprout, and then the other one is a charred,
like, blackened eggplant puree that got thickened with
the steamed cake to give it a little bit of sweetness.
Chef Chris, this egg is cooked so nicely.
The idea of chicken fried stick is so smart,
but the execution here I think is a little bit wanting.
My steak is a little bit burnt in the fry part,
and then this is pretty rare.
I agree with Tiffani.
The cut is a little too tough to do something
like this concept with.
Having said that, that eggplant steamed cake puree,
I'm going to call it rainbow ganoush, is delicious.
-Nice, I like that. -[Tiffani] Yeah.
You should put that rainbow ganoush on
-your menu immediately. -Yes.
And also, the cooked eggplant, this is delicious.
-It's not soft, sweet, like perfectly cooked. -Thank you.
Next up, Chef Arnold.
So this is a beef and eggplant laksa
with a coconut curry broth and some rice noodles.
So not everything at brunch has to have an egg,
and different cultures outside of the Western world
do dishes like this.
[Miss Ginger] This is drag.
-Right? -Thank you.
This is really over the top. It's never enough.
[Miss Ginger] She's giving drama. She's giving Medusa.
-[Miss Ginger] She's giving. -[Tiffani] She's giving.
Yeah.
First thing I was hit by was the smell.
-Okay. -It's so inviting.
It's very warm.
I sense the ginger in there. I feel a little bit like a cannibal right now.
[all laughing]
But if I taste like this, I'd eat myself all day.
-Oh. -Hey, hey, hey.
I love the fried noodles.
I think they're such a nice addition,
but they're a little difficult to eat.
[Gabe] I agree.
I like the idea of the puffed noodles fried, but two things.
If you're frying them, make sure they're all fried
because many of them are not. You didn't puff up.
Then two, too much of it.
Visually, it's very stunning, but it's just hard to eat.
But the crisp of the noodle with the soup itself,
it's a really nice bite.
The steak, on the other hand,
It doesn't taste like anything to me.
It detracts from the flavor of the soup.
Right.
[Miss Ginger] But the eggplant is the complete opposite.
Thank you.
Finally, Chef Jenn.
For you, I have made a marinated grilled steak
with skillet potatoes,
a sunny side up fried eggplant,
and a sausage gravy hollandaise.
[Gabe] I want a gallon of that Hollandaise sauce
that you just made.
So good.
What a smart use of the sausage gravy.
The steak is cooked beautifully,
and so is the eggplant, to be honest.
If there is one thing that I think all of it needs,
-it's salt. -Yeah.
My original thought was the same as yours.
Like, it could use a hit of salt,
maybe a little bit of pepper, until I took a piece of
-everything on one bite. -Okay.
And that one bite is so perfectly balanced.
It all just has this big burst of flavor.
[Tiffani] The steak is cooked perfectly. It's cut nicely.
I don't know if I'm super buying
the steamed rainbow cake as like a marinade to the steak,
but I think this is a really successful dish.
Potatoes and the hollandaise together are what
make it brunchy, right? And that's really, really smart.
Thank you so much.
At the end of the day, it's anybody's game,
but I feel like I really was able to harness some creativity.
I'm really excited to see what's under that cloche.
I feel pretty good. I know I messed up a little bit on the steak.
Everything else, I felt like I executed
pretty much perfectly.
Which two fabulous chefs will be making dessert?
Whose dish is on the chopping block?
Chef Chris, you've been chopped.
Judges?
Chef Chris, we really love the idea of
the chicken fried steak.
Unfortunately, the cook of that steak was a little tough
to sink our teeth into.
-We had to chop you. -Oh, thank you so much.
I've loved being here. I had so much fun.
-Thank you. -Good job.
Thank you.
A little bummed, but the people that are moving
on ahead of me are two really talented people.
I'm proud of the food I put out.
I feel like I can go home with my head held high.
Chef Jenn, Chef Arnold, this is your final set of ingredients.
Check them out.
[gasps]
-Oh, my. -What the heck?
La bouche, baby.
-All right. -It's a disco ball croquembouche.
Holy disco ball.
The disco ball makes me feel very at home.
-[Ted] You also have gooseberries. -Oh, yum.
[Jenn] What.
-[Ted] Salted caramel. -Okay.
-What is this? -[Ted] And pride candy.
Okay. Okay. All right.
Cool, cool, cool, cool, cool, cool, cool.
And here we are.
Thirty minutes on the countdown clock. We're starting it now.
-Let's go. -Come on, you two.
-Let's finish. -Last round. Let's go.
I'm going to take 500 trips to the pantry.
[Ted] So, judges, what makes a dessert brunchy?
Well, I think the most important thing is that
it cannot weigh you down for the rest of the day.
But you still got a Sunday fun day to go and handle head on.
So you don't want anything that's going to be too sweet...
Things can be sweet, sweet, sweet when it comes to dessert,
but I'm one that always tries to find balance,
sour, tart, maybe even spicy.
