Original subtitles

It's time to show us what you're made of.

Nemo: I'm going to win because I'm a badass.

Mimi: I feel like I'm going to be a threat.

Ted: Open your baskets.

Whoa. [ chuckles ]

nemo: This is for $10,000.

Matt: This is a wild card.

Think it's gonna trip up a lot of the other chefs.

Let's go, let's go, let's go, let's go. Oh, no.

If the glove's filled with blood,

then we know it's bad.

Scott: This is very, uh... Snotty.

Yes. Why?!

Coming through. Behind, behind.

Scott: He's only working one-handed.

Ted: Three, two, one.

Mimi: Best food wins.

What you got?

Four new competitors here to race the clock.

Nemo: Being a chef is stressful,

so I like to box as a way to decompress.

I'm nemo bolin.

I'm the chef at saint Monday in providence, rhode island.

Can you grab pea greens and parsley

to finish the claims?

My food is seasonal american.

A lot of salt, a lot of fat, a lot of acid.

Once I step on the line in the kitchen,

everything else washes away.

I'm going to win by being aggressive.

"chopped" doesn't scare me.

I'm mimi weissenborn.

I'm the executive chef at vinatería in harlem, new york.

We've got 25 on the books for tonight,

and I've got about 10 fresh bronzino.

Vinatería is a mediterranean- inspired restaurant

with influences from italian to spanish.

The food I make a super hardy and evokes a lot of soul.

This is our sauce. So this is for the bronzino.

I first stepped into the kitchen when I was 15.

I still work the line. I'm ready to literally throw down.

This is peruvian cuisine.

I'm jose luis chavez.

♪♪

for you, my friend.

I'm the executive chef and owner of mission ceviche

in the gansevoort market.

We serve the best peruvians ceviche.

Spicy, fresh, crunchy.

It hits every note.

When I came to the u.S., I had to prove myself,

and I'm ready to prove again who I am.

Dumpling, short ribs.

I'm matt greiner.

I'm the executive chef

of mofu shoppe in raleigh, north carolina.

We're serving pan-asian cuisine executed as the highest level.

Big flavor, bold,

but also, we try to keep it simple.

Every dish isn't 10 to 15 things.

I've always had the drive to work cleaner, faster,

more efficient than the guy next to me.

I'm going to bring that to "chopped."

♪♪

hello, chefs.

So there are three rounds,

mandatory mystery ingredients for each course.

If your dish doesn't cut it, you will be "chopped."

no way. Not me.

Alright, then.

Let's see what's in store for the appetizer round.

♪♪

open your baskets.

Oh. Ooh.

And you must use...

Look at this baby right here.

...A rabbit terrine...

♪♪

...Guanciale.

Guanciale. Nice.

I see the guanciale and flip out.

I've made it many times.

That I know how to approach real fast.

Ted: ...Spring garlic...

Beautiful.

...And burger meal mix.

Yum.

Mimi: Burger meal mix -- I love you late at night

after a long day when I don't feel like cooking,

but what are you doing in my "chopped" basket?

Ted: Only 20 minutes.

Do your best.

Clock starts now.

♪♪

think you know what you're gonna do?

Feel good? Feel good. Yes.

Chris, scott, you are joined by erik ramirez,

an executive chef specializing in peruvian cuisine.

Welcome. Thank you for having me.

There are some really beautiful flavors

in this basket -- tender spring garlic,

the gorgeous guanciale.

The luck kind of runs out

when you get to the burger meal.

Chris: There's actually 40 varieties of this stuff.

This one is the salisbury steak flavor.

It's all in the manipulation of the spices.

Lot of sugar in this.

Maybe use it as, like, your salt.

But there's also plain pasta in that box that they can use.

[ laughs ]

nemo just looked at the pasta

and threw it all in the garbage

and kept the spice packet.

Alright.

This basket is a lot of meat, it is a lot of savory.

So my approach for this basket

and for this round is to lighten everything up.

I'm going to make a frisée salad with rabbit,

guanciale, and spring garlic vinaigrette.

The first thing I'm going to do is dice up croutons,

add the burger meal seasoning packet for umami,

salty, savory seasoning, then throw them into an oven

and just forget about them for a bit.

How you feel? Good to go.

Chris: That rabbit terrine looks beautiful.

This basically is a savory approach to gelatin.

Yeah, a lot of fat.

Rabbit, mushrooms, of course, gelatin.

That's gonna be super, super rich and creamy

on the palate.

