I dedicate this post to two of my Northeast friends, who have nothing in common except that they both know me and they both have the flu – at least one of them has come down with the N1H1 virus, and the jury’s still out on the other one.

I bring both of them up because this week’s “Top Chef” features a chef, Jennifer, who was also sick as a dog, but who managed to whip the rest of her fellow cheftestants in the elimination challenge. It’s beginning to be a little boring this season, because the challenges all seem to be split between four chefs – Jen, Mike Isabella and the Vultaggio brothers. But I’m proud of Jen – not only is she the only woman in that rarified group, but she’s the least whiny among them – she’s harder on herself than on other people, and unlike Mike I., is not inclined to throw anyone under a bus on first impulse. And that makes me love her automatically.

This wasn’t a very exciting episode, even with the gimmick that the chefs were going to be cooking at their palatial chef home, rather than on a campfire or poolside, or in a box with a fox with some lox (Why has there been no Dr. Seuss challenge?) The Quickfire gave Yukon Cornelius Kevin a choice between $15,000 and immunity, and he wisely took the money. Because I already had it spent for him. Although I doubt his choice would have been to pay for Pergo in my condo.

The aforementioned Elimination home cooking challenge was sort of cool because it forced the chefs to consider what home chefs have to go through – namely, trying to throw together something fancy with limited cook space, time and fanciness. Have you ever made gnocchi on a counter the size of a Scrabble board? Of course you have. But the fancy chefestants haven’t, and the fact that they had to do stuff like that made me squee a little like a Jonas Brothers fan. For I am sort of shallow and bitter.

My favorite part of the challenge, other than that it involved chefs like Govind Armonstrong of Miami Beach’s Table 8 handing ingredients to the cheftestants and letting them sort it out, was that it offered me new reasons to play my favorite game this season: Why Mike Isabella Acts Like A Jerk. Today’s example: Getting Robin as a partner and immediately beginning to talk smack about how much better he is than her – he described being “livid and angry” to be paired with her. I wonder how she felt.

Their dish actually came out OK – not excellently, but not in the basement. That was left for Eli and Ashley, who sauteed gnocchi. I don’t know why. The judges were right – anything that messes up the tender texture of those precious little morsels of potato goodness is wrong. Wrong, I tell you. And that means Ashley, who had become a favorite, got the culinary boot.

The food this season looks delicious, but the competition is sort of snoozy. What do you think?