MONDO EXTRAS

Andy reads a fan question about Colicchio's Sniff 'n' Sneer asks if Clay was nervous when Colicchio checked in on him. We get a flashback of Clay's shaky hands arranging his dish for his first and last Elimination Challenge. Clay admits to be so nervous he was "shitting" his pants. We now move into a montage of the various ways the judges have been the judges, and how we have learned so very much from them. For instance, with the heading of "Chefs work better when medicated," we get the judges reacting to Mikey cooking under the Vicodin influence. Then there's "Tom eats like he's on Top Surgeon" and we get clips of Tom carefully dissecting his food. Gail gets treated to "Gail flaunts her culinary knowledge" and we are reminded that she said awe-inspiring things like, "Great salads take a lot of imagination" and "Food is for eating." There are a mass of Colicchio clips where he's talking about "finger-pointing" and also the inevitable, "This isn't Top 'Fill in the Blank.'" Back in the studio, Andy wants to know about Colicchio's fork skills. Colicchio shrugs that he never noticed it before, and Padma jumps to his defense saying Colicchio was dividing up food for the other judges. Not every time, Padma. Did you watch those clips or were you getting busy with your Visine? Gail finalizes with, "He's trying to be dainty," and I have to love her for putting the "dainty" and "Colicchio" together in my head. With lace gloves. And a teacup.

Another fan wants to know if the judges know who's going home ahead of time, because it doesn't appear they spend too much time deliberating the issue. The judges all shout this down and say it really takes a lot of time. Colicchio admits that he goes in with the idea of who he thinks should win and then they all have a debate about it. Ted Allen turns the question to the cheftestants, asking if they ever thought a decision was flat-out wrong. Sandee says she was shocked by the decision to send her home and again we get the argument that she poached her lobster tail and didn't really use the grill to cook it. Sandee wants to know why they judge every episode on its own and don't take all past performances into consideration. The easy answer from the judges is, "That's what we've been told to do."