My food philosophy is keep it simple.

This food doesn't need to be more complicated

than it already is.

So I'm going to make a warm rabbit terrine

with spring garlic and glazed guanciale.

First thing I want to do is render out my guanciale...

And then I add the spring garlic.

I'm assuming you're a big fan of guanciale.

I am a big fan of the guanciale.

"guancia" is "jaw" in italian,

so the guanciale is that cured jowls of the pig.

It is really, really flavorful.

Is guanciale smoked or not smoked?

Not smoked.

Matt: Burger meal mix is the wildcard.

I think it's gonna trip up a lot of the other chefs.

I know it's way overpowering and way too salty.

I'm gonna try to stick to the noodles.

Alright, so matt took his pasta,

coated the terrene.

Now he's trying to fry it.

That's gonna melt.

♪♪

mimi: I work in a mediterranean restaurant,

so I do a lot of flatbreads.

I'll do an occasional flatbread pizza.

I'm making grilled flatbread with a rabbit terrine,

guanciale ragu.

Combine good ingredients, grill a flatbread, home run.

Easy for me.

I'm going to get started on my ragu.

I pick out the rabbit.

Guanciale.

Gonna throw a dash of that burger mix

to add a little bit of salt,

and then I take the pasta from the burger meal mix

and throw it in the fryer.

Adds a nice crunch element.

Chris: Mimi is grilling pizza dough.

You gotta make sure that it's cooked,

and it's got to be thin.

And that's the other thing is it looks a little thick.

♪♪

jose luis: This basket is a little bit crazy for me,

and I want to play it safe.

I'm making a spinach salad

with white truffled braised guanciale.

The burger mix thing,

I didn't grow with this in my culture.

So I decide just play safety.

I'm gonna blanch the pasta

to add the soft texture to the salad.

Then I get sweet potato,

and it's going to bring crunchiness to the plate.

So it looks like jose luis is frying sweet potatoes.

Erik: There's actually

over 3,000 varieties of potatoes in peru.

He's actually cooking at a peruvian restaurant, as well.

We'll see how he measures up to you, sir.

[ chuckles ]

so, like, what's interesting about peru, right,

it's the biodiversity of coast,

sierra, which is the andes.

You have forest, then rainforest.

You have all these different microclimates,

so the result of that

is all these amazing ingredients.

You're making me want to go to peru. It's interesting.

It's a great country.

Ted: Alright, chefs, 10 minutes on that clock.

♪♪

nemo: For the rabbit, guanciale, and spring onion vinaigrette,

I take mustard and sherry vinegar

for a bright note.

Before I was the chef at saint Monday,

I had my own restaurant, and unfortunately,

about a year ago, I got very sick.

I was hospitalized for weeks and out of work for months,

and I ended up making the decision to sell the restaurant.

So I definitely want to win today to show

that I'm back cooking at a high level.

♪♪

matt: Rabbit terrine starts to break down in the pan.

The gelatin is dissolving.

A terrine soup, if you will.

As long as I keep the chunks of rabbit meat solid and tender,

I can just serve it rustically.

♪♪

whoo!

Mimi: I want to add a sweet element to this flatbread,

so I take the blueberries.

I cook them down with a little bit of lemon juice.

I decide to go ahead and build my flatbread.

I would argue that pizza dough

is one of those ingredients in this kitchen

that you think is going to be easy to work with.

Yeah. And it isn't.

Mimi: For me, cooking really brings out passion.

I like to really kind of, like, make love to my food,

just like I do my people.

[ laughs ] whoo!

Behind, behind, chef.

Less than five minutes remaining.

Jose luis: The spring garlic,

I decide to give a very nice julienne.

♪♪

I cut myself.

Jose luis cut himself. Ted: Oh, boy.

Here? Yeah.

Chris: And apparently hasn't used his rabbit terrine yet.

So now here's what happens on 20-minute round, right?

Even if you lose one minute,

you've lost 5% of your time.

Oh, my gosh. Let's go. Let's go. Let's go. Let's go.

♪♪

♪♪

oh, my god.

Perfect. Ready to go, chef.

Jose luis is back in action.

It doesn't look like it was a very serious cut.

But that was still almost a minute of his time lost.

Jose luis: At this point,

I didn't even touch my rabbit terrine.

This is not good.

Scott: Jose luis just took some of the rabbit out of the terrine

and put it inside the blender.

So we have a rabbit vinaigrette.

I blend in a bit of pistachio oil...

To add a little nuttiness.

