Top Chef All-Stars Review: They’ve Got Their Groove Back

It seems like only yesterday that Top Chef first entered our homes and seven seasons later we arrive at the newest incarnation of the series aptly named “All-Stars.” The cheftestants are the disgruntled, dramatic and in some cases highly talented former contestants from seasons 1-7, all brought back to compete in the ultimate Top Chef and for two hundred thousand dollars.

From season one we have Stephen Asprinio and Tiffani Faison; season two – Elia Aboumrad and Marcel Vigneron; season three – Dale Levitski, Tre Wilcox, and Casey Thompson; season four – Richard Blais, Antonia Lofaso, Dale Talde, and Spike Mendelsohn; season five – Jamie Lauren, Carla Hall, and Fabio Viviani; season six – Jennifer Carroll and Mike Isabella; and season seven – Tiffany Derry and Angelo Sosa.

Notably missing though are my season six favorites Kevin Gillespie and Bryan Voltaggio.

Let me say that this first episode was more exciting than all of season seven combined. The quickfire challenge was to create a dish that best represented their season’s host city. All the chefs were then grouped up according to their respective seasons. The winner was Blais, Dale, Antonia and Spike with their pork and black pepper sausage with mustard ice cream to highlight Chicago. The added bonus was that they had immunity from the elimination round.

The elimination challenge was undoubtedly a genius way to start this season. Each chef was presented with the ingredients to the dish that they got kicked off for and their task was to recreate it, but better. They were allowed to make changes but not deviate so much that it would make the dish unrecognizable. The collective groans that came from the chefs after they lifted the silver lids were priceless. In essence, their return to Top Chef is the ultimate do-over and now was the perfect opportunity for redemption by getting it right this time around.

Some of the hilariously memorable dishes were scallop themed – Spike’s frozen scallop catastrophe and Dale’s butterscotch and scallops in the “what the hell was he thinking” category. Both chefs were able to pull it off this time with glowing comments from the judges. Surprisingly though, the winner was Angelo with his homemade ramen with sweet glazed pork belly and watermelon. Unfortunately Blais was disqualified from competing because he went over time. He probably would have won if not for his slow and meticulous plating.

The loser of the challenge was Elia who didn’t improve on her red snapper steamed in ti leaf with snapper jus. Personally I think Stephen should have gone home because all three of his dishes were lack luster. But hey it’s the judges’ call after all.

Speaking of judges, guess who became a permanent judge for this season? It was really about time Anthony Bourdain came on board. As one of food television’s most notable faces, it was only a matter of time this happened. While his verboseness on No Reservations can sometimes feel like one trying too hard to sound smart, cultured, and on the cusp of douchebaggery, I do like watching him on TV.

This episode has me optimistic that season eight will be a good one and we’ll see lots of creative and innovative food. We got to look back at all the craziness and past drama throughout the years and now we’ve got matured and grown up chefs, maybe.

Yeah right. Can’t wait for the next episode!

Season 8, Episode 1: History Never Repeats (originally aired December 1, 2010)

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Photographs courtesy of Bravo and ImdbPro