Top Chef Tour Bus Rolls Into Boston

  Click here for more on the tour.

 Posted on AllTopChef.com

New Gigs from Top Chefs Bryan Voltaggio, Stephen Asprinio, and Hosea Rosenberg and Marcel Vigneron Goes Japanese

Season 1 wine guy and aspiring restaurateur Stephen Asprinio has his sights set on world domination with his "smart casual" Pizza Vinoteca, featuring iPad ordering, root beer made by his father, and, of course, wine - a concept he hopes to expand nationwide after launching in NYC in the spring.

Season 5 winner Hosea Rosenberg is eyeing Denver locations for his next project, Blackbelly, according to Eater Denver.

On the heels of his brand spanking new eatery, Lunchbox, which we reported about on Tuesday, Bryan Voltaggio reveals details of his next new Frederick, MD restaurant to the Washingtonian, an affordable diner-style concept offering healthy fare and housed in a remodeled car dealership.

Voltaggio brother Michael also gets some serious ink from LA Times restaurant reviewer S. Irene Virbila in her LA Times review of his first solo gig.

And Marcel Vigneron keeps doing his Marcel thing, this time merging his "molecular gastronomy" proclivities for a sushi bar pop-up. Check out possible menu items from Grub Street LA here.

Posted on AllTopChef.com

TC News and Information 9.12.11

This week’s Willy Wonka episode of Just Desserts rated inclusion by producers The Magical Elves in their top 10 list of favorite episodes of all the shows they’ve produced, saying it “may be the ultimate episode of Just Desserts. . . ." Click through the slide show for the 9 others, many of which I’m sure our readers will recall.

Have you been reading Just Desserts Season 1 winner Yigit Pura’s Bravo blog about this season? You can also find him “half-naked and sugar-coated,” Yigit says, in a calendar for Meals on Wheels, one of his favorite charities. You can glimpse him in the right-hand sidebar, or purchase one, here.

Were you as glad as I was to see TC Masters contestant Hugh Acheson as guest judge on last week’s episode? He’ll be back as one of the judges on TC9: Texas with Emeril Lagasse, reports Entertainment Weekly.

Frequent TC judge Eric Ripert’s Le Bernadin recently reopened and Feast has before, during, and after videos about the restaurant’s renovation. Meanwhile, Ripert protégé and TC All-Star Jen Carroll has announced she is leaving Ripert’s 10 Arts restaurant in Philly, according to Grub Street.

Three Top Chef chefs make the New York Times list of this fall’s most hotly anticipated restaurants: Masters 3 winner Floyd Cardoz’s North End Grill, Season 3 winner Hung Huynh’s Catch, and All Star contestant Dale Talde’s Talde.

Those Voltaggio brothers are busy too. They have a new cookbook coming out, and Michael’s long-promised LA restaurant Ink. (reported here to be opening in late September) has been upstaged by his new sandwich shop, Ink.Sack, which opened recently a few doors down. LA Weekly’s Jonathan Gold reports here. Yum Sugar has a great video interview with Michael Voltaggio here about his numerous new ventures.

All-Stars winner Richard Blais tells Eater his wife came up for the name of his next restaurant, The Spence, slated to open in winter 2012. He’s also a finalist for Restaurateur of the Year from the Georgia Restaurant Association. Winners will be announced in November.

All-Star Casey Thompson has teamed up with Sam’s Club and is eyeing new opportunities in Napa, according to this interview with Eater. Dale Levitski has been enlisted by Sam’s Club too.

Here's a report of Season 4 of Top Chef Masters filming in Vegas (scroll down to the second paragraph under The Scene and Heard).

Finally, if you’ve ever dreamed of being on Top Chef, you have something in common with Marge Simpson, reports Zap2It. Tom Colicchio will appear in animated form on The Simpsons season premiere on FOX September 25. Is it just me, or does this rendering look more like Hosea Rosenberg?


Posted on AllTopChef.com

TC News and Information 4.4.11

In case you're not sated with interviews from the final two after last week's show, here are interviews with Richard Blais from the Chicago Tribune, TV Guide, and Slashfood. And don't miss Eli Kirshtein's Bravo blog, which reveals a little more about the personal side of Blais, his mentor and hero.

Mike Isabella talks to Grub Street and the Chicago Tribune.

For a couple of different perspectives, here's an interesting blog about teachable moments from the finale. And here's a thought-provoking piece from the Village Voice about why more women don't win Top Chef, with comments from several of the female chefs from the All-Stars season (thanks to reader Jennifer for mentioning it in the comments!).

Speaking of girl power, NYC pop-up-of-sorts, What Happens When, is launching a Monday night series featuring "female chefs, female pastry chefs, and female sommeliers." Check out the line-up, which includes Season 1's Lee Anne Wong, All-Stars Jennifer Carroll and Carla Hall, and Season 5's Leah Cohen.