Nuttiness -- nut -- nuttiness.

I'm using words I never used before,

so that's why it's so hard.

♪♪

nemo: For the salad,

having a runny egg yolk is such a great way

to tie dishes like this together.

Got beautiful sunny-side eggs.

Chris: Yes, a nice-looking egg!

[ laughs ] a little bit of excitement.

We got an egg!

Mimi: I'm going to serve a raw brussel salad

on top this flatbread.

Just have a little bit acidity

to tone down the heaviness of the ragu and the meat.

I check on my flatbread.

It seems right, but I'm really not sure about that center.

So I just got to get this flatbread

back into this 500-degree oven.

Two minutes on the clock.

Chefs, make sure you use all four ingredients.

Coming through. Behind. Behind.

♪♪

20 minutes go by like it's nothing.

I see apple, which I know is going to bring some crunch

that it definitely needs.

Ted: One minute to go, chefs.

I'm concerned about jose luis.

Yes.

Ted: Maybe his cut was worse than we thought.

He's only working one-handed.

Erik: Look at the glove.

The glove's filled with blood, then we know it's bad.

Got to hurry up, chefs.

Hit the gas pedal here.

10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1.

Time's up.

♪♪

mimi: I'm pretty happy with my flatbread.

I'm just praying that this baby's

cooked all the way through.

Jose luis: I feel sad

because this is a moment to show who I am as a chef,

and it's not special to look at,

but I hope the judges like the flavor.

♪♪

chefs, mystery ingredients you got for round 1 --

rabbit terrine, spring garlic, guanciale, and burger meal mix.

Chef mimi, please tell us about your appetizer.

Today, I've prepared for you

grilled flatbread with rabbit guanciale ragu

and a little bit of a shaved brussel slaw on top.

♪♪

I love that you went with a grilled flatbread.

I think that was a great idea.

The mascarpone works really wonderfully

with the flavors from the terrine.

The rosemary is a really great touch.

It's delicious.

Scott: I agree with chris.

I think the flavor profiles that you created are fantastic.

Even the little pot with the blueberry really works well

because it's like a pop of bright acidity

that cleans the palate.

Erik: I do like the crunchy pasta from the burger meal mix.

That added a nice contrast,

because the pizza dough is pretty raw.

It's delicious, but it's raw dough.

I can demonstrate.

Chef mimi, thank you.

Thank you.

Next up, chef matt.

Just did a warm rabbit terrine...

With a guanciale and spring-onion glaze.

Figure, like, the burger meal powder mix was in your sauce.

It actually wasn't.

I just wanted to use the pasta.

The pasta buzzed up,

and then it started to dissolve in the pan, so...

Alright. So I'll just take that.

Got it. So that's what's thickened up your sauce a little bit.

Pretty much.

It is definitely pretty delicious.

I really like how you could taste the layers of flavor.

Scott: I think your flavors are great.

You get the spring onions, you get the guanciale.

I think gently warming that rabbit was a good move.

Big challenge for me is

did you really think that you'd be able to fry gelatin?

This is very, uh...

Snotty. Yes.

I mean, it has that mucus-like texture to it,

which even though it's delicious,

it's still mucous-like.

I mean...

Chris: I really love the apple and the mint.

I think it works really well.

But yes, the texture is really difficult to get around.

Chef, do you think you have

any sort of an edge here over your competition?

I would say the fact that I've cooked

french, italian, german.

Now I cook pan-asian food,

my determining factor is just my...

Range.

...Range, my array of different food

that I've cooked in my career.

As long as you're cooking all of those well.

Yeah, they don't turn to mucous.

[ laughter ]

that's a good point.

Next up, chef nemo.

I made a frisée aux lardons

with a warm rabbit spring-onion vinaigrette.

♪♪

scott: You're clearly a very thoughtful chef.

Everything that's going on here,

it's just like the perfect lunch salad.

Thank you.

I love the contrast between the braised rabbit

and the salad and the croutons.

Perfectly cooked eggs.

Great run on the yolk.

You'd be surprised how many bad eggs we get here.

That's the difference between good and great.

It's those little things.

I do like the idea of the rabbit,

spring garlic vinaigrette with the salad,

but you have olive, capers, mustard.

There was just a couple bites

that I just thought were, like, aggressively seasoned.

Yeah.

But if you do eat the egg yolk,

it mellows it out a little bit, which is nice.

Yeah, that was part of the goal.

I agree that this is just on the edge of being salty,

but other than that, I think it's great.

