Next up is Daniel Gagnon, 25, who is from Long Island City, and is a chef at Babylon Carriage House. Daniel has, and I realize this has become a cliché, unfortunate facial hair. He's got an overly groomed full beard, but then has shaved stripes from the outside of his mustache down his chin, as if to outline a goatee. But then he still has the beard on his cheeks. And he didn't shave the strips all the way so there's a teeny tiny strip connecting his goatee to the hair on his cheeks. You kind of have to see it to believe it. Either way, I've never seen that style before, and there's a reason for that. It's dumb. And way too high maintenance. He seems like a typical Tristate goombah, although his last name seems French, not Italian, so who knows? He makes the bold statement that he's going to win the show. He might want to start out by winning the battle his beard is waging against good taste.

Lauren (remember her? Georgia? Husband in Iraq?) squeals and hugs the next arrival, because they went to culinary school together. Patrick Dunlea, 21, is still a student at CIA. He's really cute in a baby-faced and scrawny sort of way. Patrick thinks some people need years of experience to win the show, but some people just have the skills, and he's one of the latter. The next member of the European Union is Stefan Richter, 35, who was born in Finland and lived in Germany, Switzerland, and other countries. He thinks that if you just cook to make a living, you won't make it. You have to have passion! Of course, he says this in the most deadpan and unemotional way possible.