STARTS JUNE 16TH!!!

http://www.bravotv.com/top-chef/bios

my early predictions: Sosa, Hopcraft, or Dean will win it.

The cross dresser will get really annoying really fast.

Guy with dreadlocks will cut someone.

[Edited on June 9, 2010 at 2:01 PM. Reason : ]

6/9/2010 2:00:40 PM

Sweet ass, looking forward to it.

Saw Mike Isabella at the Dupont Circle Farmers Market a few months ago doing a cooking demo.

Top chef is a bright spot in the summer when tv is at its worst!

6/9/2010 3:02:26 PM

on the dvr schedule.

been looking forward to it

6/9/2010 4:16:55 PM

yessss i'm excited

has anyone been watching top chef masters in the meantime?

i <3 top chef soooo much.

6/9/2010 4:26:32 PM

^yep, I didnt start watching top chef until last season, I would watch Hells Kitchen, The Next Iron Chef, and the next food network star, and Top Chef blows them out of the water. Its nice to see some great chefs compete and not a bunch of line cooks who are thrown together to make good television.

6/9/2010 4:30:38 PM

masters has been fun

6/9/2010 4:30:50 PM

is this year's masters series better than last year's?

6/9/2010 6:57:17 PM

^yes, way better

6/9/2010 7:45:47 PM

i have a problem with masters this year...they didn't let rick bayless defend his title...so who ever wins has to know its because rick wasn't even in the field. it seems like its not as good of a title because of it.


BUT THIS IS TOP CHEF: DC THREAD, OK?!

6/10/2010 12:40:41 AM

Oh shit! Eric Ripert is one of the permanent judges now.

I'd be scared shitless to cook for him

6/10/2010 12:41:47 AM

yeah, no shit.

for some reason, i don't feel that this season's field isn't as stacked as last seasons'.

6/10/2010 4:21:07 AM

Quote :

"for some reason, i don't feel that this season's field isn't as stacked as last seasons'."

wat

having ER as a permanent judge is a pretty huge get for this show, in my mind. i'll get a lot of enjoyment each week just from his criticisms.

6/10/2010 8:51:03 AM

bttonight

6/16/2010 1:36:28 PM

DVR set!

6/16/2010 1:37:10 PM

Eric Ripert would be hard to cook for considering his prestige.

If they added Anthony Bourdain then it would really be some brutal shit.

6/16/2010 5:40:52 PM

where the fuck is the discussion?!

7/8/2010 3:35:51 AM

well, there hasnt been anything that happened that was really that interesting so far

except for kenny so close to getting nixed this early

i dont like the multi-elimination team challenges though

the baby food quickfire this week was kinda strange

gonna give this week's ep another pass through, wasnt paying that much attention last night

the dreads guy creeped me straight out and i was happy to only have to have his beedy eye looking at me for one ep. was surprised he was a jb finalist

[Edited on July 8, 2010 at 8:54 AM. Reason : e]

7/8/2010 8:53:07 AM

Just watched the newest episode..

I kinda liked the different services to knock people out (dunno if they've done that before)

Kinda shitty that they kept the teams for the dinner service though. They could have easily made it individual for that.

7/8/2010 9:48:11 PM

We've decided that if Kenny gets kicked off the show, we're not watching anymore.

7/9/2010 12:59:29 AM

Quote :

"If they added Anthony Bourdain then it would really be some brutal shit."

Naw, Bourdain is easy as hell to please: make something simple with pork or offal.

This season is seriously weak, especially compared to last season. I just want to skip ahead about 5 episodes to get rid of the obviously poor contenders. Not even exciting at this point.

7/9/2010 1:21:14 AM

Last season's group had a bunch of great chefs. It appears that there are significantly less this season. At least there isn't a contestant this season that stays on way longer than they should because they keep mentioning they survived cancer.

7/9/2010 11:18:39 AM

i would have been seriously pissed if i were arnold and i would have straight called that bitch out. he kept pushing her to cook the damn pasta and she said she knows what she's doing. what is the complaint about the dish? pasta isn't done. and then she made a smart remark about letting a younger chef take the lead when it was her shit that got them booted

7/11/2010 4:02:12 PM

well, the dish was weird on top of having undercooked pasta.

7/11/2010 6:30:06 PM

double elimination sucks for the asian tranny guy. annoying to be sure, but at least the food was interesting. that instructor shebeast blew it. when you fuck up in that way you make it too easy for the judges, whose decision making flow chart is basically 1) cooked correctly? 2) seasoned correctly? 3) cool dish?

