Top Chef Texas Cooks In Tim Love's Lonesome Dove Western Bistro Where Dakota & Nyesha Are Sent Home For Raw Venison

Tim Love Drinking Tequila with Padma

That is Padma on the left, Tim Love in the middle, and Formerly Fat Chris on the right, during the Quickfire Challenge on this week's Top Chef Texas.

The Quickfire Challenge this week had to do with choosing a specific Don Julio tequila selection and somehow making it taste good with some food item of the chef's creation.

Tim Love and Padma then sampled the tequila wares, taking shots of tequila as they did so, with each sampling. By the end of the sampling Padma and Tim did not seem too tipsy.

Ty-Lor, he of last week's BBQ steak cut hand disaster, won the Quickfire. But no Immunity. The pain of the lack of immunity was somewhat mitigated by winning $5,000.

For the Elimination Challenge Tim Love flew in some of his chef friends for Game Night at his Lonesome Dove Western Bistro in the Fort Worth Stockyards. The chefs were paired with whoever they were standing next to.

That had Heather and Bev cooking together. Heather being the Big Bully who picked on Beverly last week, but won a new car anyway.

The chefs were told what game they would be cooking. Wild things like quail, venison, elk and duck.

And that they would be cooking in the kitchen of Tim Love's Lonesome Dove Western Bistro.

This is the first time whilst watching Top Chef that the cooking took place in the town I am living in and in a restaurant with which I was familiar.

I thought to myself, Lonesome Dove is not very big, how are they all going to cook there? Turns out, the size and lack of air-conditioning of Tim Love's kitchen did turn out to be an issue with the sweating chefs.

On his Bravo Blog, judge Hugh Acheson had this to say about Tim Love and his kitchen, "Time to get to Ft. Worth. Tim Love owns this town. It’s a great honky-tonk town. The tiny kitchen was about 150 degrees and the chefs are vying for space in an already emotional clusterf---ed space."

We only saw a short flash of the Fort Worth Stockyards before we entered the Lonesome Dove Western Bistro. We saw no Cattle Drive down the Stockyards main drag, no cowboy on a horse.

The chefs were tasked with judging each other's cooking, deciding who the 3 worst teams were, with the regular judges judging who got told to pack their knives and go.

I am liking Top Chef Texas. But, I am not liking all the team challenges. When do we get to the part where the chefs are judging solely on their own cooking?

And this week's teaming was the most unfair. Double elimination. Worst team totally goes. Dakota told Nyesha she was a whiz at cooking venison. Nyesha trusted Dakota. Nyesha's part of the dish was not criticized. Both were told to pack their knives and go due to Dakota's undercooked venison.

Meanwhile, Quickfire winner Ty-Lor, teamed with Edward, cooked quail, deemed by Acheson as the best dish, to him, of the season, giving them the win. And $10,000 to split. This was a good payday for Ty-Lor.

Next week the chefs leave the Dallas Fort Worth Metroplex and head to Austin. I hope it is not another team cooking challenge.

American Idol: Casey James Makes Final 3 Along with Crystal Bowersox & Lee DeWyze

The American Idol judges, or whatever the proper name might be for the goonballs who make comments after one of the singers sings on American Idol, have thrown the Cool, Texas boy, Casey James, under the bus so many times, who would have ever predicted he would be one of the last 3 standing, in this, the lamest season of American Idol yet?

Actually, in my tone deaf view, Casey James is the only one of the remaining 3 who does seem, sorta, Idol-worthy.

Even my aforementioned tone-deafness can detect that sometimes Lee DeWyze goes way into wrong note mode.

I know she's been pimped from the start, but to me, Crystal Bowersox, nice girl may she be, just seems really generic. Previous seasons of American Idol I don't think she would have gone so far. And, tattoo bigot that I am, I'm really offput by that monstrosity she's got painted on her back.

I think Michael Lynche really overstayed, and should never have been saved. Seeing a song from Free Willy, a movie about a whale, seemed perfectly ironic.

The final 3 now get the American Idol cliched, contrived hometown visits. Casey James' hometown visit will be a visit to his new hometown, Fort Worth. He will be in a parade down Exchange Avenue in the Fort Worth Stockyards, at 4pm, tomorrow, Friday, afternoon.

The Fort Worth Stockyards is about 9 miles from my abode. Am I motivated to go videotape and photograph this? I don't know. Years ago, I went to Burleson, hometown of the first American Idol, Kelly Clarkson, to witness the macabre scene outside the theater that was premierring her movie. It was all so contrived and fake. But amusing to watch.

I'll see if I can motivate myself to go to the Stockyards tomorrow afternoon to see the kid from Cool, Texas.