"Top Chef" Recap: Episode 4.10 "Serve and Protect"

Quickfire: The salad days of Top Chef.
Elimination: Bad cop, no doughnut.
Padmaism: "Bring salad's sexyback."

Another one bites the dust — As the chefs prepare for the day's challenges, Stephanie reflects on Nikki's exit.

Stephanie: It's really sad to see Nikki go down in flames. You know the stakes are high, and at this point the chefs lefts are at a really high level.

Everyone is still tired from being up 40-plus hours straight on the wedding-from-hell catering marathon. The boys' egos, in particular, are still bruised. Despite the hug-out, Spike and Dale aren't going to take advantage of California's newly legalized same-sex marriage anytime soon.

Spike: Dale is a little bitch. His "I'm not here to make friends" routine, why would you want to be the outcast and act like an asshole?

Um, takes one to know one?

Dale, in the meantime, doesn't care that the rest of the house thinks he is an ass. He is focused on the task at hand. That task is apparently putting as much hair product on his head as humanly possible.

I swear, now that lesbo-hawk rocking chefbian Jennifer is out of the competition, the men in the house use more styling products than the women.

So, who comes along to buck the trend of tiredness and tension? Oh, come on, you know it's Andrew.

Andrew: Everyone in the house is all beat down — except for me who is still all crazy. I woke up today with a f---ing fire inside my stomach. Like, either I am going to stab somebody or I'm going to make some amazing food.

Whew. Am I relieved he said "fire" instead of what else he could have woken up with in the morning. Cough, culinary boner, cough. Moving on. Quickly.