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Yay Stephanie!!!!! So excited that she gets to open a restaurant. I hear its going to be in Chicago...i'm totally going when it opens.

I love love love that Stephanie won! However, I felt that the episode was almost anti-climatic, as compared with last season's finale which was live and full of confetti and completely overdone. She is the first female Top Chef!! The producers should have seen this coming and not just glazed over it; I almost didn't realize that she actually won.

I'm glad Stephanie won. I think that she was the most consistent out of all the remaining contestants. I think everyone would agree that one of the most important qualities of a good restaurant is consistency.

Hooray Stephanie! And I agree--I was a bit bummed when I saw Richard three-pete his banana scallops, but sweets are challenging if your palate just doesn't bend that way. Tons of kudos to Richard for admitting he choked. It was a noble action, contrasted by Lisa's need to assign winners for each course. I'm glad Stephanie won, and her braised pistachios do sound exciting, but it's been fun daydreaming about Richard's food, and I think I'm going to be searing bananas tonight and glazing ribs with malta this weekend. ;)

I'm glad Stephanie won, but I was a little disappointed in Richard. He grew to be my favorite and he did really whimsical things I never thought would work and somehow did. It was sad to see him choke.

But I think Stephanie won with the lamb dish. If even one component had been off, I think it would have been Lisa's, sadly. Three cheers for braised pistachios!

Also, another thing that struck me was that Lisa pulled out rice pudding again after having botched it, and another rice dish, on earlier episodes. For the sake of the delicious dish, I'm glad she nailed it. And okay, I do think it was brave of her to pull it out again in light of her previous rice disasters.

Totally agree Jaynamo. I thought that this was a completely anti-climatic show. I was almost bored...but overall this was my favorite season (favorite episode was last season when both Bourdain and Despirito were guest judges and you could feel the tension between the two).

It was a total producer's decision: a woman had to win. So when Lisa made it into the finale, it was a forgone conclusion that Stephanie would take it. I agree that it was kind of a yawn, even though Stephanie was my favorite from the begininning.

I found a lot of drama in the finale. I was surprised and impressed to see Lisa show us the chef she could be--not only getting along with her sous chef, but psyched to work with a pro, doing things she'd done before, but doing them well, like the prawns and the dessert, and overall having a sense of calm, and a finally deserved sense of self confidence. She almost won; I don't think ANYONE saw that coming .

I cry foul that they were required to do dessert. Dessert should always be extra credit for a chef.

I felt terrible for Richard. He's a much more talented chef than his meal showed, and I think he put too much time into being clever (e.g., the dish titles) and not enough into making just really good food.

I agree that Stephanie won on the pork, and in spite of her dessert. Lisa really was a challenge; Steph wasn't the shoo in. But I think her meal and her win show what we've seen all along--she's a calm, steady, skilled chef, who impressed quietly with small innovations like the pistachios (shut up, already, Ted!) rather than with big ones like Richard's nitrogen and smoker. That she only won the one quickfire was an index of this, too.

I think the dwelling on the pistachios was an indicator that there weren't many other noteworthy elements to get excited about. Richard's dishes were truly flops and Lisa's dishes were apparently bordering on too spicy and too sweet even though they all flowed together and looked beautiful on the plate.

I disagree with your point on the dessert Girl Detective. Even if desserts are not their forte, they shouldn't go into battle without any weapons. They could have a little notebook with a fruit dessert, a chocolate dessert, a gelatin dessert, a cake, etc. To that, they can inject ingredients that help to reflect their passion for cooking--like Dale's dessert or Lisa's dessert from the finale (I'll give credit where credit is due).

I know they are all talented, even Lisa, but it was a pretty anti-climactic episode.

I'm so glad stephanie won. She was so nice and genuine and usually for reality t.v. that makes you boring and forgettable but she was very likable for me!

Was anyone annoyed by Lisa's overconfidence? The show was interesting for me because I really didn't want Lisa to win and they made it look like a possibility. I thought Richard was going to say he deserved to win, I felt like him saying he choked was him throwing in the towel. Lets say they were thinking of naming him top chef- they wouldn't have been able to give it to him after his own statement.

I totally agree with you DianaRead.

They still could have made him Top Chef and may have wanted to. His admittance of failure gave him no chance. It was a bad move for someone who said they could not accept failure as an option.