Each week we'll watch Aragona chef Carrie Mashaney represent in the show's New Orleans season.

Previously, on Top Chef: Cream cheese craziness! "Gloopy and soupy" chicken!

Okay, Top Chef. Are you messing with me? I thought it would be kinda fun to recap Carrie Mashaney’s adventures on your crazy show. Except, it’s been weeks and we’ve barely seen her.  And not to overthink this, but I notice she’s always hanging out with Nina--the unabashed alpha dog in this competition. Granted Carrie's performances recently haven't hit any major, camera-friendly high or low points, but come on. Can it be you are editing Carrie out now because she’s a major contender down the road? I can’t handle your mind games, Bravo.

Where was I? Oh right, this episode. Nick comes down with strep throat and stays behind to recover while the rest of the chefs go meet jazz trumpeter Kermit Ruffins and his madras pants. The quickfire is all about improv. Which is a fancy way of saying it’s musical chairs with Kermit playing the trumpet. Chefs march around various stations, stop when the music stops, and continue cooking whatever dish awaits them. Carrie starts a cabbage salad with crispy chicken skin…and that’s the last we see of her. Literally she is the only chef whose dish we don’t see during the quickfire judging. Brian wins. Moving on.

The elimination challenge: Put on a potluck dinner for Kermit and a bunch of musicians. The chefs make their own teams; Nina and Carrie immediately zero in on each other (see what I mean?) and add Carlos and Stephanie to the mix.

GUYS! CARRIE IS ON THE SCREEN. FOR MORE THAN THREE SECONDS. Her group decides to go upscale Italian. Carrie suggests fried artichokes. When talk turns to dessert, Carrie’s teammates just kind of go silent and look in her direction. Carrie enthuses that dessert will set their team apart.

Meanwhile, back at Whole Foods, Nick bugs Travis on the phone so he can armchair fish shop from his sick bed. Man, you know what sounds good? Fish made by someone with strep throat.

That night the chefs go to a bar to watch Kermit play. Carrie does some goofy second line-style dancing and it’s very cute.

Cooking commences the next day. Carrie’s team serves up Stephanie’s fried baby artichokes, Nina makes gnocchi again, and Carrie and Carlos do a summery tiramisu with goat cheese, pistachios, and nectarines.

Back in the stew room, the TV fires up a live vote count in the Conlin-Sawant city council race random judge Sue Zemanick, exec chef at Gautreau's, saying that Carrie’s tiramisu “really brings everything else down.”

A horrified Carrie mouths some mild obscenities, certain that knife-packing is imminent. Ultimately the teams’ performances are pretty close and it sounds like anyone could be on the bottom. Tension = mounting.

The winner: Carrie’s team! And specifically Stephanie for those artichokes. Let us note that those seemed to be Carrie’s idea. After that withering tiramisu commentary, the only feedback Carrie gets from Tom is maybe a little more sponge cake, and that it needed the traditional coffee note.

The loser: The gray team seemed an imminent disaster from the start. Nick was deathly ill, Brian has immunity, Travis has some Vietnam issues, and Patty has consistently struggled. She’s sent home for forgetting to add some much-needed chili threads to a boring watermelon salad. When she returns tearfully to the stew room, all the other chefs are like, “yup.”

Line of the night: “I’ve learned to feel like shit all the time, until they tell me not to.” Rockabilly Sara is finally getting the hang of things.

Minutiae:

• Man, Stephanie really likes artichokes. And she's come a long way from getting sent home in the first episode of the Seattle season.
• In case you missed Justin’s grits recipe: “milk, water, and a f*$cking shit ton of butter.”
• Why was Tom the only judge not sweating up a storm when they showed up at Kermit's bar to sample the potluck food? That man has magic powers.
• Once again, the Times-Picayune has a nice breakdown of who's who and what's what in this episode.