In article >,
sf > wrote:

> On Wed, 03 Feb 2010 13:25:58 -0500, Kate Connally >
> wrote:
>
> > Actually, they did. The chef erased it from the blackboard a short
> > while after they started preparing the dish. If they had copied it
> > into their notebooks at the beginning they would have been okay. But
> > they weren't told the recipe would be "taken away" so they would have
> > assumed they could continue to refer to it as they worked.
>
> I didn't see that one.

Apparently not.

>In the episodes I saw, each person had their
> own recipe on their own recipe card and it wasn't taken away... they
> just didn't refer to it as much as they should have. IMO: the erased
> recipe was an object lesson in "you can't make the dish if you haven't
> memorized the recipe and you never refer to it. I guess the chef's
> should have articulated the concept behind why they erased the recipe
> better

It was pretty obvious why they suddenly erased the recipes, especially
since they had always left them up before, and there was an expectation
they they would be there for reference while cooking. They were trying
to "break" them, to get them to start crying and totally lose it.

> so the audience wouldn't feel so sorry for the contestants.

The "coaches" made a big point of asking the contestants, more than
once, if they had read the recipes. After getting several "yes"
answers, the coaches then erased them.

--
Dan Abel
Petaluma, California USA