'Extreme Chef' Recap: Episode 3 'Mountain Chefs'

In the “Mountain Chefs” episode of this week’s Extreme Chef, the mountain wilderness of the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area invited all sorts of new mayhem to the three chefs who hailed from North Carolina, California, and Las Vegas.

Christine Avanti is the executive chef at Passage in Malibu, California, a world famous celebrity retreat. Having grown up on a ranch, Chef Avanti said at the beginning of the show that she learned how to drive a tractor before she could drive a car and she was the “superwoman of health food.” Her hope was that the other chefs would underestimate her.

Jean Paul Labadie, the executive chef at Marche Bacchus in Las Vegas, Nevada, spent 14 years training under Emeril Lagasse. Talk about stressful – Extreme Chef should be a cake walk by comparison. Chef Labadie was looking forward to “his time to shine.” But under the pressure of Extreme Chef, would his star fizzle out?

And Jerome Brown, a private chef in Rocky Mount, North Carolina (the home state of yours truly), seemed to have it made. Chef Brown is ex-military and threw down the gauntlet saying he’d cooked in extreme situations from ice storms to extreme heat. But he ended his montage with the kiss of death, saying, “Bring it on,” and that’s just what Extreme Chef did.

The grueling competition began when in the first challenge our erstwhile chefs had to retrieve a basket of fish. Naturally obtaining the succulent seafood was no mean feat. First they had to swim to an anchored kayak. Chef Brown, an early favorite due to his military background, charged into the water. Not a yard into the lake he began to struggle and members of the Extreme Chef production staff had to rescue him. As Chefs Avanti and Labadie gained a massive lead on him, Chef Brown had to wait on land and received an added five-minute delay after the other chefs returned to land with their protein.

Chef Avanti beat the pants off her competitors on her way out to retrieve her fish, swimming quickly through cold water to her kayak, retrieving the basket of fish and anchor, and paddling back like she’d been born on it. Chef Labadie struggled in his kayak, almost losing his paddle and taking what seemed like an eternity to return to shore. Both Chef Labadie and Chef Brown gave Chef Avanti her major lead in the first challenge.

Once they had accomplished what most of us would consider the culinary equivalent of waterboarding, the chefs had just 30 minutes to prepare their own version of a dynamite seafood dish (including filleting the whole fish).

Chef Avanti was thrilled to see that her cooler contained citrus, garlic and green onion – staple ingredients in many delicious seafood dishes. She created a Mediterr-Asian striped sea bass dish with fresh citrus salsa. It looked like Chef Avanti would snag a home run in challenge one until she went to filet her fish. All she had was a boning knife and she struggled through it.

Chef Labadie decided to go with an Asian style dish as well, opting to make a citrus shitake mushroom striped bass. With great ease he railroaded through his filet and got cooking. Chef Brown also excelled at his filet having worked with striped bass before. He decided to cook his bass with a citrus leek reduction and while it looked delicious, when he went to caramelize his leeks, he made a devastating discovery. What he had added wasn’t sugar at all, but salt. Quickly, Chef Brown added more water and broth to reduce the mixture but it was too late.

At the end of the challenge, Chef Brown’s salty mistake was his undoing and he received the lowest marks from four star Chef and Chopped Grand Champion Madison Cowan, who was the guest judge for the first tasting. Chef Cowan praised Chef Labadie’s dish but did say it was a bit under seasoned. He felt the same way about Chef Avanti’s dish.

Although Chef Avanti’s Mediterr-Asian striped bass received praise, Chef Labadie stole the show with his shitake mushroom striped bass, his win providing an advantage of choosing the protein for everyone in the next challenge between duck breast, venison and baby back ribs.

Chef Labadie selected duck breast while Chef Avanti got the baby back ribs which take a long time to cook. Chef Brown was ecstatic to receive the venison because as he said, the recipe was already in his cookbook. But the lovefest didn’t last – host Marsh revealed that the next challenge would occur one and half miles up a steep mountain trail. Marsh also revealed a pile of ingredients under a huge tarp – the chefs could only take ingredients that would fit into the large backpacks.

