Top Chef ™
Baker:
Season:
Week:
Challenge Type:
Potato Croquette, Cheese Curds and Beer Gravy
Chef Manny: " lived in ten different cities, but I have never lived in the midwest. I only know two dishes with cheese curds, poutine, and fried cheese curds. So I go with poutine with a potato croquette, cheese curds, and scallions. Good old pork fat."
Chef Manny (during prep): "I'm going to put the cheese on top. I don't want the croquettes to be gooey. I want to be able to fry them without them falling apart. I'm going to press them in between two sheet trays, and I'm going to let them cool down overnight, and cut them tomorrow, bread them, and fry them."
Chef Manny (presenting to judges): "We have a potato croquette, cheese curds, and beer gravy.
Kirsten Kish: "So there's no cheese curd in the potato?"
Chef Manny: "No, there's no cheese curd in the potatoes. Instead of having french fries with curds and gravy, I'm having potato croquette.
Judges (behind the scenes)
"I just wish that Manny had incorporated the cheese curds in the dish. "
"It's really salty. This gravy's good. I like it. Not too thick. It's really flavorful."
"I'm really disappointed that the cheese curds are just on the plate. There's no effort to even incorporate it into any kind of the dish. I didn't think we were going to get them just out of the bag."
