‘Top Chef: New Orleans’ preview: Nick vs. Carlos in the great oven war

It really is not often that you see contestants on “Top Chef” directly going after one another, mostly because so much of the competition is based really on your own performance. Since you are solely responsible for the food that you put up, there is always a way to ensure that you are doing and serving the right thing.

This is all what makes the sneak peek below so surprising to us, since you are looking at a chef in Carlos who does something that’s never really appreciated by the judges: Throwing another chef under the bus. The contestants are all serving food in somewhat of a line, and he blames Nick for it taking him so long to get a dish out to the judges. Why? He claims that Nick “stole” his oven to warm his plates, which in turn has him having a difficult time getting food together quickly.

The difficult thing here is that we’ve really liked Carlos all season, and we’d probably enjoy his authentic Mexican cuisine probably more than anyone else in the competition. But calling out another contestant? Weak move. He should have been more assertive in making sure that he had his food cooked quickly; the judges are going to remember this. Not only that, but Nina’s reaction to what he did in a confessional serves as some pretty great evidence that this sort of behavior is frowned upon by most of the other contestants.

Still, we don’t feel like either Nick or Carlos are going to be in any real trouble. These two will probably be among the top five or six in the season along with Nina and possibly Carrie and Stephanie. There seem to be a few other chefs right now who are just skating by, and haven’t really done much of anything to impress just yet.

Who do you think is to blame here for oven-gate, and would you be more likely to not enjoy Carlos’ food when he blamed another contestant for the delay in serving it? Share below, and take a look here for a full review of this past “Top Chef: Last Chance Kitchen” showdown.

Photo: Bravo