‘Top Chef’ elimination predictions: Who will be sent home at the end of episode 2, ‘Living the High Life’?

Only five Gold Derby users correctly predicted that David Murphy would be the first cheftestant eliminated from “Top Chef” season 21, but that’s pretty impressive considering we hadn’t seen any of the contestants in action yet. How accurate will our odds be forecasting tonight’s second episode, “Living the High Life”? See who we’re betting on here.

As of this writing it’s a close call between Amanda Turner and Rasika Venkatesa. Turner had one close call already. In “Chef’s Test” she was tasked with cooking a soup for the judges, but hers was much too salty, which the judges’ couldn’t get past. So she ended up in the bottom three along with the worst grilled chicken chef (Kenny Nguyen) and the worst stuffed pasta chef (Murphy). But instead of comparing their dishes to decide who would be eliminated, host Kristen Kish instructed them to make another dish in just 20 minutes using the leftover ingredients from the challenge.

On the fly, Turner came up with snapper crudo, hominy puree and crispy tortilla. Unfortunately, the judges weren’t too impressed with any of the three chefs, who overcomplicated what should have been simplified preparations for such a short sudden-death challenge. The good news for Turner, though, was that she had the best thought-out dish of the three chefs. Murphy seemed to just throw random ingredients into a blender and call it a day, resulting in his elimination.

As for Venkatesa, she didn’t wind up at the top or bottom after the judges tasted her stuffed pasta; they liked her flavor profile but didn’t really think it was a pasta dish. So it wasn’t the best first impression she could have made, and you never know when someone will precipitously drop from the middle of the pack to the bottom. Do you agree with our odds that one of those two will exit the competition next?

Be sure to make your predictions so that the contestants can see how they’re faring in our racetrack odds. You can keep changing your predictions until just before the next episode airs every Wednesday on Bravo. You’ll compete to win a spot on our leaderboard and eternal bragging rights. See our contest rules and sound off with other fans in our reality TV forum. Read more Gold Derby entertainment news.