Top Chef Cookbook Giveaway!

You have the Top Chef The Cookbook. You have the Top Chef: The Quickfire Cookbook. Now there's a third cookbook available to Top Chef fanatics!

How to Cook Like a Top Chef teaches aspiring chefs what it takes to be a star in the kitchen. Packed with exclusive content including a foreword by Top Chef: Masters winner Rick Bayless, original recipes from contestants, behind-the-scenes interviews, juicy trivia, and tons of tips and tricks, this volume is as indispensable on the cook's countertop as it is essential reading for Top Chef fans.

Here's a sneak peek at the book, in Adobe Acrobat PDF format:
Interview with Michael and Bryan Voltaggio

All Top Chef has FIVE copies to give away to our readers. But yes, there's a catch: you must leave a comment naming your favorite Top Chef or Top Chef: Masters competitor and why. Please include your valid e-mail address in your comment. (Winners will be notified by e-mail.)

Contest ends August 14th.
The fine print. Please read carefully.

• Contest open to residents the United States of America and Canada only.
  
• Please be 18 years of age or older.
  
• The odds of winning are dependent on the number of entries received.
  
• Winners will be chosen at random and notified via email.
  
• Only Entrants who provide valid e-mail addresses will be considered in prize drawings.
  
• Entrants may not be awarded two of the same prize from different sources. If it is found that the individual chosen as the recipient of a prize has already won the same prize elsewhere, a new winner will be selected.
• The prizing for this giveaway was provided by Bravo. Bravo is not a sponsor, administrator or connected in any other way with this giveaway.

So what are you waiting for? Tell us who is your favorite chef'testant and you can be a winner!

Top Chef Finale Virtual Viewing Party! and...A Contest!

Ok - first: Bravo is having a Top Chef Finale Virtual Viewing Party! Fans will be able to chat and submit questions LIVE on Facebook, Twitter, and from their mobile phones! Judge Toby Young, the Voltaggio brothers, Ash, Kevin, and others will be tweeting for the East Coast broadcast and Robin will tweet for the West Coast broadcast.

RSVP for the event on Facebook here.

Follow BravoTV on Twitter: twitter.com/bravotv

You can also check out this page to follow the party.

And now for the real fun - All Top Chef will be giving away a $100 gift card to the Bravo store to one lucky winner, and a copy of the Top Chef Quickfire computer game to another! Two chances to win!

Here's how you do it - just participate in the Top Chef Finale Virtual Viewing Party tomorrow night. Leave a comment on this post about the fun you're having while chatting with Toby, Ash, Bryan, and the rest of the gang: tell us what questions you may have asked, and especially let us know if you got an answer from anyone! If you can't make it to the party, then leave a comment with the questions that you would like to ask Michael, Bryan, and Kevin, if you had the opportunity to ask them. (You may actually hear your question asked by the lovely Laura K when she does the exit interviews on Thursday.)

We'll pick two names at random from the comments, the first person we choose will get the gift card, and the second will get the game. But you can't win unless you comment - please leave them between 10PM and 3AM ET (yeah, we're generous like that) on December 9th to qualify for a prize.

Have fun!

We Have a Winner!

The winner of our "Why I Love Top Chef" essay contest is Holly Burpo. Congratulations, Holly - you have won a copy of the Top Chef cookbook, which will be winging its way to you shortly.

Here's Holly's winning entry.

When it comes up--and it does--I always tell people I learned to cook in self defense. During my childhood my grandmother cooked for me. My grandmother never made tuna casserole--in fact, I've never tasted tuna casserole. My grandmother made pea souffle. My grandmother could roast a chicken better than those silly Foster Farm or whatever commercials could dream of. My grandmother was good. Mom wasn't bad either.

I hated it.

I hated being sent to the store for "corn starch" and not even knowing which row to start looking in. I hated when she put swiss chard on perfectly good garlic bread and ruined it for everyone. I especially hated the five kinds of squash I never new the name of but really disliked each in their own special and individual way.

Then I moved out, went to college. I moved from San Antonio, Texas to Seattle, Washington and never came back.

I was on my own when it came to food. I was a picky eater with an unusually refined palate.

In words words, I was screwed.

And yet, as I scrambled to make sense of meat and starches and vegetables I hated less than others, it started coming back to me. I knew how to pick out ripe fruit. I knew where the corn starch was. I knew what radicchio looked like, even if all I did to it was pass on by.

I found Top Chef in its second season, and actually spent most of my time trying to talk the underdog--Marcel--into being more talented and less of a jerk. And wishing he'd please, please stop rapping. I'd learned how to cook because I had to. I got hungry several times a day. I'd somehow missed that it could be creative, how it could be fun.

Here was Top Chef, in one of its most emotional seasons, showing me the way.
My parents and I don't have a great deal in common, but now when I call home I can ask about Top Chef, because Mom watches too. Back then she said Marcel reminded her of my boyfriend. I'm not sure why and I'm much too afraid to ask. And while I couldn't call Top Chef when I had the bright idea to make mushroom soup, let the pan get too hot, and then set the butter on fire--I could call Grandma. But I blame Top Chef for convincing me I wanted to spend my Friday night making soup.

It's just a TV show, but it's become more. An intersection of experience, a point of reference. Something I suddenly have in common with the people who raised me, now two whole times zones away.

So that's why I love Top Chef.

Don't Forget to Enter Our Contest

There are still a few days to get your essays in to us for the chance to win a copy of the Top Chef cookbook! For more details, see the original contest post.

Contest!

All Top Chef is having its first contest!

The Prize: One grand prize winner will win a copy of the Top Chef cookbook.

How to Win: Compose a short essay about why you love Top Chef. It should be at least 200 words. (C'mon - that's not so long. This blog post contains 158 words.) The All Top Chef team will choose the winner based on creativity and originality.

Deadline Please cut and paste your essay into an e-mail (please, no attachments) and send it to us at alltopchef@gmail.com by midnight, Wednesday, October 7th. The winner will be notified by e-mail during the month of October.

The Fine Print: Contest open to anyone in the U.S. and Canada, except as noted. Members and family members of the All Top Chef team and NBC Universal are not eligible. All Top Chef retains the right to feature the winning essay here on the ATC blog.

Good luck, and get writing!