7/12/2010 12:02:48 AM

so it seems kinda unfair that the losers won trips to france, it seems like dinner is alot easier to make "best meal" than breakfast or lunch.

i dont know how i would have solved it but it just seems kinda gay that a team made a breakfast in the bottom 5 out 7 and a lunch in the bottom 3 out of 5 and then won the whole day.

Also, the editing sucked last ep b/c while they were eating kenny and the other guy's ribs, everyone was talking about how good they were, then in the elim they busting em. did the breakfast and lunch not come into play at all??

dumb challenge on top of a super dumb quickfire. babyfood??

7/12/2010 12:24:53 AM

^they won trips to Spain and Italy, but I do agree they basically rewarded the best of the worst

7/12/2010 12:51:06 AM

this whole playing up angelo as some super villain is getting old

and maybe kenny's not as strong as it was portrayed early

kinda bummed about tamesha going, there were plenty of other contestants i'd have rather seen gone before her.

but, again, i didnt like the way they chose who was up for elimination again.

nor did tom c it seemed

7/22/2010 1:59:49 PM

Worst episode of the season so far. Top Chef is starting to head towards the bad reality TV realm. The quick fire where they started a dish then just switched it up on them was a boring gimmick that served no good purpose.

And the elimination challege was your standard reality show gonna-cause-some-drama-for-more-ratings schick. And as a result, they lost a top 5 quality chef when there are only maybe 5-6 quality chefs to begin with. The one chick with the cartildge (Amanda) should have been the one on the bottom going home, but the other team was dead set on Kenny.

I'm also not convinced that Angelo's placement at the end of the table so he could responsd first was happenstance. He makes the first comment then plays pied-piper so that all his underlings fall in-line.

I'm considering not watching anymore this season.

7/22/2010 2:11:25 PM

yeah, this was a bad episode.

7/22/2010 2:58:43 PM

^^Couldn't agree more! Felt like I was watching a VH1 reality show or Hell's kitchen last night. I don't mind twists to some extent, but when you have 45 minutes to cook and create a meal with a meat that you may not know much about, there is plenty of drama, no need to force a switch 15 minutes in.

And the contestants have always been used to judge in prior seasons, but never as integral in the selection process as they were last night.

7/22/2010 3:01:14 PM

Duck white kidney is testicles.

7/22/2010 5:02:25 PM

this season is weak as hell


i mean, think about the strongest chefs on this season compared to those previous

no comparison, so they are making it more about this bullshit drama and are trying to manufacture interesting television. super-villain angelo, focusing on potential hookups...

attn Top Chef -- if I wanted to watch Real World, I'd do it.

7/22/2010 5:34:19 PM

To be fair, with this many people still on the show, you can't really spend much time on any one person so they end up trying to give you a general sense of what's going on between the contestants.

But.. I hate the fact that I have hardly any clue what people are cooking until it's served up on a plate, and the judges don't give an idea of the dish in general.. They just nitpick a couple of things that doesn't make any sense to the audience without knowing what the positives are..

You pretty much have to pause the show during the brief instances they flash some food on the screen if you want to know what the hell is really going on.

7/22/2010 7:06:18 PM

i absolutely agree this is getting a little to reality show-y if you feel me. like a combo of hell's kitchen and the next iron chef. it seems that in past season they focused far more on the actual food than they do now...

7/22/2010 8:28:11 PM

it was a stupid set up. I would have liked it more if the chefs got to pick two to go to the top 2/bottom 2 as well--as a surprise. that would have been both dramatic and a lot more fair. I was sorry to see her go home, but she also criticized the hell out of every dish from the other team.

and, in the end, the judges had valid complaints about the losers' dishes, too. I think Tom C was just amused as to how negative the first round of judges were (but did anyone really expect everyone to be positive?)

they definitely had it out for kenny though. my advice to kenny: get the damn chip off your shoulder and cook... you should know you are better than most of the twerps on the show.

7/22/2010 10:29:14 PM

Dumb, dumb gimmicks last night. Switching up the proteins mid-preparation was just lame. Plus, the way they did the elimination was just begging for someone good to be sent home, and seemed to reward the weaker chefs--which does not make for good TV later on. Granted, Tamesha's dish didn't sound good and it seemed like Kenny's was mediocre at best. But Kenny shouldn't have even been there, Amanda's cartilage chicken was the obvious choice but they all were out to torpedo Kenny.

I also agree that his whole "marked man" routine is getting old. But really aside from Kenny and Angelo, and the whole illicit romance angle they're trying to work with Ed and Tiffany, the personalities aren't that interesting this season. Along with the chefs not seemingly as skilled--weak season so far. The season Hosea won wasn't so strong either but it was at least more interesting.