The go-tos are nutmeg, cinnamon.
But then I'm a little bit more exotic, right?
Chef Arnold, what are you doing?
I am making an orange olive oil cake with
a little pinch of five spice.
I'm gonna do a little berry jam compote.
Maybe some glitter's gonna happen. I don't know, we'll see.
One of the great things about olive oil cake is that
it's not so sweet and has a really great neutral palate.
I can do something really fun by grabbing some wonton wrappers
and making a cute little stuffed wonton.
So today I'm gonna do a croquembouche rangoon.
Croquembouche is a cream puff stacked into a tree,
but I'm not really familiar with the disco mirror balls.
That's kind of throwing me for a loop.
The famously difficult croquembouche.
The mirror balls are not edible.
No, not edible.
I think there are some great elements.
The chefs can use the pastry. They can use actually the filling.
In this case, it's cream.
[Jenn] This is the round that I've really prepared for.
And now that I'm here, I actually think I could win this.
Chef Jenn, what are you cooking up?
I'm working on a little cake myself,
but with a little brunch twist.
We're going to call it a little pancake.
-Pancake. -I like that.
There'll be an ice cream, too, because it is a party after all.
-You know what I'm saying? -Right on.
We love a good ice cream.
I love a bad ice cream. I'm just going to be honest.
I just love ice cream.
[Jenn] I'm going to use the salted caramel
as a base in my ice cream to kind of take
the place of sugar and really bring that caramelly element.
Okay, let's go.
I cannot believe I'm here.
This is crazy.
I want to win this $10,000 because I'm going to be 50 years old.
Come on, Jenn.
I want to take my family to some tropical beach
where we don't have a care in the world.
That vacation is calling my name.
I see some good looking pancakes.
Those do look real nice.
All right, chefs, 19 minutes on the clock.
I can do it. I can do it. I can do it.
You know, gooseberries for me seem to be
this very like European Christmas legend,
like gooseberry jam and a croquembouche.
There's nice sweetness, nice bite, nice tartness.
So essentially with my gooseberries, I'm making a compote.
A gooseberry is almost the flavoring texture
of a teeny tiny little apple.
They range depending on the ripeness.
They can be very tart, they can be very sweet,
they can be very crunchy.
Gooseberries!
It's kind of giving me creamsicle vibes.
I'm making a gooseberry mascarpone glaze
to kind of put around the top and then layer in with my pancake.
Ten minutes on the clock, chefs.
Ten minutes to cerveza.
All of a sudden, I hear the ice cream machine
hollering at me.
-Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. -[ice cream machine squeaking]
She is banging and clanging.
The ice cream machine is doing a song of torture. It's... [imitates squeaking]
If you let the ice cream go for too long,
it just becomes a mess.
[Jenn] It's possible that I've overchurned my ice cream,
which has been a mistake I've seen chefs make over and over.
I cannot believe this could be happening to me.
I am so worried about what's going to come out of this thing.
I'm confused.
All right, chefs, five minutes to get it done.
I've seen that ice cream maker take down a number of chefs.
At this point, the competition could be on the line.
I open up the valve.
Ah, smooth and creamy. It's perfect.
-I've done it. -Lord, thank you.
The ice cream looks great, Jenn.
Thank you.
You can't stop me now.
The last thing I need to do with this ice cream
is get some of those chopped up pieces
of croquembouche folded in so it really feels like
an over-the-top extravagant ice cream.
[Gabe] I think he might come down to just the dessert round.
Chef Arnold is so good at developing flavors.
But then you have Chef Jenn, who creates
very composed dishes.
Arnold seems very calm, very collected.
It's the Botox, Ginger.
-Botox? Never heard of it. -Fabulous.
The moment of truth has come.
I grab my cakes out of the oven.
[Tiffani] Woah.
-Those cakes look fabulous. -Those cakes look beautiful.
-[Arnold] Hey, Jenn, guess what? -What, honey?
-The cake, it is fierce. -Same, same.
[Arnold] I add a little bit of salted caramel on the bottom
so the cake doesn't roll around.
In the basket, we have a jar of pride candy.
So these are artisanal candies that are literally pulled
and then rolled with pride colors.
I'm using the pride candy as a little bit of
a textural element in my party pancakes.
I'm going to put it in the middle so that there's something
to break up just the fluffy and creamy.
-[Miss Ginger] You're at the finish line. You can do this. -[Tiffani] Yes.
Chef Arnold and I are both giving it everything we have.
The intensity is insane.
One minute, chefs.
Ooh, one minute.
-Guys, come on. This is the last stretch. -You got this.
[Ted] All right, chefs. Final seconds of the final round.
-Ten, nine, eight, seven, six... -Oh, my God.
-[Gabe] The final touches. -...five, four, three, two, one.
-Time's up! -[all cheering]
Don't cry for me, Chopped kitchen.
-Oh, honey bunny! -Yes, queen!
We did it!
Wow. That was crazy.
If I take this championship home, ain't nobody gonna talk
to me no kind of way forever.
