Moving on to Cliff, the judges sample a radish, French beans, and bronze fennel salad with a tomato butter purée. Tomato butter? LOVE. Elia did some raw tuna with onions, spinach, sesame, lime, ginger, and garlic. She explains, "It's more of an Asian seasoning, but I put some olive oil and mustard into it." Lunetta proclaims it, "Delicious." Frank made a scallop carpaccio with a lemon vinaigrette and piled a salad of cucumber and radish in the middle with smoked salmon. Chef Lunetta thinks, "Presentation-wise, it's very pretty." And taste-wise? Son of Sam explains his "crudo" of zucchini and summer squash with a "quick pickle" of peaches, plums, and Kyoho grapes. Michael -- whose name, I noticed for the first time is now "Mike" in the Bravo graphics -- stones his way through his dish. He's entertaining, so let's listen in, "Here I have a, like, watermelon napoleon with, uh, avocado, cilantro, salmon jerky." The NOTpoleon falls over as Lunetta cuts into it. That doesn't bode well for this competition even though I've had the same thing happen to me at countless restaurants. I mean, they're visually appealing and then you cut into them and you make a big delicious mess. I specifically recall that happening to me with a beet and goat cheese napoleon at Chive in San Diego. The slices of beet slipped right away from the chevre layers, so I ended up using my fingers. Not pretty, still tasty.













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