You can find more about Fan Favorite Carla Hall's petite cookies here.

And as a new winner is crowned, Season 5 winner Hosea Rosenberg is shutting down his Boulder food truck business, while Season 4 winner Stephanie Izard continues to pursue Olympic dreams and the prospect of being a James Beard Award winner for her Chicago restaurant, Girl and the Goat.


Posted on AllTopChef.com

TC News and Information 1.09.11

"Top Chef "and TC judge Anthony Bourdain's "No Reservations" have been nominated for Producers Guild of America awards (in separate categories).

Bravo grand fromage Andy Cohen gets a lengthy write-up in the New York Times.

Congrats to Season 4's Nikki Cascone on the birth of her son, and on her newly opened NYC restaurant, Octavia's Porch. Nikki talks about her "global Jewish" Lower East Side restaurant here.

For those of you who've been thinking Mike Isabella looks pudgier on All-Stars than he did back in Season 6, here's what he has to say.

Richard Blais was working the Bravo stage at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. You can see him demonstrate how to make "popcorn-sicles" in this video.

Blais is also cooking a James Bond-themed Valentine’s Day dinner for the Nashville Film Festival. Tickets are, um, $2,500 per couple or $8,000 a table.

Or you could attend this January 11 dinner in Denver prepared by Hosea Rosenberg for a mere $75 per person.

Staying in and cooking at home during the lean, chilly winter months? Chicagoan Dale Levitski offers suggestions on that topic and more in this new interview.

And you still have until January 31 to enter a fish taco recipe in the Wild Alaska fish taco competition, which Top Chef Masters contestant Susan Feniger talks about in this podcast.

Casey Thompson may have been PYKAG'd last week, but her restaurant, Brownstone, made Eater's "Heat Map" of 9 top Dallas restaurants to eat at "right now." You can also read Casey's own take on the episode that led to her departure on her blog.

TC News and Information 10.18.10

Guest judge for this Wednesday's episode of Just Desserts will be Michael Laiskonis, Executive Pastry Chef of Eric Ripert's Le Bernadin. Read his recap of last week's episode here and more of his thoughts on the show here.

Here's a peak at what Ripert recently cooked up at 10 Arts with his protege, Season 6 finalist and returning All-Star Jennifer Carroll, including suckling pig!


Jennifer Carroll is among the TC contestants who will appear at the Food & Wine All-Star Weekend in Las Vegas Nov. 5-7, hosted by Gail Simmons. Also scheduled are Fabio Viviani, Carla Hall, and Hosea Rosenberg, according to this item.

Michael Voltaggio, Fabio Viviani, and Season 6's Ron Duprat will appear at the Philadelphia Food & Wine Festival Oct. 29-31.

At a recent appearance in Wisconsin, Season 6 Finalist Bryan Voltaggio revealed that he was offered the chance to appear on the upcoming Season 8 All-Star season, but declined, according to this interview.

Season 7 winner Kevin Sbraga recently talked to NPR.

And according to this item, Season 7 finalist and returning All-Star Angelo Sosa's restaurant, Xie Xie, has closed.

TC News and Information 9.20.10

We all have our opinions about Season 7. Executive producers Dan Cutforth and Jane Lipsitz of Magical Elves offer their own critique here.

Meanwhile, there were plenty of Season 7 finale parties and Just Desserts premiere parties last Wednesday. Zagat offers up a comparison of the Gail Simmons/Food & Wine finale bash at Craft (where Ed Cotton confirmed he will not be appearing in future TC’s – which presumably includes the all-but-certain All-Star Season 8) with the premiere party hosted by Johnny Iuzzini (at which no desserts were served).  

Gawker attended the F&W shindig, encountering a Padma “lost in the fog of forgetfulness,” then fled to watch the episode elsewhere, as no one in the party crowd seemed to care to watch it.  

DCist reports that viewing parties for the final S7 episode at Eric Ripert's West End Bistro, The Oval Room (where S7 contestant Tamesha Warren is the sous chef) and Spike Mendelsohn's Good Stuff Eatery were sparsely attended (but as someone who lives a long way from D.C., I still would have loved to be one of the few).

Just Desserts contestant Yigit Pura's restaurant, Taste, hosted a TC:JD viewing party, which definitely included desserts, which you can see more of here.

Kevin Sbraga reveals more details about the restaurant he hopes to open with the $125,000 he earned as Season 7 winner, while runner-up Ed Cotton says he would have sat on the money but still has aspirations for his own restaurant...

Season 4 winner Stephanie Izard has finally opened her new restaurant, Girl and the Goat, which Chicago Magazine offers an in-depth review of here. And Season 5 winner Hosea Rosenberg’s new food truck business gets a thumbs-up from his hometown paper in Boulder for its global cuisine here.