I think it's great.

Thank you.

Okay. Finally, we go to chef jose luis.

I decided to create something very simple,

so I create spinach salad with guanciale glaze

with white truffle and rabbit vinaigrette.

So first of all, it sounds delicious.

It sounds like you made some very nuanced choices

from the pantry.

Um...

But you cut yourself.

And I am looking, and I do see a spatter of blood

on the inside of my bowl.

♪♪

there's some blood on the exterior of this bowl, as well.

♪♪

jose luis: This is not good.

The worst thing can happen is just put blood on my dish.

Not good.

♪♪

♪♪

so sounds delicious.

It sounds like you made

some very nuanced choices from the pantry.

Um...

But you cut yourself.

And I am looking,

and I do see a spatter of blood on the inside of my bowl.

♪♪

so we can't eat this is really the bottom line,

and so we had to chop you.

You dish sounded delicious.

Had you not gotten blood on our dishes,

chances are you'd be moving on

due to the raw state of mimi's pizza dough.

I'm sorry to say, mimi.

You were on the chopping block, but unfortunately,

we never even got that far with you, jose luis,

because we just couldn't taste your food.

And so we had to chop you.

I understand,

and I just want to say being here is a privilege.

Six years ago, I moved to new york,

and my first job was selling pizza for $1.

It was great.

Right now, I own mission ceviche.

I got two locations and a pop-up in brooklyn.

I've actually been to mission ceviche.

The ceviche is really good there.

Thank you, chef. Life is beautiful.

I've got my baby daughter, four months.

Congratulations. Congratulations. Congratulations.

So you came here six years ago, you didn't speak english,

and you worked at a dollar pizza store,

and now you own four restaurants

and a brand-new baby, is what you're saying?

Yes, that's me right now.

Half a finger. [ laughter ]

hopefully, we'll see you back here.

Absolutely. Hope to see you soon, guys.

Thank you. Ted: Thank you.

This for me has been an amazing experience.

So I'm positive right now because I'm growing.

You just have to work really hard and follow your dream.

♪♪

chef mimi, chef matt, chef nemo,

it's time to shake out the nerves

and show us what you're made of.

♪♪

open up your entree baskets.

Whoa. Oh, nice.

And you'll be making main dishes with beer ramen...

What the...?

...Sablefish...

Corn on the cob... Nice.

...And lemon cake mix.

♪♪

[ groans ]

nemo: Looking at all four ingredients,

the sweet fake lemon cake mix feels like the most difficult.

Countdown clock is set at 30 minutes,

and it starts...Now.

♪♪

behind, behind.

Ted: So the beer ramen really looks like

a glass of beer filled with noodles,

but it's actually not beer at all.

Scott: It's a broth with ramen inside

and an egg-white froth on top of that.

It didn't really taste that good.

[ laughter ]

I would probably just use the broth.

Maybe get some dashi or sesame oil and garlic.

That might be right up matt's alley

because he is into the pan-asian cooking.

Matt: When I taste the beer ramen,

it just tastes like a nice pan-asian broth.

Now I just want to add some dashi.

And then I add the cob, which is nice and sweet,

and that'll give a nice burst of freshness to the dish.

For my entree, I'm going to make pan-seared sablefish,

lemon piccata bread, and then my corn and beer ramen broth.

For the lemon piccata bread, I grab the capers.

I seed a jalapeño to add some heat to it

to knock out the sweetness of this damn cake mix.

Ted: Matt is preparing to bake in a muffin tin.

Hopefully, it can get done.

Erik: Hopefully, he's not pouring too much

in those tin molds because it might not cook in time.

Yeah.

♪♪

scott: I am a lover of sablefish.

I love the texture. It has great fat content.

It's really hard to screw this fish up.

You know, just totally delicious.

But that lemon cake mix. What do you do with that?

I think I'd approach that

as, like, my better for sablefish.

I love that idea of battered fish.

Mimi: I have no idea what sablefish is,

but I'm thinking fry this baby up.

I'm making beer ramen and lemon cake battered sablefish.

To make the batter for my fish, I'm taking the lemon cake mix

and I'm taking the beer brine from the ramen.

Chris told me I could have been chopped

from that raw pizza dough,

so I know I got to bring my a game this round.

♪♪

nemo: Corn makes me think of summer

in martha's vineyard, where I grew up.

We sat down most nights together as a family, grandparents,

aunts and uncles were there.

And so I want to take that experience

and put it on a plate for the judges.

