Top Chef Review: Underwhelmed Introductions

Top Chef season seven begins this week and its host city is the nation’s capital of Washington, DC. This was a treat since I’ve lived in the area for a couple of years now and I actually recognized the places they were at, not to mention repeated attempts to figure out where they were filming last April so that I could sample the food.

The first episode introduces us to this season’s competitors and it’s an amalgam of chefs representing different parts of the country: the West coast (CA), Northeast (NY, PA, NJ, MA, CT), Southwest (TX, CO), South (TN, FL), and the Midwest (OH).

The chefs find their first quickfire challenge on the rooftop of the Newseum where host Padma Lakshmi and head judge Tom Colicchio greet them. The seventeen of them compete in the classic mise en place race. The first round they must peel ten potatoes, second round dice ten cups of onions, and in the third round cut four chickens into eight parts.

Each round only the quickest chefs make it through until only four remain to make a dish out of  potatoes, onions, and chicken and then serve it to Padma and Tom. The top four are Angelo, Kevin, Kenny, and Timothy. To make things more interesting the winner gets twenty thousand dollars. Kenny is a machine and is first in finishing everything but Angelo wins in the end with a roasted spice chicken with chilled onion jam.

In the elimination round, the chefs cook for the kick off party of the National Cherry Blossom Festival and they are to create a dish that represents where they’re from. Angelo, Kenny, Timothy, and Kevin get to pick three other people to compete with in the elimination round where each group will have a winner and a loser. Out of the top four there will be a winner and one of the bottom four gets kicked off.

The dishes were underwhelming. Angelo ends up winning again and you can see his ego inflate even more. His dish was arctic char with pickled shallots, chillied tapioca and smoked bacon froth to represent rural Connecticut. I might be biased because he used foam and after Marcel’s over use of foam in season two I’m just not a fan. Arnold’s kaffir citrus basil cake, palm sugar anglaise & “myint” julep looked and sounded tasty but the judges found the cake too dry.

In the end John with the crazy dreadlocks gets eliminated. He made a maple mousse napoleon with crisp macadamia nut and vanilla sauce. His fatal mistake was the dry dough and telling the judges that he bought it. While the three others in the bottom had also made serious mistakes, Gail brought up a good point of how John’s dish only had three components and that since the dough was store bought, that was one third of his dish right there.

I am totally missing Michael Voltaggio right now from season six. While Michael was cocky, his food was definitely different and creative. The early lead Angelo had was underwhelming if you compare him to past seasons’ contestants. He immediately was dropping names and places during the Newseum meet and greet and in the interview said that his goal was to win every single challenge. Lofty goals, sir, and I’m doubtful you’ll succeed, but hey I guess we’ll find out. I’m rooting for Kenny!

Overall the show made DC look very pretty and I’m hoping that we’ll see more creative food as the season progresses. The best part had to be Eric Ripert replacing Toby Young as the new guest judge.

They highlighted some of the future episodes placing the cheftestants at the CIA, Goddard Space Station and Mt. Vernon. Guest judges will also include White House chef Sam Kass, MSNBC host Joe Scarborough, Congressman Aaron Schock of Illinois, Senator Mark Warner of Virginia, CIA Director Leon Panetta and NBC White House Correspondent Savannah Guthrie. Definitely very DC.

Season 7, Episode 1: What’s Your Constituency? (originally aired June 16, 2010)

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Photographs courtesy of Bravo and David Giesbrecht.