I’m so excited for the premier of Top Chef season 6, filmed in fabulous, I mean food-abulous Las Vegas. I learned very fast that it’s hard to blog and watch the show at the same time, especially a reality show where you’re trying to get to know the new cheftestants while formulating your written opinions about them.
So bear with me as I try to figure out what was going on in the first episode.
The glorious, magnificent Top Chef kitchen is housed at the M Resort, located on the south end of Las Vegas Boulevard.
Seventeen cheftestants – the most ever – are competing for the title of Top Chef, and the secondary prize of $100,000. I have a few immediate opinions.
· Jesse – the lip piercing is very distracting. Don’t think I can look at it all season long.
· Eve – the voice. I can’t even describe it. I don’t want to listen to it. Please stop talking. (Not that she talked that much, but that she talked at all.)
· Michael – get over yourself. Now.
There’s also a competitor named Ash Fulk. Go ahead… say it out loud.
The show starts with the classic mise en place quickfire. Instead of boning a chicken, whipping some egg whites and finely dicing an onion, the chefs have to schuck clams, and clean chops, lobsters and prawns. This was supposed to be a “Vegas style” mise en place. The blue team one.
I must have dozed off for a minute, because somehow Robin got immunity. And I can’t for the life of me figure out how, since she wasn’t on the blue team. Oh, well… that’s what TiVo is for.
But wait, there’s a twist… Robin can trade her immunity for a $15,000 chip. She opts to keep her immunity, and chefs from the top two teams (blue and black) get to make a dish using the mise en place ingredients to compete for the $15,000.
Jennifer and Jesse had the great Tom Colicchio’s two favorite dishes. Jennifer had a clam ceviche that looked lovely, and Jesse made a dish out of prawns that, according to Tom, tasted thoroughly of the ocean even given the half hour time constraint. He seemed to have more to say about Jesse’s dish, but he picks Jennifer as the winner. She doesn’t get immunity, but $15,000 is pretty significant.
Jennifer struck me as an early favorite, so I’m glad she won the second stage of the quick fire. (I’m still trying to figure out how Robin got immunity. The Bravo website is not responding…)
On to the elimination challenge…
The chefs have to create a dish inspired by one of their vices. I was surprised to learn that being hot tempered and a procrastinator count as vices. I’m going to have to look that up. The people who used alcohol in their dishes get points from me, because booze is definitely my vice (or 9-5 survival tactic, whatever).
The chefs each get $150 to shop at Whole Foods. In my experience, a $150 at Whole Foods doesn’t get you a lot of groceries.
The chefs are cooking in Cut, Wolfgang Puck’s restaurant in the Palazzo Las Vegas Resort. Wolfgang is the guest judge, and the chefs are competing within their teams from the quick fire. So, one chef from each team will be up for the win, and one will be up for the elimination.
Since there were too many contestants to keep track of what they all cooked, I’ll skip to the winning dishes. Ron, Mike, Kevin and Jennifer are the top 4. Kevin’s procrastination inspired arctic char was the winner. Hector, Jen, Jesse and Eve are on the bottom.
I’m not going to lie. I was hoping that Jesse or Eve would go home. Mainly because of the lip ring and the very odd voice. But Jen gets told to pack her knives and go.
And now that I’ve had some time to think about, I don’t think I could look at her neck tattoo each week. (Since a full arm tattoo is called a sleeve, I so want to call her neck tattoo a collar. But I’m not sure that’s right.)
There seems to be a whole lot of talent on this season. A lot more executive chefs, and a couple of James Beard nominees. It looks like we’re in for a great season. Tune in each week on Wednesdays, at 10 pm ET to get your fix of the best food show on TV. And, check back here each week for my musings on each episode. I’m sure it’ll get a lot more interesting as we get to know the cheftestants.
For more information on Top Chef and the cheftestants and judges, check out www.bravotv.com/top-chef.
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