For my entree, I'm making corn succotash

and a lemon-cake-crusted sablefish.

So nemo just poured a little bit of that lemon cake mix

right next to his fish.

Looks like he's going to just go straight dredge.

I'm not sure how that's going to work out.

The lemon cake mix is definitely sweet,

but I think the fish should balance out the sweetness.

Alright, chefs, 15 minutes on the clock.

Matt: The piccata cornbread is going to be rich,

so I'm thinking I need a relish

with shallots and some corn and dill.

It's gonna bring brightness

to cut through all that richness.

My food point of view is three ingredients

and the truth.

Keep it simple. Showcase the food.

Showcase the produce that you're bring in.

♪♪

mimi: I'm gonna make a corn salsa

with fresh chopped red onion,

fresh cilantro, a little bit of lemon zest.

It is a nice, fresh take

to cut the fat of the fish and of that fried food.

♪♪

10 minutes to go, folks.

♪♪

nemo: For the succotash, I want the corn to caramelize

to bring out the sweetness,

but also, to that, I add orange bell pepper,

cherry tomatoes, and tomatillos.

I deglaze the pan with white wine,

and I add some of the beer ramen broth to finish it.

I definitely want to win today

because it took a long time to get back to full health,

and it would be a great feeling to show my family that I'm back.

Five minutes left, chefs.

A sauce is always nice with fish,

so I'm making a red pepper puree with heavy cream.

Whoo!

Nemo -- he's a hell of a competitor,

and chef matt definitely has skill.

But I have 15 years of experience in a restaurant,

two years as an executive chef.

I feel like I'm going to be a threat.

Mimi has a concoction in her blender.

Erik: It's actually fine.

Like, one of my go-to sauces for my grandmother

is roasted red pepper,

heavy cream, and cream cheese.

That doesn't sound that good to me.

No, it's actually pretty good. Oh, it is?

Insulting his grandmother.

Scott: Insulting his grandmother.

♪♪

nemo: I want to make a lemon cake beurre blanc

to go with my sablefish.

I reduce white wine and shallots together with basil,

and then I add lemon cake mix with extra lemon juice

to control the sweetness and begin to incorporate butter.

Hey, guys, you're coming up on one minute.

Let's move fast, chefs.

Matt: I pull out the bread.

So of the seven that I made, four came out really well.

And now I'm gonna start thinking about how to plate this dish.

Scott: He's pouring broth over the muffin?

Come on, man.

Ever get, like, soup with, like, bread,

and, like, the bread just sits in there too long

and it's, like, really soggy and, like, kind of --

yes. We're about to have it again, my friend.

Ted: Finish strong, chef.

Come on, guys. 10 seconds.

10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3...

Almost there. ...2, 1.

Time's up.

[ applause ]

good job, chefs.

♪♪

matt: I look down my plate,

and all I can think about is this bread might get soggy.

I'm regretting my decision.

What's the sauce? It's a red pepper.

Mimi: I'm happy, but jose luis got chopped on a technicality.

We all kind of got a free pass, essentially,

so now it's like, "okay, best food wins. What you got?"

♪♪

♪♪

chefs, another intriguing combination of ingredients

in that entree basket -- beer ramen, sablefish,

corn on the cob, and lemon cake mix.

What do we have, chef matt?

Today, we have a pan-seared sablefish

with a piccata cornbread

and a corn and beer ramen broth.

♪♪

I really like the broth.

I like the dill you put in there. Thank you.

So it's like a dashi dill kind of thing on, right?

And the fish is perfectly cooked.

Thank you, chef.

Yeah, it just don't get cooked better than this.

Thank you.

But...The muffins aren't working for me.

♪♪

at all.

And at least in my case, I got a bath sponge.

I wasn't gonna say it, but...

♪♪

I mean, listen, I don't want to make light of your food.

Your food is very good. The muffin's not successful.

The rest of the dish is.

Scott: Yeah, you're a fantastic cook, matt.

But as impressive as your fish cooking is,

is as bad as the muffin is.

You know what I mean?

Yeah. Chef mimi.

I prepared today a beer battered lemon cake sablefish

and corn salsa and a red-pepper puree.

I like the usage of this lemon cake mix on this dish.

You not only solved the processed sweetness flavor,

but it's a great batter.

Erik: It kind of has, like, this, like,

you ever have, like, a fried, like, oreo,

and, like, the exterior of the fried oreo

is, like, that cakey sweet.

It has, like, that thing going on.

