TNFNS, Season 6, Ep. 2

The Next Food Network Star SPOILER ALERT!!!

Well, how about Aarti? She got over her stagefright in the Giada lasagna challenge, crushed the carnival challenge and appears to have grabbed the lead from Aria. The question is, will she make a good food network claymation figure?

Speaking of Aria, after her rockstar performance last week, she tried her best to go from First to Worst with her forgotten meatballs and talking to the camera as if the audience was a bunch of third graders (which will only work if she convinces the judges that her “point of view” is teaching 8 year olds to cook). Good thing she’s still the apple of Bob’s eye.

Paging Brad, please take the hat off. Seriously, I get that he’s trying to be different or whatever, but does he sleep in that thing? Would he wear it on his show? He should at least have a different hat each week. Maybe try a coonskin cap next challenge? Also, it’s never a good thing when you love your dish waaayy more than the judges do. Especially when they describe it as “inedible”.

And Dzintra. Ah, Dzintra you annoying little Martha Stewart wannabe. What does she have to do to get voted off, spend the whole episode talking to herself? Oh right, she did that. I loved that Bob said to her (and yes, I’m paraphrasing), “Plate your damn food for God’s sake!”, while she continued to yell at herself. I can only assume they are keeping her around for sheer comedy at this point. We’ll probably have to endure a few more weeks of Dzintra.

Poor Doreen. So much potential, but she spent most of the episode furrowing her brow and biting her lip. I thought it was great that the rest of the contestants were shocked that she was voted off. I assume they figured (hoped?) Dzintra was gone. If nothing else, Doreen did figure in the funniest moment of the week, when the judges nicknamed her point of view “Simply Complex” and Bob deadpanned, “Simply Complex - that’s not a show we’re going to do.”

Well, there’s still a long way to go and no Guy Fieri in the mix so far (Guy himself will be on the show next week though). If I were a betting man I’d say Paul is next on the chopping block, but Brianna will most certainly be in the mix. And that, as they say, is why they play the game.