Top Chef: Tailgating (Episode # 406 )

This week's Top Chef proves that it's always the simple stuff that gets you, as the chefs are tasked with cooking a tailgate for Bears fans -- a challenge that sees some of them struggling to relate.

After a heated post-elimination (Zoi went home for her unseasoned mushrooms) tensions are running high in the house. Jennifer wants to win one for her girl, and Dale and Lisa just want to prove each other wrong.

Quick-Fire Challenge: The contestants have to cook a dish paired with a specific beer, from the average supermarket variety (Michelob) to mystery brews (Land Shark). Out-for-vengeance Jennifer gets the latter beer and pairs it with shrimp and scallop beignets with avocado and fennel...looks delish (don't you want to be able to taste this stuff?!). You'd think Spike, the resident bad boy, would be into a beer challenge, but he half-asses it and lands himself in the bottom with a charcuterie plate (umm...where's the cooking there?). Jennifer ends up winning (though Stephanie puts in a strong showing with a mussel dish), and she has immunity. That's for you, Zoi!

Despite last week's tensions, a little free time and some booze brings out the love in the chef house. Mop-topped Aussie Mark and Spike take a bubble bath, prompting Antonia to call the whole scene a cheap porno. Bow chicka wow wow. 

Elimination Challenge: The chefs are grilling out for a Bears game tailgate. Dale, a long-time Bears fan, is stoked. Ryan, a self-proclaimed metrosexual, is not. Everyone seems to be putting a fine-dining spin on classic tailgate foods...ribs, chicken skewers, hamburgers, shrimp (mark jokes -- what will he throw on the barbie if everyone else jacks shrimp?).

Out on the field, all the chefs chose a gas grill except Mark, a decision that will come to haunt him as his station gets messy and unmanageable. Speaking of unmanageable, Ryan's three-part dish (bread salad, poached pears and brandy cocoa) has him enlisting the help of Bears fans, who then aren't so into the food. Things that look amazing: Richard's Pate melt, Dale's ribs, Stephanie's pork with pear potato and bacon salad (yummm), and Andrew's shrimp. Nikki feels like she's winning over the crowd with her sausage and peppers, but she runs out of sauce by the time the judges roll around. Wah-waww.

Judge's Table: Richard, Stephanie (could she be our first female winner?), and Dale are the tops, with Dale taking it home. In the bottom we have Nikki, Ryan and Mark. Nikki should have made her own sausage and failed to keep enough on the side for the judges, but she's safe (girl has nine lives). Mark was unhygenic and the skewers didn't quite work out, but he's cute and Australian, so he's safe too. In the end, Ryan goes home for not getting the challenge and lacking in execution as well.