Week 4 results: All about the skill

Wow, going from last place to first in one week, I soared ahead by choosing Richard as the winner and the contestants not fighting. Though with 25 points up for grabs each week, my now total of 19 for the season really doesn't put me too far into the lead. Although, if people keep skipping weeks, it doesn't really help them (Ahem, Julia and prettypants namely since they are still in a tie for second place with LookGirl even though they didn't play this week.)

Also, LookGirl thought it would be a good idea to give everyone who tied in the first week a win, I could go either way, so I'm going for it and as an update from last week: I have two wins and everyone else who has been playing has one win. Basically, long story short on all of this, it's still an open game, so get all your friends to join. And on to the results...

1. The quickfire challenge this week was actually kind of fun and really showcased who the real, trained chefs are and definitely separated the winners from the losers here. They had to prepare a vegetable platter showcasing at least three different techniques and I do have to say, so of them looked delicious. Dale won this one with a vegetable sushimi plate (pictured at left), but with Richard right on his tail (though the guest judge was his former employer...)

2. The elimination challenge was an odd one, with teams of two (and in the case of Andrew, Richard and Dale, three) creating one course in a 6-course meal with each a different movie theme. The movies in general were pretty lame, but latter group pulled it out, even with their terribly odd smoking technique, with "Willy Wonka" and their creative way of combining ingredients you wouldn't normally put together — aka. white chocolate and wasabi, which Zoi said couldn't taste good. Um, she was wrong! (pictured at top with recipe here)

3. Zoi almost got sent home again, and I really wish she would just go home. This time, Manuel unfortunately got the ax — though I don't think it was really his fault and Spike should have been the one to take responsibility here for the Vietnamese dish (pictured at right), Manuel was not ever really a standout chef and would have gone home sooner rather than later anyway.

4. Glad we switched out the question since Gail wasn't on again. But there was no fight. We do see in the previews for next week that there is an all-out screaming match and even tears, so anyone who gets this wrong we know clearly doesn't read this!