Thomas Patrick Colicchio is an American celebrity chef. He co-founded the Gramercy Tavern in New York City, and formerly served as a co-owner and as the executive chef. He is also the founder of Crafted Hospitality, which includes Craft, Temple Court (NYC), Craftsteak and Small Batch restaurants. Colicchio is the recipient of five James Beard Foundation Awards for cooking accomplishments.
Top Chef is an American reality competition television series which premiered on Bravo in March 2006. The show features chefs competing against each other in culinary challenges. The contestants are judged by a panel of professional chefs and other notables from the food and wine industry, with one or more contestants eliminated in each episode. The show is produced by Magical Elves Productions, the company that created Project Runway.
Top Chef: San Francisco, originally broadcast simply as Top Chef, is the first season of the American reality television series Top Chef. It was first filmed in San Francisco, California, before concluding in Las Vegas, Nevada. The season premiered on March 8, 2006, and ended on May 24, 2006. The show featured chefs from around the United States living together in one house and competing in a series of culinary challenges. The prizes for the winner of the competition included a feature in Food & Wine Magazine, a showcase at the annual Food & Wine Classic in Aspen, Colorado, a Kenmore Elite kitchen set, and US$100,000. The series was hosted by Katie Lee Joel, in her only season as host, and judged by chef Tom Colicchio and food writer Gail Simmons. In the season finale, Harold Dieterle was declared the winner over runner-up Tiffani Faison.
Marcel Vigneron is an American celebrity chef best known for his award-winning restaurant and catering company, Wolf, in Los Angeles. Marcel was also the runner-up of the second season of Top Chef, which aired in 2006–2007. In 2011, he had his own television program on Syfy, Marcel's Quantum Kitchen, in which he started and ran a molecular gastronomy experiential catering company. He later competed on Top Chef: All-Stars in 2011, on The Food Network's The Next Iron Chef in 2012 and The Food Network's "Superstar Sabotage: Heat 2" on the show Cutthroat Kitchen in 2014. Vigneron has gone on to judge several televised cooking competitions, such as Iron Chef, America’s Best Cooks, and Guy's Grocery Games.
Top Chef: Chicago is the fourth season of the American reality television series Top Chef. It was first filmed in Chicago, Illinois before concluding in San Juan, Puerto Rico. The season premiered on Bravo on March 12, 2008, and ended on June 18, 2008. In the season finale, Stephanie Izard was declared the winner over runners-up Richard Blais and Lisa Fernandes. Izard was also voted Fan Favorite.
Alessandro Stratta is a celebrity chef and restaurateur of mixed Italian and French heritage. Stratta played the role of Iron Chef Italian on the television show Iron Chef USA. He was the recipient of the James Beard Foundation award for Best Chef Southwest in 1998 and was executive chef and owner of his famous namesake restaurant, Alex, in Las Vegas until its closure on January 15, 2011. He was later diagnosed with colon cancer and became a cancer survivor. He was the executive chef and owner of "Tapas by Alex Stratta" in the Las Vegas suburb of Summerlin, until it closed in 2015. In 2016, Stratta became executive chef de cuisine at Prado restaurant at the Omni Hotel in Paradise Valley, Arizona.
Richard Blais is an American chef, television personality, restaurateur, and author. He appeared on the reality show cooking show Top Chef, and is known for his take on classic American cuisine. Blais was the runner-up for the fourth season of Top Chef and returned several seasons later to win Top Chef: All-Stars.
Stephanie Izard is an American chef and television personality best known as the first female chef to win Bravo's Top Chef, taking the title during its fourth season. She is the co-owner and executive chef of three award-winning Chicago restaurants, Girl and the Goat, Little Goat, and Duck Duck Goat, and opened her first restaurant, Scylla as chef-owner at the age of 27. Izard received a James Beard Foundation Award for "Best Chef: Great Lakes" in 2013 for her work at Girl and the Goat. She has made a number of appearances on Top Chef since her win, both as a guest judge on subsequent seasons and as a participant in Top Chef Duels. In 2017, Izard competed in the Food Network series Iron Chef Gauntlet, where she overall defeated chefs Bobby Flay, Michael Symon, and Masaharu Morimoto to obtain the title of Iron Chef.
Top Chef: New York is the fifth season of the American reality television series Top Chef. It was first filmed in New York City, New York, before concluding in New Orleans, Louisiana. The season premiered on Bravo on November 12, 2008, and ended on March 4, 2009. In the season finale, Hosea Rosenberg was declared the winner over runners-up Stefan Richter and Carla Hall. Fabio Viviani was voted Fan Favorite.
The Best Thing I Ever Ate is a television series that originally aired on Food Network, debuting on June 22, 2009.