Yeah. I mean, it's crispy. It's light.

The fish is really moist and beautifully cooked.

Just stellar work.

But the corn needs a little love.

It needs some spices, need some seasoning,

some olive oil, even.

Scott: [ sighs ] those onions -- I always say this.

I feel like a broken record.

You got to do something with the onions.

It's like an onion farm on the plate.

Otherwise, your flavors are great.

That texture of the batter on the fish is, like --

I mean, it's still crispy. It's still crunchy.

All that being said, too many damn onions.

Okay. Chef mimi, thank you.

Thank you all.

Finally, chef nemo, tell us about your dish.

I made a lemon-cake-crusted sablefish

with a corn succotash

and a citrus and lemon cake beurre blanc.

The old citrus and lemon cake beurre blanc trick.

[ chuckles ]

erik: I like every component of the dish.

Really like the freshness of the peppers,

the corn, the tomatoes.

Kind of like winter meets summer

with the citrus and the tomatoes.

That was nice.

Yeah.

Chris: Great side accoutrements.

Your fish is cooked wonderfully.

It's melting in my mouth.

But this lemon cake mix, when it hits your palate,

you get that beurre blanc.

But there is just this unmistakable, weird aftertaste

that I've been struggling to find a word for

other than just, like, processed sweet taste.

Scott: Yeah, I agree.

I think the key to utilizing those products

is you want them there, but if you embrace it too much,

it throws the rest of the dish off.

Great cooking, though, otherwise.

Thank you.

Feel nervous, not gonna lie.

That lemon cake mix --

really kind of shot myself in the foot there with that.

Hopefully, they'll take the fish cookery itself

to kind of edge me over the other two guys.

I felt proud of my cooking so far,

but my lemon cake beurre blanc was brutal.

♪♪

so whose dish is on the chopping block?

♪♪

♪♪

chef matt, you've been chopped. Judges?

Matt, unfortunately, the risk that you took

with your lemon muffin made it mushy and unappetizing,

and so we had to chop you.

Thank you.

I'm feeling disappointed myself.

I knew that lemon cake is the downfall of the dish.

Sucks to be right. [ chuckles ]

you win some. You lose some.

But at the end of the day, you move on.

♪♪

chef mimi, chef nemo.

Let's check out this final basket.

Mimi: I'm feeling good about going against nemo.

There's no pastry chef in my restaurant.

I'm the sole person teaching desserts to staff,

so I feel like I've got a handle on things, essentially.

Dessert -- it's something

that I always have made my cooks and chefs do,

so I'm looking forward to the challenge.

Ted: Open up.

♪♪

whoa.

And your desserts must feature feta cheese ice cream...

Interesting.

I'm intrigued, but also slightly horrified.

Ted: ...Pears...

This is awesome.

...Blueberry ketchup...

Oh, my god. Please stop.

Please stop doing really weird things that ketchup.

Why?!

Ted: ...Chocolate-covered espresso beans.

Interesting.

30 minutes.

Time starts now.

So, judges, many times we've talked about how delicious

salty things can be with sweet things,

and I think that the feta ice cream,

obviously very salty cheese, you could turn it into

with feta, like, anglaise sauce of some kind.

Erik: A little sweet,

but you definitely get the feta flavor.

It's not as strong as I thought it was going to be,

which is actually nice.

Nemo: Feta ice cream and the pears

have me sort of thinking of this tradition

in new England of serving apple pie

with a slice of cheddar cheese, and so for my dessert,

I make caramelized pear tartlet with blueberry coulis

and a salted chocolate espresso mousse.

I'm taking a risk making this pear tartlet.

I have to get in the oven quickly

or it's not going to bake all the way.

So I crank up the heat.

I need to figure out the blueberry ketchup up.

Weird.

It's very acidic, and it needs a little bit of brightness.

It needs some freshness.

Let's talk about blueberry ketchup, shall we?

It has maybe the texture of ketchup,

and that's about as ketchup-is-y --

ketchup-y -- ketchup-is-y.

[ laughter ]

chris: Yeah, I'll take it.

Ted: Chris.

Save us, chris.

Let's talking about blueberry ketchup.

It doesn't taste like ketchup.

It does, however, have some vinegar,

so it's much more savory.

Taking my lines and he's using it better.

Yeah. I noticed.

Mimi: No matter what was in that basket,

I already made a decision that I was going to make zeppole.

It's comfortable. I've done it before.

And they're going to be delicious.

