Stephanie's Take

Please welcome Season 4 champion Stephanie Izard as All Top Chef guest blogger!

well, i finally got a chance to catch up with season 6 and see what i have been missing! with all my traveling, it seems way too many hotels are missing bravo, so i was a bit behind, but thanks to on demand i am all over it. plus when you watch it on demand you get to see tom's diet coke commercial at least five times per episode. bonus.

so the new season. i am of course as impressed as everyone else by some of the talent they snatched for this season! as with all seasons there seem to be a few standouts who are just a tier above the rest, but you never know. someone may surprise us, and all it takes is one mistake…. turns out i have actually met two of the women from this season. one, eve, has already left the show but i would like to give a quick shout out to. although she did not shine during the challenges, i have had the pleasure of eating at her place in ann arbor and it’s charming and also quite delicious. i wish her continued success there and if you are in my old college town, you should check it out.

i also had the pleasure of eating jen's food in philly when i was there with nikki for an event. we had a great meal and had a chance to chat with jen (of course not knowing she was going to be on the show...not sure if she knew yet or not). she is definitely a force to be reckoned with in the kitchen and is for sure the female power this season.

aside from jen, there are a few others that stand out. the two brothers, bryan and mike, are of course two of the front runners. they have both made some killer dishes so far and are very accomplished in the field already. i have to say if i were to choose one person to root for, however, it would be kevin. i love his personality. plus, he has made a number of strong dishes and has also received high accolades in his career thus far. hard to say at this point who the winner will be but i just have a soft spot for him.

there has been a lot of excitement and many surprises already. a little jealous of the 15k for some of the quickfire challenges...though since i did not win one until puerto rico i guess there would have been no golden chips for me anyhow :) on the other hand, sending someone home for a quickfire was pretty harsh. maybe not quite as bad as last season when that poor girl got sent home before even getting into the kitchen [Lauren Hope], but it would still suck. especially since it was right before one of the coolest challenges yet on the show. getting to cook for a table of some of the most amazing chefs in the world is an opportunity that may never come around again for any of the contestants. and lucky kevin got to sit and enjoy their company which again is amazing.

the girls are not having a very strong showing thus far, aside from jen. i think the first three to go home were all women which was a little discouraging. however, this week there were a couple of new faces to the top four dishes. ashley finally made it to the top with her seared halibut which seemed to really hit the mark. and laurine finally gained some confidence and pulled through with a simple yet tasty dish. i am a sucker for baked potatoes so i was all over it. of course the brothers were right there as well. mike's dish looked refreshing and creative though his brother just seemed to make a more fitting dish for the occasion.

all in all i had fun finally catching up on this season and am excited to see what happens. it always brings back crazy memories (maybe that is why i could not sleep last night) when i watch other seasons, but brings back fun ones too. best of luck to everyone on this season and look forward to meeting more of you, as we all bump into each other at one event or another. and enjoy the ride....

Don't forget to check out Stephanie's site at http://stephanieizard.com!