The next challenge was literally built on the backs of our brave culinary competitors. The chefs were in for another workout as they were required to hike a massive trail with their equipment and ingredients packed in those heavy backpacks. Chef Labadie took what he knew he would need for his dish plus whatever else would fit.

Chef Brown and Chef Avanti grabbed as little as possible with Chef Avanti filling containers to keep the load light. Would it be enough when she reached the top?

Chef Labadie remarked about the noise he made with clanging pots and pans as he navigated up the trail. The steep trail proved to be most problematic for Chefs Brown and Avanti. Even uber-in-shape Chef Avanti was surprised at the steep trail and Chef Brown thanked his lucky stars that he could rely on his Army training to make it up the mountain. Chef Avanti brought up the rear this time.

For this challenge, the chefs were feeding a dozen hikers and the judges. Chef Brown had to sear his venison in a pot, opting to make venison medallions from his venison rack. Chef Labadie, Chef Avanti and Chef Brown only had a hunting knife which Chef Avanti said reminded her of Rambo’s knife from the '80s.

Chef Brown added orange citrus, rice wine vinegar, soy sauce and molasses to his dish for his sauce. Chef Labadie made Israeli cous-cous to go with his duck and remarked about Chef Brown’s early plating. But Chef Brown had a strategy of using the heat in his citrus sauce to warm up the venison medallions and cabbage.

Two unexpected twists included making a dessert, and obtaining the ingredients which were hanging in trees around the cook site. Chef Labadie got there first, grabbing the easiest, low hanging bag. Chef Brown followed suit leaving Chef Avanti the highest more challenging bag. But she got the last laugh – Chef Labadie had little to work with in his bag. Chef Brown got malt chocolate, fruit and powdered milk. Chef Avanti decided to wait on the dessert and try to get her ribs cooked, which seemed to be taking forever.

Chef Brown made a chocolate apple with berry compote and chocolate sauce. Chef Avanti decided to forgo dessert entirely to focus on her ribs. Chef Labadie didn’t begin his dessert either and Chef Brown was the only chef who complied with the dessert instructions.

Judges for the second and last round were the very articulate Chef Cowan and LA Magazine food critic Lesley Bargar Suter. As the hikers and judges bellied up to the wilderness kitchens, each chef described their dishes. Judge Suter was critical to the point of biting (saucer of milk, table two), something the competing chefs didn’t appreciate and expressed in some biting comments of their own during deliberations.

In the end, Chef Avanti separated the woman from the boys with her own elimination. The winner of the second challenge was Chef Brown who excelled in both his savory and sweet dishes. The two remaining chefs had to fulfill the final challenge of preparing that perfect single bite to the tune of $10,000.

Wild boar meat, blackberries, ramps, garlic and lily bulbs were the mandatory ingredients. Ramps are wild leeks that look like scallions, save the broad leaves. The chefs were only allowed to use a Swiss Army knife as a cooking utensil. What’s next, ice a wedding cake with a chain saw? Hmmm, better not give them any more bright ideas.

Judge Suter finally focused on something nice (and in all fairness, perhaps in editing, viewers lost some of her more compassionate moments) when she admired Chef Brown’s speed in grabbing his supplemental ingredients and Chef Labadie’s “cool as a cucumber” approach.

Chef Brown decided to make a wild boar stew while Chef Labadie decided to make a wild boar ramp wrap. As the chefs ribbed each other, host Marsh chimed in and Judge Suter quoted from the tangential book of silly business phrases in recommending the chefs use every second to make sure they didn’t “phone this one in.”

Chef Brown struggled with his heat source, while at the end of the challenge Chef Labadie had time to spare, prompting viewers to wonder if his arrogance would come back to haunt him.

Chef Labadie’s wild boar ramp wrap with wild berry pistachio relish earned praise from Judge Suter but not from Judge Cowan in a turnaround from previous critiques. Chef Brown thought his dish had good balance, but Judge Suter and Cowan felt the dish was all blackberry, too little wild boar and not enough balance of flavor.

In the end, Chef Jean Paul Labadie walked away with the title of this week’s Extreme Chef and $10,000. Tune in next week on the Beach Blow Out episode when the chefs rely on a treasure map to locate their protein and build their own work stations on the way to crowning another Extreme Chef!