Ah yes. What would Sunday night be without another dull episode of Next Food Network Star!

This week’s episode opened with some stock footage of California. We saw cars driving down the coast, the sun setting over lifeguard towers, and if you looked closely, you could even see Dzintra doing ballerina twirls across the Golden Gate bridge. Save yourselves!

For the first challenge of the day, the contestants had to cook dishes using various peppers, and then present them on camera. Bobby Flay took the opportunity to mention that he “made a career” out of working with peppers. Wow. And all this time I thought he was just a punk with a rich dad.

Giada, who really doesn’t do anything on the show other than stand around and give Serena dirty looks, tried to help out by telling the contestants to “bring the food to life.” Das misunderstood, and immediately started performing CPR on his jalapeno pepper. It didn’t respond. Poor guy.

Brianna fought for the right to use the red fresno pepper, probably only because it matched her red hooker dress. Anyway, once she got situated, she started making some chili chicken skewers. “I’ve got the energy and I’ve got the attitude,” she boasted. It’s just a shame she didn’t have a shirt with sleeves. No one needed to see her clumpy deodorant clinging on to her pits for dear life.

The contestants have really been struggling in front of the camera this season. Tonight was no exception. Das and Brad were boring and lifeless, and I found myself wanting to slap annoying Aria because she started moaning in ecstasy before the fork even touched her mouth. This bitch has been watching too much Rachael Ray.

Brianna won the challenge, because she best described the taste of her food while on camera. Bobby said he enjoyed the “pop” of her fresno pepper. He probably also enjoyed the way her boobs almost “popped” out of her skintight red dress. I’m just saying.

In a related story, Giada’s showing more roots than she is cleavage. What is this world coming to?

Next, everyone headed into the Star Kitchen (corniest name ever) where they were greeted by (gasp!) 3 ACTUAL CHEFS! I’m surprised Susan Feniger, Jonathan Waxman, and Eric Greenspan didn’t spontaneously combust, being so close to Sandra Lee and all. But I digress. For the elimination challenge, the contestants were asked to reinvent the chefs’ favorite childhood dishes. Everyone was nervous, but Serena was clearly the most panicked. She said, “seeing a bunch of chefs in chef coats is terrifying!” Silly Serena. It’s not nearly as terrifying as seeing them in bowling shirts and cheap sunglasses.

For some unknown reason, Das thought it would be a good idea to slather a prime steak with three different kinds of berries. Yeah. It didn’t go over too well with the judges. The whole dish was a bigger bomb than the new Tom Cruise movie “Knight And Day.”

Even worse, when Bobby asked him to describe a prime steak for the viewers at home, Das nervously mumbled: “Yeah, um, it’s a nice cut. Filet is the most tender. Prime is right under that.” Really Das? Nice try, but…….

Brad won “most boring finalist” of the night (it’s no coincidence you get the word DRAB if you rearrange the letters of his name), and Paul won “biggest idiot.” Eric Greenspan asked him to reinterpret steak, so what did Paul do? He went ahead and prepared… PORK. Yeah. That’s what I’m saying. If he was one of the best people to try out for this show, I don’t even want to know who they rejected.

Tom prepared a lamb and potatoes dish for Jonathan Waxman, and told the judges “honest food is the best food.” Tom’s food then told him he had man boobs. Hey, sometimes the truth hurts.

Meanwhile, Herb broke down in tears while presenting his dish to the judges… not because the food reminded him of his awful childhood, but because Susan Feniger just beat him in a push-up contest backstage.

Aarti got the most asinine praise from Bobby Flay for “creating her own pomegranate molasses” – but all the bitch did was BOIL A JAR OF POMEGRANATE JUICE. Are you kidding? If Flay’s that easily impressed, maybe he can come over to my house sometime for a batch of my famous Eggo waffles.

Finally, Serena told a charming little story about “curly haired pests” in her grandmother’s kitchen. Fogelson ate it up, but I was grossed out. To me, it just sounded like grandma needed to call an exterminator.

Later, in the judging room, Herb continued whining and crying about being fat when he was a kid. Bobby Flay wasn’t having any of that shit. He turned to Herb and said, “I know you can do this. Lift your head up and make it happen.” That’s also what Flay reportedly said to January Jones right before she crashed her car last week. OOH! ZING!

The winners (totally by default) this week were Annoying Aria, Awful Aarti, and Boring Brad.

DAS was eliminated this week, mostly because he sucked at everything and his ego was way too big. Well, you know what they say:

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