As we count down the hours until episode 7 of Top Chef: Las Vegas let us take a moment to look back and honor its most recent exile, Chef Ron Duprat.  His childlike wonder delighted us through half a dozen episodes, and although at times it seemed he didn’t know how to make most dishes, and often appeared completely lost, you have to tip your cap to a man who walked around the Vegas desert asking the other contestants for a sword.  Why he needed a sword to make a coconut lime tuna ceviche we’ll never know (we’ll also never really grasp what a coconut lime tuna ceviche is), but you have to appreciate his thinking outside the box (or maybe the sword was intended for his universally reviled Haitian Mojito.  Again, why he’d need a sword for that…oh, maybe he meant like those little plastic swords for cherries that are sometimes used instead of toothpicks).  But, despite Ron’s innovation, he was unable to survive a disappointing deconstructed paella (or as judge Toby Young calls it, pa-ella, like the Rhianna jam. Pa-ella, ella, ella) even though paella is a dish Ron claims he makes everyday in his restaurant.  As his self-proclaimed vice was coming to the US from Hati in a small boat, methinks Ron was a little confused during some of the challenges, and this was pretty obvious when Eli and Kevin tried to explain what deconstruction means.  I think it broke Ron’s brain.

Ron, your limitations be damned!  We toast to you with a disgusting Mojito.  Without you the incidence of red Crocs has been reduced by a stunning 100%.

Luckily, the saturation of tattoos remains at record levels.

Nice.

No word yet it Reginald VelJohnson will play Ron in the Top Chef Vegas movie, but I hear they are in talks.