I'm making a ricotta zeppole with a blueberry crème anglaise

and a chocolate espresso bean topping.

To make my zeppole batter,

I'm going to take the pear and I'm going to microplane it

to create a nice lightness.

I'm taking a risk

cooking these zeppoles bigger than I normally do.

I don't know if they are going to be cooked in the center,

but I really wanted to just put one on a plate and just...

"here you are, judges."

my one ball.

Scott: I love chocolate-covered espresso beans.

Mmm.

I mean, something as simple and delicious

as chocolate and coffee, right?

It just works.

Chris I threw down a couple of handfuls of those,

so we're gonna be doing push-ups and pull-ups

in a couple of minutes.

Ted: Those things are delicious.

Alright, chefs, 15 minutes on the clock.

I wonder if pear flavor would infuse into an anglaise.

Such a heavy, thick thing already.

Kind of hard to see what she's doing.

Gonna go check out what they got going on over there.

♪♪

what's going on? Hey, how are you?

So what's the concept of your dish?

It's a little bit sweet, a little bit savory.

So I'm making, like, a chocolate mousse

with those espresso beans that were covered in chocolate

and then feta ice cream.

Well, I wish you the best of luck.

Thank you.

Okay, mimi, how's it going over here?

It's going good. How are you doing?

Good. Curious to know

how you're gonna use that feta-cheese ice cream.

Basically, what I'm making is a crème anglaise

because I thought it was kind of already the flavor line.

Don't you typically use, like, yeast for zeppole?

So you got to kind of let it -- you can, yeah.

I'm going to say a good prayer here today.

[ both chuckle ]

see, what happens. Yeah.

I wish you the best of luck. Thank you.

Mimi: To make my crème anglaise,

I'm going to combine the feta-cheese ice cream

with the blueberry ketchup.

Adding that blueberry ketchup

is going to add the right amount of tartness

into that feta ice cream to tone it down a little bit.

Ted: Mimi has definitely befriended the fryer.

I have a feeling she leans a little heavily on it, but...

Three rounds of frying food is way too much.

♪♪

ooh.

I give nemo a side eye, and I realize he's doing tarts.

And I'm like, "okay, nemo,

pulling out all the stops, my man."

also a very hard thing to make

in a short amount of time and under pressure.

Nemo: I pulled the pear tarts out of the oven.

The edges are maybe a little bit darker than I want.

Oh, whoa, hold on.

Two of them are a little dark.

That's okay. He only needs four.

Dark everywhere, actually.

Less than five minutes to go, chefs.

Mimi: Heard that?

This is for $10,000.

I'm definitely thinking back to mimi's grilled pizza dough.

If I make a mistake like that,

I'm definitely going to get chopped.

♪♪

♪♪

nemo: I look at the pear tarts.

They're a little burnt on the edges,

but it's definitely better

than having a soggy, raw dough, like mimi's raw-dough situation.

I have to just go with it.

Okay, chefs, two-minute warning right now.

♪♪

mimi: I taste a zeppole.

I don't really taste the pear,

so I'm going to create a raspberry-pear compote

to really highlight the pear ingredient.

Nemo, what do you got in that food processor?

Almonds, and then I had the espresso beans in there already.

Yeah, I love that. Yeah.

This round feels a little bit more hectic cooking desserts.

It's not my day-to-day activity.

Here we go, chefs. Final seconds of the final round.

10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1.

Time's up.

[ applause ]

nice job.

What did you make? Beignets?

No. Like a zeppole.

Mimi: Everything's there. Zeppoles look crispy.

Maybe not my best dish aesthetically plated,

but I know my flavors are -- pow, they're there.

Nemo: I'm happy with it.

I wanted to push it a little bit and show the judges

that I could cook all the way through

and that this dessert is definitely worth $10,000.

♪♪

♪♪

ted: Chef mimi and chef nemo,

for your final faceoff in the "chopped" kitchen,

you made desserts with feta-cheese ice cream, pears,

blueberry ketchup, and chocolate covered espresso beans.

Chef nemo, what do we have?

So we have a caramelized pear tartlet

with a blueberry ketchup coulis

salted chocolate and espresso mousse.

♪♪

first of all, lot of good, delicious things happening here.

The mousse specifically is just really well-done.

I never would know or guess

that there was any feta involved in here,

but there's a really pronounced saltiness to it

that works beautifully.

But here, you've got to take four basket ingredients

and make a cohesive dish,

and I feel like you gave two finished desserts.

