The judges on Chopped are seriously mean. Alex Guarnaschelli may have cried in last week's episode when the winner broke down himself, but otherwise she's a steely bitch totally unlike her demeanor on The Cooking Loft. It also seems like even though the cockiest chefs on Top Chef are the ones that tend to do well, the most confident ones on Chopped are booted early on; they generally get burned (ho, ho) by the time limitations.

Continuing to clean out the fridge, I made a crustless quiche today based on a Veggie Times recipe using a pile of fresh(ish) spinach, some green onions I didn't know I had, and the rest of the pico de gallo (it's finally all gone!). A little on the bland side mostly because there's only a 1/4 cup of shredded parmesan when most quiches are much cheesier, but this is a good basic recipe into which you could throw all kinds of leftovers to use them up.

I'm hanging at home today because the property management is doing their periodic inspection of smoke detectors and pipes. Because they need access to the bathroom, I can't just lock up the cats and there's no way I'm sticking them in their crates all day (the time window is 9.30 to 4.30) so I'm here so the cats don't freak and scuttle out an open door. It's nearly 2.00 now and they haven't been by yet, so I made the quiche for lunch and am getting caught up on soaps while I monitor what's going on at work via email and IM.

Shangri-La update: Not hungry, had trouble figuring out what to have for dinner last night and lunch today

While I like Chopped, the judges have made two decisions lately that set some dubious precedents. On last week's show they were willing to overlook one contestant's not using all the ingredients, and on this week's episode they let pass the chef who dropped his protein on the floor before serving it. Now any contestant who makes a convincing case for "forgetting" to include an ingredient can conceivably get by with not using one of the oddball ingredients that he can't make fit into his dish, and dropping meat on the floor is just a flat-out health hazard. Gordon Ramsay would have yelled his head off and possibly barfed.

On the other hand, seared watermelon sounds really good ...if I'm ever hungry again.