You know what I'm saying? I'm gonna become intolerable.
I want it bad.
I know this dessert is a home run, but Jenn is fierce.
May the best queen win. [laughs]
Chef Jenn and Chef Arnold, for the dessert round
of our Chopped drag brunch, we gave you
a disco ball croquembouche,
gooseberries, salted caramel, and pride candy.
Chef Arnold.
I made a five-spice orange olive oil cake
with a gooseberry and apricot jam,
a little croquembouche wonton, as well as a little bit of cream.
I think there's some disappointment.
Oh, wow.
That we don't get more desserts like this.
[all exclaiming]
The olive oil cake is super smart.
The gooseberries cooked and also raw, perfect.
My favorite part, I think, is the croquembouche
crab rangoon situation you've given us on the top.
It's so delicious.
This feels like I've got my hint of sweet,
and I'm about to go and tear up the town.
Which is exactly what I want at a brunch.
[Gabe] The cake itself works very well.
That cream that melted, it's exactly what you needed.
Otherwise, it would have been a little dry.
Very impressive for the 30 minutes.
Thank you, Chef Arnold.
And finally, Chef Jenn.
Judges, today for dessert, I have made for you
-a party pancake. -Hey!
[Jenn] With a gooseberry mascarpone glaze garnished with
the pride candy and a croquembouche
salted caramel ice cream.
-To me, this says drag brunch. -Yeah.
It looks like the glitter and the confetti
and the rhinestones and the sequins,
but you look at it and you go, it's a pancake and some ice cream.
That is the best pancake I've ever had in my life.
-You are lying. -No.
They're very fluffy. They're very light.
[Tiffani] The egg content in this pancake is very high.
It makes it spongy and custardy, and I love it.
Love the fact that you mix the mascarpone
with the gooseberries.
But the star for me here is the ice cream.
Great job on that. Like, it's silky.
-It's smooth. It's really delicious. -Thank you so much.
My salted caramel is iced up just a little bit,
but I'm going to think about these pancakes, like, forever.
[Miss Ginger] Forever. [laughs]
I will never forget that as long as I live.
-Thank you, chefs. -Thank you, judges.
Thank you, Ted.
Judges, this was a ton of fun.
It's been a day where the chefs clearly slayed.
It started really well.
The avocado chocolate mousse from Chef Jenn.
-Oh! -[Gabe] And those fritters.
-Yep. -And then that pork belly that you love so much.
It was so good.
Not to be outdone, Chef Arnold showed up
with bells on in the first round.
He took the peanut butter pancakes and essentially
made toast points.
[Miss Ginger] It was a really clever play.
-It makes it exciting. -[Tiffani] It was a good dish.
[Gabe] Yeah. And then there was the ketchup.
I mean, ketchup is a bully.
-So really all you taste is ketchup. -Yeah.
And you know where he kind of went back on
-the stage and say, this is me, Paulie. -Honey laksa.
Yeah, that's exactly it.
I love how he took the eggplant and made
the star on that soup.
I mean, it was melting in your mouth.
What did not melt in your mouth was that skirt steak.
Oh, you're right.
Chef Jenn's steak was cooked beautifully.
-And so was the eggplant. -[Miss Ginger] It was so good.
-[Tiffani] It was gorgeous. -[Gabe] Wasn't it so amazing?
-Today is a very close race. -Yeah.
-This is a drag brunch. -[Tiffani] Mmm-hmm.
What would you want when you walked into a drag brunch
and sat down and looked at the menu? Mmm.
[Arnold] The competition all day today has been neck and neck,
so I don't know who actually has a lead,
but I feel like I could be a Chopped champion.
[Jenn] I do feel like I have as much a chance as Arnold does.
I really am proud.
Let's see what happens.
So, whose dish is on the chopping block?
[shudders]
Chef Arnold, you've been chopped.
-Thank you. -Judges?
Chef Arnold, on appetizer round,
the ketchup was just a little too assertive.
And in the entree, the skirt steak needed some char to it.
The dessert was technically perfect
and joyous and fun and delicious.
Jenn just had you edged out in two other rounds.
And so we had to chop you.
Hey, first alternate still has first in the name, right?
100%. 100%.
-I'm so proud of you. -Thank you. Aw.
-Congratulations. -Thank you so much.
-See you soon. Bye. -Bye, sweetie.
So close.
[sighs] Well.
Even though I'm not the Chopped champion,
I still feel like I've won.
Bye.
So eternally grateful for this opportunity.
I have heard Ted Allen say in my head, and that means.
And that means, Chef Jenn Strange,
you are the Chopped champion.
For winning our drag brunch competition,
you will collect a sparkling $10,000 prize.
Congratulations.
-[all cheering] -Yay! Yes! Yes!
Ha! I am a Chopped champion, and you can't tell me nothing now.
You can't tell me nothing.
My kids are going to be so proud.
[imitates explosion] It's like fireworks are going off.
It's insane.