The 12 Days of Bitchmas -- Day Four: San Francisco Chef Emerges from “The Baths” Conspicuously Ungay, Pleads Not to Be Hated Because He's Beautiful

Jean Cocteau once wrote that “les privilèges de la beauté sont immenses,” but no matter how great the privileges of beauty, we almost—and it may simply be old age, possums, or a touch of the black bile—feel sorry for the purtiest cheftestant of all time, San Franciscan Ryan Scott.

“Oh, come off it,” snapped Miss XaXa. “He certainly picked the right city to have such a purty mouth in. Not to mention those handle-ears. He’s like a soup mug.”

Well, so much for the Kelly LeBrock of the reality food television world.

As The Modesto Bee is only too immodesto to tell us, Ryan Scott was born in the titular city, but soon enough moved to Los Baños, which, should your Spanish fail you, possums, means, “The Baths.” Of course, it also means, “The Bathrooms.”

“Wait,” said Miss XaXa, who has personal experience with the Central Valley of California, “doesn’t that mean we can say he’s literally from the dumps?”

Oh dear, yet another strike against the shit-eating grin. And the bonnie lad already has so many strikes against him.

Eater SF, which has breathlessly and gleefully chronicled all things Ryan, dug up a “(more-than- ) slightly ridiculous video” in which Ryan, dubbed “Sexy Chef,” oleaginously discusses fish and brags about his time in Hawaii while cheesy porn music plays in the background. Eater SF also caught Ryan training as a waiter at Pier 23 Café, despite being the chef at Myth Café. And our pal Josh Ozersky of Grub Street, who watched an advance copy of the new season’s first episode, describes Ryan as possessed of “such surpassing smugness that [he is] already rooting against him.”

Add to that the porn-star name, the pink-flowered shirt, and the perfectly groomed hair—it’s hard to tell if it’s slicked with gel or self-regard—and it becomes hard to see the pretty boy for the strikes.

Not that it means anything, of course. In his Bravo profile video, Ryan is the only one who hastens to invoke his girlfriend: “I don’t take longer than a half an hour when I cook at home for my girlfriend and I [sic].”

Ok, Ryan, got it. Though you are the chef at Myth Café, your girlfriend is anything but mythical (though ours always were).

In a show of mock-humility that must have required a great deal of energy to perform, Ryan declares in the same Bravo video, “I’m a little hidden in the back, which is fine, actually; that’s the way I want it.” Oh, falsely modesto bee, no one who looks like you or grooms like you is fine with being hidden in the back.

But this, Ryan, possum, is exactly why we can’t wait to be entertained by you throughout the season. Now if we could only settle on a nickname for you.

We suggested the Immodesto Bee, but Miss XaXa favored Soup Mug, or “Mugs.” We countered with Little Pitcher, since, as you know, possums, little pitchers have big ears, but Miss XaXa responded, “Actually, he looks like a catcher.”

What are we to do? It may, in the end, come down to Ryan’s Hopeless.

Suggestions, possums?

Jowly Green Giant Killer?: CJ Jacobson Goes One-Ball-to-the-Wall with Fellow Cheftestants

Ah, the Jowly Green Giant, possums. He's tall, 's got one ball, and wants it all, and our pal Lesley at Eater LA finally caught up with him to find out whether he's just a mellow beach boy or really a Machiavellian mastermind.

We've always been of the belief that CJ Jacobson's whole "ungay, laid-back, blond volleyball player from behind the Orange Curtain with the peculiar syntax" persona is merely a smokescreen.

Remember how he was always there as a one-man, monorchid Greek chorus of disapproval and moral rectitude (Sandee didn't barbecue, Dale used mashed potatoes)? And remember how last week at Judges' Table he agreed with Andrea Strong about everything, saying she was on-point about Brian's sweating, etc., and this week told the judges that Tre's bread pudding was boring?

Hmmmmm. Possums, let us not forget the Huffington Past. Yes indeed, he worked as a personal chef for Arianna Huffington (who certainly knows from ungay by now, and ought to have a little talk with Diane Von Furstenberg). Need we say more?

Lesley manages to get deep, John from Cincinnati quotes such as, "You can only judge yourself when times are tough, you know?" but the Jowly Green Giant denies any master plan to cast Tre Wilcox as the executive chef in order to get him kicked off. He also is tickled by the idea that people think he has a "dynamic...character." And then he goes all biatch and condescending on the remaining contestants:

Casey and Brian are coming around, and Dale is surprising me also.

"Coming around"? "Surprising"? Meow! Well, it must be easy to condescend when one is so tall.