Heather H. (as in Hurlburt), winner of the Top Chef: Just Desserts Episode 1 Elimination Challenge, talks about TC:JD and her prior competitive cooking experience here.

And TC:JD contestant Zac “Gold Dust” Young will be adding fried whoopee pies, seasonal doughnuts, and a chocolate soufflé with salted peanut caramel and nougat ice cream to the menu at NYC’s Flex Mussels restaurant according to this report.

The charming and multi-talented Hubert Keller (he’s also apparently a kick-ass DJ), whose Top Chef judging experience goes back to Season 1 and who is fondly remembered by many for his resourcefulness in cooking pasta in a dorm-room shower on Top Chef Masters Season 1, returns as a judge on Just Desserts this week (he’s alternating with Dannielle Kyrillos of Daily Candy – anyone else heard of her? I hadn’t). In other news, Hubert’s Las Vegas outpost of his San Francisco-based Fleur de Lys has closed but will reopen as a tapas restaurant with a lower price point in December according to this report.

 [Still from Anthony Bourdain's Alternate Universe]

And finally, because he may be one of the most beloved Top Chef judges of all time, even if he wimped out on the snarkiness in his Season 7 appearance, a bit of Anthony Bourdain news. Tony is writing a “graphic novel” (aka comic book) about “ultraviolent food nerds.” In the interest of full disclosure, I must confess I am a Bourdain-o-phile (yes, I actually plunked down $46.50 to see him live and wrote about it at length here). 

So that’s my inaugural post as a brand spankin’ new member of the ATC team. Any links you especially liked – or didn’t? Any news you’d like to see here that I’m missing? Please let me know in the comments or via email.

Thanks!
eggy

TC News & Information 4.16.10

Top Chef sightings all over the DC area, according to the Examiner.

Hosea Rosenberg is helping to develop a line of frozen foods for Kashi.

Stephanie Izard will be participating in a cooking demonstration/cook-off and luncheon to benefit Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center today at Midwestern Culinary Academy. More info here.

Marcus Samuelsson talks about Top Chef and more here.

Here's an interview with Top Chef Masters season 1 winner Rick Bayless.

Scary: Gael Greene's sordid adventures may be turned into a TV series.

TC News & Information 3.24.10

What's Stefan Richter been up to recently? Opening restaurants and flirting, of course. Read a new interview with him here.

There will be lots of familiar faces at the upcoming Pebble Beach Food & Wine event, April 8 - 11, including Top Chef Masters Graham Eliot Bowles, Michael Chiarello, Hubert Keller, Roy Yamaguchi, Tim Love, and Jonathan Waxman, former Top Chef judges Tyler Florence, Ming Tsai, Wolfgang Puck, Rick Tramonto, Gale Gand, Thomas Keller, and Jacques Pepin, and cheftestants Jamie Lauren, Fabio Viviani, Carla Hall, and Hosea Rosenberg. For more information, visit http://www.pebblebeachfoodandwine.com/.

Richard Blais claims he's not a molecular gastronomist.

Season 4 cheftestant Valerie Bolon is hosting a Culinary Speakeasy. Click here for more information.

Video du Jour - Hosea Rosenberg at Mardi Gras

TC News & Information 12.27.2009

Richard Blais has teamed up with SousVide Supreme, a home version of the immersion circulator. Find out more information at the SousVide Supreme Web site.

So where is Hosea Rosenberg today? Follow him on his blog, Where is Hosea?

Las Vegas Weekly has an interview with Michael Voltaggio here.

Nice Digs! Bryan Voltaggio is right at home in Home & Design Magazine.

The latest Special Edition of the Creative Loafing Top Chef Podcast features Kevin Gillespie. Click here to listen.

Fox & Friends has six recipes from TC 4's Ryan Scott including "Red Miso and Jagermeister Braised Short Ribs."

TC News & Information 12.6.09

The latest street food news: Ketel One-branded trucks dispensing free chef-made food will be in New York from today (December 3) through December 5, then moving to Chicago December 10 to 12, then L.A. December 15 to 17. Rick Bayless is the Chicago chef and Ilan Hall is the L.A. chef. In addition to free food, Ketel One will be offering free rides home (to promote responsible drinking over the holidays). Check out the list of locations and menus here.

Spork or Foon blogger Teanna interviewed Danny Gagnon for Spot On Long Island. Read it here.

Hosea Rosenberg offers 10 Thoughts.

Season 1 champ Harold Dieterle and guest judge Johnny Iuzzini are in competition for the title of NY's Hottest Chef. Vote for your fave here.

and finally...Tom Colicchio offers advice on dining out with baby.

TC News & Information 11.11.09

Las Vegas Weekly has set the odds for this week's episode featuring Nigella Lawson.

Skillet Doux shares TCLV power rankings after last week's episode.

Here's a brief article about Top Chef: Just Desserts casting in New York.

