Top Chef Masters, S4E10 (the finale).

Today’s chat transcript is up. I apologize to anyone looking for Wednesday’s Sportscenter segment, but I don’t think it’s going to appear online. I’ll tweet the link if that changes.

* So for the finale, each chef had to make a four-course dinner, with an odd theme – each dish had to be the equivalent of a letter, starting with a love letter, then an apology, then a thank-you, then a letter to himself. I never really get these whole “translate an emotion into food” things. Make four awesome dishes, then cook up a story afterwards to fit. The chefs do each get an assistant, a surprise appearance by someone from Chris’ restaurant and a longtime cooking buddy of Kerry’s.

* The judges will be joined by ten diners. Obvious conclusion, made by Chris, Kerry, and me, is that it’s the ten eliminated TCM contestants.

* Chris says the only way to beat Kerry, a classically trained chef, is to put his heart on the plates, which was his hint that one of his dishes would in fact contain heart.

* Kerry does all his shopping at Whole Foods; Chris goes to three places, losing some cooking time but getting more adventurous ingredients. Letting him loose in a butcher shop with a fistful of dollars might make for an hourlong reality show of its own.

* Chris says he hated the smell of tripe as a kid and would run screaming from his grandmother’s house when she cooked it. Now he’s known for offal. Maybe it served as some sort of exposure therapy. Then he makes blood sausage and it looks like a horror movie. I’ve had black pudding, but have never cooked with blood, which apparently is a pretty labor-intensive and, um, messy process.

* Curtis does a side commentary where he talks a lot and says nothing, mostly just saying how either chef could win and whoever doesn’t execute will lose. He’s the Tim McCarver of Top Chef.

* But then Curtis cooks dinner for the final two, which is a great idea, since Curtis was originally a chef but is better known in the U.S. as a TV personality. I’d love to know if this was the producers’ idea or Curtis’; people who love to cook love to cook for others, and I could see Curtis wanting to do something for the two finalists but also to show off his own skills. He made two dishes but the foie gras with figs and Sauternes jelly seemed really clever and interesting. I also enjoyed the snippets of the three chefs’ discussion on critics who don’t have kitchen experience or a culinary education, pointing out that knowledge can be acquired in multiple ways, and (from Kerry) a thought on the challenge of deconstructing a dish in your mind when all you see is the finished product. Obviously, I side with the critics in a sense, since I evaluate baseball players, teams, and even front-office personnel, but never played the game (and couldn’t, in fact). It probably took me longer to learn how to evaluate than it might have taken someone with field experience, but I think I’ve at least figured it out enough to do my job.

* The ten extra diners are all food critics, not chefs, so it’s the toughest set of judges the chefs have faced all season, or perhaps just the biggest bunch of complainers they’ve faced all season.

* This could be entirely editing, but while both chefs look extremely intense in the kitchen, Chris seems like he’s enjoying the chaos, while Kerry just seems stressed. Maybe it’s just their processes. I’m a lot more like Chris personality-wise, at least in the kitchen. If things are going too smoothly, I’m more likely to get distracted by something else.

* Serving time. First course, the love letter: Kerry serves a jjigae (not to be confused with a jugga jigga wugga) with scallops, spot prawns, and gnocchi, earning praise for “smoothness and finesse,” which sounds boring. Chris serves beef heart tartare with foie gras and puffed beef tendon, which is not boring. One critic calls it a “steampunk version of steak tartare.” I don’t even know how to visualize that.

* Second course, the “apology:” Kerry serves a flan of sugar snap peas, prosciutto, morels, and chervil, earning raves all around. The color of the flan was amazing, although I have to admit my first thought was “Shamrock shake.” Chris serves scallops, pancetta piana (pancetta that is cured flat rather than rolled), and sea urchin. Lesley Kama Sutra or whatever her name is calls it the makeup sex. Ruth says it’s sexy. Jane Goldman hates it because she’s celibate.

* Third course, the thank-you: Kerry serves branzino with clam ragout and mustard greens and a little bacon, an homage to his family’s New England roots. The theme so far with Kerry is technical excellence but not a ton of wow factor. Chris serves tripa napolitana with a dark brown streak on the dish to represent him running out of grandmothers house. This earns some of the biggest raves so far around the table.

* Fourth course, the narcissist’s plate: Kerry serves dry aged côte de boeuf (a thick bone-in rib steak), short ribs, swiss chard, and a fennel and potato gratin. Lesley says the frying to crisp the short rib dried it out, which would be criminal, but otherwise gets high marks. Chris makes his “last supper,” a blood sausage with pork-jus poached oysters, and a sunnyside up egg. Francis makes a horribly awkward analogy about swimming in the ocean and getting a back rub from a pig. I believe it’s illegal to even fantasize about that in 13 states. John Curtas calls this embarrassingly awful. No one agrees with him, apparently.

* Critics table: Kerry says the letter to himself was about enjoying something special and rich. Chris says he won’t cook for the critics, but cooks for himself. “When you cook to receive accolades you lose direction and focus.” Isn’t that true when you’re at the top of just about any profession? If you’re cooking for the masses, you need to listen to the customer. When you’re so good that people will pay twice as much for your food, it’s because they’re paying for your vision, or to experience your passion.

* Ruth says she’d never had beef heart tartare before and loved it. Krista loved the poached oysters. Francis liked the reduced jus’ unctuous texture. After the larger group seemed to favor Kerry, the five judges seem to favor Chris. Ruth asks if you want to be comforted or thrilled, while Jimmy Sunshine comments about not wanting to be TOO thrilled, then heads off for his Wednesday-night bingo game.

* The new Top Chef Master is … Chris. I’m a little surprised given the editing of the dinner comments, and Chris seemed to genuinely think Kerry would win. He ends up raising $141,000 for the Michael J. Fox Foundation on the show, and mentions (I think for the first time) that he lost his uncle to Parkinson’s last year after a 34-year battle. The Foundation posted a brief story on Chris’ win, which says that Fox himself called Chris to congratulate him.

I’m skipping Life After Top Chef because October is always so crazy between scouting the Arizona Fall League and watching playoff games, but I’ll resume blogging for Top Chef: Seattle when it starts up on November 7th.