‘Top Chef: Last Chance Kitchen’ review: Can Brian Huskey stop Louis Maldonado?

“Top Chef: Last Chance Kitchen” may as well have been retitled “Louis’ Kitchen” so far this season. The guy has dominated, and he’s never come across as being stressed out, nervous, or at a loss of what to do. It’s one of those things that makes you wonder how in the world a guy this good was sent out of the main competition in the first place.

The most entertaining them about him this week against Brian Huskey was just watching him cook. It was methodical, deliberate, and like an artist painting a masterpiece. It was like there could have been streakers and a marching band in the room, and he wouldn’t have flinched. The entire task was cooking with skin and bones, otherwise known as the stuff that Brian didn’t have on his chicken breast in his last chance.

While we thought that the edit favored Louis since Brian kept going on about how amazing he was, both of the chefs involved really did a knockout job here. There were no bad dishes, since Brian was told that he created the best thing that he did the entire season. Heck, it would have probably been enough for him to win 99% of the battles in this show’s history. The problem is that Louis apparently cooked Tom’s favorite dish of the entire season, and it looked just as good as it probably tasted.

Okay, so the one problem that we have with this episode as a whole is simple: Louis saying at the end that Tom “finally understands” what he’s doing, and what he’s capable of. It seems pretty obvious that Tom understands, given that you’ve WON seven straight of things already! We don’t really think that Tom’s approval of him is in doubt whatsoever.

Now, Louis holds the record for consecutive “Last Chance Kitchen” wins, and with one more victory, he is back in the competition in Maui. Given who is left this season, we’d be pulling if we were him for either Nicholas Elmi or Carlos Gaytan to walk through those doors. After all, he could take down either one of them if their recent struggles continue. Grade: A.