Top Chef: Las Vegas is the sixth season of the American reality television series Top Chef. It was first filmed in Las Vegas, Nevada, before concluding in Napa, California. The season premiered on August 19, 2009, and ended on December 16, 2009. Beginning with this season, the prize money awarded to the winner was increased from US$100,000 to $125,000. In the season finale, Michael Voltaggio was declared the winner over runners-up Bryan Voltaggio and Kevin Gillespie. Gillespie was voted Fan Favorite. In 2010, Top Chef: Las Vegas received the Primetime Emmy Award for "Outstanding Reality Competition Program".
The first season of the American reality competition show Top Chef Masters was broadcast on Bravo. It is a spin-off of Bravo's hit show Top Chef. In the first season, 24 world-renowned chefs competed against each other in weekly challenges. The program took place in Los Angeles. In the season finale that premiered on August 19, 2009, Rick Bayless was crowned Top Chef Master.
Fabio Viviani is a chef, restaurateur, and cook book writer who has appeared on reality television. He also sells a range of wines. In 2005 he moved from Florence to Southern California. In 2008 he appeared on the reality television competition series Top Chef, where he was voted the "fan favorite"; since then he has had a second career as a television host, on-air personality and product pitchman.
Graham Elliot Bowles is an American chef, restaurateur, and reality television personality. He first gained recognition in the restaurant business as a three-time nominee for the James Beard Award. In 2004, he was named to Food & Wine's "Best New Chefs" list, and became the youngest chef in the United States to receive four stars from a major publication.
Top Chef: All-Stars is the eighth season of the American reality television series Top Chef. The season was first filmed in New York City before concluding in The Bahamas. All-Stars consisted of chefs from the previous seven seasons who did not win the title of Top Chef. It premiered on December 1, 2010, and concluded on April 6, 2011. The cast was announced during the Top Chef: D.C. reunion special on September 22, 2010. The prize money awarded to the winner of the season was US$200,000. In the season finale, Top Chef: Chicago runner-up Richard Blais was declared the winner over Top Chef: Las Vegas contestant Mike Isabella. Top Chef: New York runner-up Carla Hall was voted Fan Favorite.
Evangelos Spiros "Spike" Mendelsohn is a Washington, D.C.-based chef and restaurateur best known as the fifth-place finisher of the fourth season of Top Chef, which aired 2008–2009. He is the chef and owner of multiple restaurants: Good Stuff Eatery, Santa Rosa Taqueria, and We, The Pizza in Washington, D.C. In the summer of 2017, Mendelsohn closed his restaurant Béarnaise in Washington's Capitol Hill and opened Santa Rosa Taqueria in its place. In 2019, Mendelsohn opened PLNT Burger, a vegan restaurant featuring Beyond Meat, inside Whole Foods Market in Silver Spring, Maryland.
Richard Benjamin Harrison Jr., also known by the nicknames "The Old Man" and "The Appraiser", was an American businessman and reality television personality, best known as the co-owner of the Gold & Silver Pawn Shop, as featured on the History Channel series Pawn Stars. Harrison was the co-owner of the pawn shop with his son Rick Harrison. They opened the store together in 1989.
Top Chef: California is the thirteenth season of the American reality television series Top Chef. The season was announced by Bravo on April 14, 2015. Similar to Top Chef: Texas, filming took place in several locations across California, including San Francisco, Los Angeles, San Diego, Santa Barbara, Oakland, and the greater Palm Springs area, concluding with a finale in Las Vegas, Nevada. Top Chef: California had a two-night premiere on December 2–3, 2015. Host Padma Lakshmi and head judge Tom Colicchio returned, alongside judges Gail Simmons, Emeril Lagasse, and Richard Blais, among others. The companion web series, Top Chef: Last Chance Kitchen, also returned, premiering immediately following the second part of the season premiere on December 3, 2015. In the season finale, Jeremy Ford was declared the winner over runner-up Amar Santana. Isaac Toups was voted Fan Favorite.
Top Chef: Colorado is the fifteenth season of the American reality television series Top Chef. The season's details and cast were revealed on October 12, 2017. The show was filmed in various cities across Colorado, including Denver, Boulder, Telluride, and Aspen. The season premiered on December 7, 2017, and concluded on March 8, 2018. Last Chance Kitchen premiered on November 30, 2017. In the season finale, Joseph "Joe" Flamm was declared the winner over runner-up Adrienne Cheatham. Fatima Ali was voted Fan Favorite.
Selena + Chef is an American television cooking show hosted by Selena Gomez that premiered on HBO Max on August 13, 2020. The first season consists of 10 episodes. In August 2020, the series was renewed for a second season, which premiered on November 19, 2020, and continues into early 2021. In April 2021, the series was renewed for a third season which was released on October 28, 2021. In November 2021, the series was renewed for a fourth season which premiered on August 18, 2022.