And they don't really complement each other, either,

which is a big, big pet peeve.

Erik: I agree with chris,

but I thought the mousse was great.

I thought it was really decadent and rich.

Loved the textures on top.

Surprised that the tart came out as good as it did.

Mine was slightly burned, but not in an off-putting way.

I really like the flavor

and the texture of the blueberry ketchup.

By taking the fresh blueberries and adding that to the ketchup,

I think that's a great way to utilize that ingredient.

I like the usage of the pear.

I think it's smart, but I think that

to their point, it's not integrated.

Thank you.

Chef nemo, thank you. Chef mimi, what do we have?

Today, I have for you

a ricotta zeppole with a blueberry ketchup

feta ice cream crème anglaise with a pear-raspberry compote,

and then also shavings of the espresso chocolate beans.

♪♪

erik: I was expecting, like, a zeppole, zeppole,

but I really don't mind, like, the texture.

It has a kind of, like, a --

it's more like a ricotta. Yeah, exactly.

The only thing I missed was I wish

I could taste more of the pear.

I'm surprised.

Like, I saw the amount of compote and I thought to myself,

"that's not going to be enough," but it is strong enough

that it gives you a nice little zest, a little pop.

I'll simply tell you that the ricotta fritter,

which I've I'm going to call it, I think it's great.

I love it. I really do.

But I'm not getting any pear anywhere.

I almost wish you'd taken that ice cream

and added some fresh blueberries,

some fresh pears, maybe sauteed them quickly.

I agree, but I like the texture of this a lot.

Fluffy, palatable -- really good move.

Ted: Chef mimi, thank you. Thank you.

As we said at the start,

presentation, taste, and creativity --

the judges will consider every plate you cooked.

Thank you, chefs.

♪♪

I really love the cooking

that these two chefs have done today.

Chris: I really like nemo.

He started with that appetizer, gave us, like,

a frisée aux lardons with a perfect sunny-side-up egg.

Erik: I thought nemo's salad was good,

but it wasn't balanced.

I thought it was too sharp in flavor.

Very acidic. Capers, olives.

Capers, a lot of vinegar in the vinaigrette itself.

Right.

Actually, out of the two first courses,

I actually enjoyed mimi's better

because her pizza tasted delicious.

But there's just no getting around that dough was under.

You could still pull it and form another pizza with it, you know?

In the entree round, nemo had a perfectly cooked piece of fish.

Was flavor-forward. The fish was beautiful.

And then he tried to make the lemon cake beurre blanc.

Which he fell short on because

it had, like, that lemon artificial sweet flavor to it.

Mimi fried a perfect piece of fish,

and she made an incredible batter with that lemon cake mix.

Yeah, I thought it was the best utilization

of that hard ingredient in that box.

It was complete redemption, as far as I'm concerned,

for that pizza dough, but then she had the corn.

It was like she did half the recipe.

It just needed more nuance. It needed more love.

They were basically tied going into the dessert round.

Then who's the winner here?

♪♪

nemo: I mean, I'm definitely worried.

The judges told me that my dessert wasn't cohesive,

but I think I outcooked mimi.

She had the raw-dough situation.

Overall, my cooking really stood out.

♪♪

mimi: I'm going to win "chopped."

it was a really close competition today,

but I think throughout, my flavors came together.

I came, I saw, I conquered.

Like, give me that money.

So whose dish is on the chopping block?

♪♪

♪♪

chef mimi, you've been chopped. Judges?

Chef, first of all, it's a pleasure having you here.

You're a phenomenal cook, and you showed it all day long.

In your appetizer round, the pizza was really undercooked,

and in your main course, that fish was so beautiful.

But the corn -- it just needed more flavor, needed more love.

And then in the dessert, ingredients that we really

couldn't identify, like the pear.

And unfortunately, those are the reasons

why we had to chop you.

Thank you. Thank you so much.

I don't agree with the judges' decision,

but it made all the way to the final round.

There's still a lot of great momentum to move forward on.

Ted: And that means, chef nemo bolin,

you are the "chopped" champion.

You beat out three other highly skilled chefs

to take home the $10,000 prize.

Congratulations.

[ applause ]

it's been a long road, and from a year ago, you know,

I didn't necessarily expect to be here at all.

So to come back and then to persevere

and to win feels amazing, really awesome.

Nemo: Winning "chopped" feels amazing.

I wanted to prove to myself

that I could still cook at a high level,

and I wanted to prove to everybody else that I could.

And I did.

♪♪