Top Chef Season 19 Episode 3: Who was eliminated and how?

Episode 3 of Top Chef: Houston brought the contestants to the football field to try and score a culinary touchdown. While the second episode took them on a ride with carbs, the third, titled Noodles and Rice and Everything Nice, saw the remaining culinary chefs serve delicious dishes in an all-new challenge.

In this episode, the cheftestants were in for a surprise as there would be no Quickfire (immunity) challenge, and they had to face each other in the elimination challenge. Moreover, the contestants were challenged by All-Star guest judge Hung Huynh, a Vietnamese-American chef who won the title of Top Chef Miami 15 years ago.

The contestant going home on Episode 3 of the show was Sam Kang, who made his potato version of the popular Indian curry dish, vindaloo.

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Details on latest 'Top Chef: Houston' Season 19 Episode 3 elimination

In the elimination challenge, the chefs were required to take on a specific Asian cuisine. Not only would they serve their dishes to Top Chef All-Star judges like Kiran Verma of Houston Indian restaurant Kiran's and Top Chef Miami winner Hung Huynh, but they would also debut their food at Houston's Asian Night Market.

The cheftestants had to draw knives and decide which of the five cuisines (Vietnamese, Indian, Chinese, Filipino, and Japanese) they would be serving at the market. Now that the cuisines were decided, the competitors had to make dishes for 100 people.

The chefs who got the same cuisine would not be working together. They tasted sample dishes from each of the five stations to gain some inspiration for their own street food. As they started preparing, nerves kicked in, and the contestants had their fair share of issues with the challenge.

As time ran out on their prep time, it was Sam Kang who was in trouble. The potatoes, being his most essential ingredient, were still boiling. He still had some extra russet potatoes he could use, but they were still raw with only one hour to cook them.

Thus, he decided to grill them and try to pass them off as a deliberate choice to impress the judges.

While serving the food to the judges, Sam tried to convince them of his choice but to no avail. The patrons were not impressed by the undercooked potatoes, so he was the one to get eliminated.

Sam Kang will get another choice at gaining a spot on the show as he will compete with the previous two eliminated contestants, Stephanie Miller and Leia Gaccione. Viewers will have to wait and see if Kang redeems his chair in the competition or not.

Top Chef: Houston airs every Thursday at 8.00 pm ET on Bravo.