7/23/2010 1:26:56 AM

I had a feeling from day one that this would be a weak season as there were/are very few michelin stars (are there any this year?) and james beard award winners. In fact that only james beard winner/finalist I can remember is that weird dude who got kicked out week one.

Last season was filled with them. And while that doesnt necessarily make any chef better than another, there just isnt the pedigree this year as last year where it seemed like there were very few people who DIDNT have some sort of award, and the competitions reflected that

[Edited on July 23, 2010 at 10:19 AM. Reason : asdf]

7/23/2010 10:17:31 AM

I think one of the "problems" with last season was that you knew it was going to come down to the two brothers, Kevin, and the really good girl (I can't remember her name) by about week three; every episode was them being awesome and everyone else struggling to keep their heads above water.

This season I really have no idea who will win.

[Edited on July 23, 2010 at 11:00 AM. Reason : .]

7/23/2010 10:59:38 AM

Well, in stark contrast to ^ from last season, Kenny was finally eliminated last night. Unfortunately, he had it coming this time. Every time I heard him talk about being disappointed about not being in the top, I knew he would try doing something over the top that would be a complicated mess. Not to mention he keeps making excuses that also shoot him in the foot.

I actually think that they purposefully choose the top 3 not only based on food, but based on conversation groups and welfare so more ppl get camera time. Like in the episode where Alex supposedly stole Ed's garnish, they conveniently put Alex, Ed, and Tiffany (Ed's BFF) all in the top? Thus others that are making top 3 quality dishes and yet don't make it in the top are confounded and push the envelope too far.

Granted, I'm still not convinced they won't do a wildcard challenge before the finale to let eliminated challengers battle their way back in. They have done that before. I can see them doing it to give Kenny and Tamesha an extra chance.

8/12/2010 12:15:41 PM

^^^I am not sure thats the case. There were some sick resumes this season, not sure about Michelin star counts, but this season was pretty stacked. There were plenty of shitty chefs last season as well.

The brothers were great, and a few others, but I dont see this year as an overall talent downgrade.

8/12/2010 1:34:56 PM

^x3 I don't know...to me, I felt like they put a lot of focus on Angelo from the beginning, and if he doesn't win, I'll be pretty shocked. I think Angelo is the heavy, heavy favorite and that was kind of obvious (to me, at least) from the beginning with the way they were profiling him and centering a lot of stuff around him. I guess Ed and Tiffany maybe are wild cards, but like I said, I'll be pretty surprised if Angelo doesn't win. I thought Kenny was the only one that would challenge him, I was pretty surprised to see him go home last night. I think Alex is gone if not next week, then the week after. Too much controversy about whether or not he's actually making his dishes two weeks in a row.

8/12/2010 1:43:31 PM

Alex is terrible (for Top Chef). He was complete dead weight last episode. How is he still on the show?

8/12/2010 3:36:41 PM

Legitimate question. Totally agree. I think he's still on because the producers got in the judges' collective ear and told them not to kick Alex off because they like the drama he brings to the table by mooching off other people's food.

8/12/2010 3:47:16 PM

^ I think this is probably a pretty accurate view, although alex did win his share of challenges. He is the Mikey for this season. They seem to pick one every year. Before I realized how much Alex sucked, I thought it was going to be the younger girl that they let progress further than she deserves, but it appears that alex creates more friction in the house/challenges, which is good for tv.

8/13/2010 9:58:45 AM

Maybe they judge people fairly based on the quality of the food they produce. This is a cooking competition after all.

lol.. jk!

8/13/2010 10:11:33 AM

Quote :

"We've decided that if Kenny gets kicked off the show, we're not watching anymore."

Dammit! There is no way that Alex (aka "The Stork") cooks better then Kenny!

We may watch just to see him kicked off the show.

8/13/2010 6:41:32 PM

Alex has been sliding by because he's controversial, and this week on the technicality that you can't kick off a member of the winning team. His luck has to run out sometime, but I give him another week or two. Amanda's probably the next one to go.

8/13/2010 9:04:09 PM

damn, I cannot believe Kenny got kicked off, I was SURE he and Angelo would be in the finals, they were far and away the best chefs. Amanda and Alex need to go home, I am so sick and tired of Alex.

8/15/2010 8:31:08 PM

^i think the producers built Kenny up way too much in the beginning and then realized he was a mediocre cook. Ed has replaced Kenny in my mind as angelo's challenge.

8/15/2010 9:37:57 PM

I still don't think he is mediocre. He is one of the best except he tries too hard to always be the top an that ends up shooting him in the foot. Go big or go home. Sometimes its both.

8/15/2010 9:51:59 PM