Season 5 winner Hosea Rosenberg offers holiday planning tips in what is essentially a commercial for Whole Foods. Watch it here.

Season 4's Ryan Scott is accepting donations for the Turkey Troops, a group that mobilizes holiday meals to San Francisco's less fortunate. Click here for more information.

TC News & Information 10.28.09

NY's City Food Tours is offering a Top Chef walking tour to several venues featured in the fifth season of Top Chef. Read the account of someone who took the tour here. Sounds like fun!

Coffee Bar in San Francisco is presenting special dinners by Laurine Wickett on November 7th and November 10. Click here for more details.

Hosea Rosenberg and Stephanie Izard prepared a 6-course meal for the Friends of James Beard Benefit dinner in Milwaukee last week. They also answered a couple of TC-related questions for the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinal. Click here to read.

Las Vegas Weekly offers this week's odds here, and SkilletDoux lists his Power Rankings here.

TC News & Information 10.25.2009

Brian Malarkey is opening his own restaurant in San Diego's Gaslamp Quarter. Read more about it here.

Want to date Stefan Richter? He's up for grabs, especially if you are organized, clean, and like to drink.

Hosea Rosenberg is the grand marshal for the University of Colorado's homecoming parade.

Salon has a very funny take on the dynamic between the Brothers Voltaggio.

TC News & Information 9.23.09

Jesse Sandlin dishes to the Baltimore Sun on Top Chef.

Leah Cohen left Centro Vinoteca to travel, and now Hosea Rosenberg has announced a 5-month sabbatical from Jax Fish House. Coincidence? They'll never tell! Starting October 1st, check out Hosea's new site whereishosea.com to find out what he'll be up to over the next several months.(source)

Top Chef Masters finalist Anita Lo takes the confusion out of fusion cuisine here.

Toby Young reports on his experience at the Emmy Awards for Gawker. "For the third year running, Top Chef was beaten by The Amazing Race. A clip was shown in which a deaf contestant told the host that being in The Amazing Race meant the world to him because it proved that deaf people could achieve their dreams, too. This proved to be such an emotional moment that both the deaf man and the host broke down in tears. Cue rapturous applause in the Emmy auditorium. In the bar afterwards, I told Tom that if we wanted to stand a chance next year we'd have to get some contestants with disabilities.

'That's why we hired you Toby,' he said."

TC News & Information 9.04.09

Here's an interview with Ashley Merriman who thinks this season kicks ass.

Televisionary talks to Jennifer Carroll, who couldn't live without her sauce spoon, here.

This week's eliminated chef, Preeti Mistry, participated in a conference call, the transcript of which can be found here.

For yet another interview with a Top Cheftestant, check out this one with Season 5 winner Hosea Rosenberg.

Season 4's Antonio LoFaso will be presenting a wine-paired dinner at Winefest Des Moines on September 13th. Click here for details. And in October, Season 3's Tre Wilcox will be in town for a couple of cooking classes.

Top Chef Master Rick Bayless is opening a new restaurant, Xoco, that serves the street foods of Mexico. Read more about it here.

Finally, Gail Simmons talks to CNN's Reggie Aqui:

TC News & Information

Isn't this cute?

Top Chef can't be this much of a time suck, can it?

TC5 champ Hosea Rosenberg will be appearing at the Telluride Festival of the Arts on Saturday, August 15th. His 3pm presentation is titled "Colorado Peach Sensations."

TC News & Information

TC5 winner Hosea Rosenberg will be on BlogTalkRadio on July 9th at noon ET.

Here's a video from earlier in the year featuring TC2 champ Ilan Hall.

The Culinary Institute of America's "Insight from the Inside" new podcast features former Top Chef judge, Scott Conant. Past CIA podcasts featured TC champs Ilan Hall and Hung Huynh, upcoming TC Masters competitor John Besh, and former TC guest judges Johnny Iuzzini, and Grant Achatz.

Here's an interview in Asiance Magazine with Top Chef Masters' Anita Lo...

...and one with TCM hostess Kelly Choi.

TC News & Information

Is TCM's Ludo Lefebvre annoying?

Diana Takes a Bite describes her experience at Lefebvre's restaurant, Ludo Bites.

Eater LA has breaking news about TC5's Stefan Richter's new restaurant.

Boulder Restaurant Examiner takes a look into the kitchen of chef Lachlan MacKinnon Patterson.

Here's a Miami Herald review of Top Chef Masters.

TC5's Gene Villiatora is popping up again in this interview.

YumSugar spoke to TC5 victor Hosea Rosenberg at the recent Aspen Food & Wine Festival.

Bake a pie for the NY Theatre Experiment! TC1s Dave Martin will be a guest judge, along with Project Runway's Kara Janx. Details here.

Here's an interview with TC2 hottie Sam Talbot.