Top Chef Masters: It’s up to Suzanne Tracht to bring it home to L.A.

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Unfortunately, L.A. has only one chef in the running to become the next Top Chef Master: Suzanne Tracht.

Episode 6 knocked out our local extraordinaire of the loup de mer, Michael Cimarusti. His chocolate mousse with ginger won the Aisle Trial quick-fire contest, in which each chef had to prepare a dish with ingredients from one aisle of the grocery store, but it wasn’t enough to pull him through to the Final Six. I’m sure that impressed his pastry chef wife as much as it did the judges.

Cimarusti hit a speed bump in the elimination challenge, though.

Each of the chefs chose a basket of ingredients for one another to cook with. After the oh-so-friendly demeanor of the past episodes, most of the chefs selected ingredients that they knew their matchups were good with. Not Jonathan Waxman, though: He gave Cimarusti some fabulous mandarins, but there were no fins to be found in his hamper.

This was no surprise, as the editing portrayed Waxman to be slightly spiteful toward Cimarusti. He poked at the Providence chef’s young age and lack of experience, and when he called out that he respected Roy Yamaguchi and Art Smith, he went on to say that he thought it was cute that Cimarusti looked up to him in his fledgling chef years.

Funny, though, because Cimarusti showed Waxman and Smith how to use their pressure cookers.

Do you think Cimarusti would have beaten Smith if there was seafood involved? Who do you think Tracht’s stiffest competition will be in the finals?

-- Krista Simmons

Photo credit: Alberto E. Rodriguez / Getty Images