Still, when Tre's crawfish fell awry, CJ wasn't there to pick it up. And guest judge Geoffrey Zakarian can't quite overlook that. Talking to our pal Maddy at The Miami Herald, Zakarian had a few choice words for him:

"He had the ability to help out and decided not to. You need someone to watch your team if you're not firing on all pistons, had a fight with your wife or you're hung over, which doesn't happen often. I don't think CJ is a leader. He wouldn't help you over the wall. He'd jump over and say, Call me when you get here. His lobster salad was something you'd throw together at your house in the summertime. You have to be really careful when you dress something, keep tasting it. And if it's too salty, throw it out. It's like he just thought, Well, everybody likes lobster, so I'll do this."

Alas, even our boy Dale didn't escape the Jungle Red-sporting claws of the attired-like-a-yachting-French-gigolo-in-a-stripey-top Zakarian:

"You should always try to dress better than the patrons. I have a real problem with sweating, too. Get a grip. "

Well, we've always thought sweating and getting a grip were incompatible, but no doubt we had a different context in mind. (Wrestling, of course.)

At any rate, we've had Howie sweating, Brian sweating, and now Dale sweating. Perhaps it's time to bring on Right Guard or Degree as a Top Chef sponsor.

(Miss XaXa, of course, has the last word. Reminding us of the adage that "horses sweat, men perspire, and ladies glisten," she wondered which category Howie, Dale and Brian would fall into.)

Jowly Green Giant Wins Frozen-Food Challenge (Natch), Comes Out as One of the Ungay (Snatch)

Possums, the Ungay--they walk among us.

We learned this from our pal Lesley at Eater LA, who in turn learned it during her exclusive interview with the Jowly Green Giant, CJ Jacobson:

You mentioned that a friend told you someone in a chat room asked if you're gay. They actually said, "So is this tall drink of water gay?"

Those fuckers. I almost have a problem being too ungay.

"Oh no he di'in't," we thought to ourselves.

"Fee fi fo fum, I smell the blood of an insecure man," said Miss XaXa, snapping her fingers in her best RuPaul.

Well, actually, we were confused more than outraged by his statement, so much so that we tried to diagram the sentence on the back of an envelope, just the way Mrs. McDougal taught us when we were wee bairns, new to this country and learning the lingo. All to no avail.

As we have mentioned before, CJ has the most peculiar and interesting syntax and vocabulary, well worthy of study if representative of SoCal surfers and volleyball players, something along the lines of, "The Crawfish Fell Awry: A Study of Fricatives and Metaphors Among the Tribes of Palos Verdes."

But this statement is just a masterpiece. We start with "ungay," and figure he must mean "straight," and then "too"--too straight? Is that possible? And then he has a problem with being too straight? Does that mean being too straight, whatever that means, gets him into trouble? Or does it mean that he has difficulty being too straight? Oh, but wait, there's another modifier. He almost has a problem. So does that mean he is too straight, but doesn't have a problem? It's enough to make Wittgenstein (who was gay) weep and say, "Told you so."

"Please stop; my head hurts," pleaded Miss XaXa. She gets worried when she sees that gleam in our eye, a worry that was not dispelled when we argued that CJ's statement is actually a publicist's goldmine, and that he ought to license it for use by high-profile Hollywood actors, so that when anyone goes asking questions of, oh, say, Tom Cruise, John Travolta, Wentworth Miller, or Jake Gyllenhaal, they can all say, "I almost have a problem being too ungay." It's genius, chloroform in verbal form.

We turned for enlightenment and analgesia to UrbanDictionary.com:

1. Ungay

(or Un-gay) Heterosexual

Don't trust him, after all he's one of the ungay!

2. Ungay

(Pronoun, adj.) equivalent to the words "undead" and "zombie", however, used to describe a zombie which is gay. Also may be used to define a homosexual who has crossed over to the straight world. The word originated one late night at a Dennys in San Diego, 2002, during a topic about independent zombie films.

This town has been overrun by the Ungay! They rose from their graves and started humping everybody!

3. Ungay

To make less gay.
To make straight.

That remake of Straight Up by Halifax is way better than the original. It's ungayed.

4. Ungay

an action taken by people to try to correct their previous sentences from sounding gay or gayish. often ends up in no avail.
(usually implied in instant messages and chatrooms)

(C and E are guys)
C : why didn't you bring your phone, at least the vibrations will wke you up.
C : *realises and begins process of ungay-ing. oh shit, i mean the vibration in your pocket when you receive messages
E: wtf?

Ok, so CJ's not gay. He's a zombie. Well, that clears things up.

Then we remembered CJ's exchange with Howie on the last episode, where Howie looked like even more of a "douche" (another favorite terms of the PalosVerdians) because he, like, didn't get that, like, OC good ole boy CJ was, like, being sarcastic.

"Well, maybe he was joking," we said to Miss XaXa. "Perhaps we ought to give him the benefit of the doubt."

"As long as we know that we don't want Don't Ask, Don't Tell turning into Don't Ask the Tall."

OK, CJ, so you got the benefit of the doubt. But just in case, the Feather Boa Brigade and the Glitter Squadron are on standby and ready to attack the Beanstalk and the Magic Beans. Ok, Magic Bean.