So where are those \"Top Chef\" trailblazers now? Click on the names on the left to find out...
";
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A fan favorite from season one, Dave was known for down-to-earth food with layers of intense flavors ... and for telling Tiffani Faison during a judges’ panel, \"I'm not your bitch, bitch\" – a slogan that later made it onto T-shirts.
Following the show, he worked in New York as executive chef at Crave On 42nd in Hell's Kitchen. Dave tried to bring hype to the restaurant last year when it was already in debt, but the combination of a location on the far west side of Manhattan along with a slowing economy forced the restaurant to shut its doors this fall.
Dave is currently considering moving to take a position as executive chef of the food program at the University of Illinois as well as some offers to work as a private chef.
\"You come out of a TV show and you work even harder,\" Dave said. \"You have to put up or shut up.\"";
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Season one contestant Lee Anne has gone on the other side of the camera at \"Top Chef,\" now working as a culinary producer for the show.
\"I have a good perspective from being an ex-contestant,\" she said.
Lee Anne helps design the challenges, picking ingredients, time limits, the budget and rules. She stocks the pantry the chefs use, as well as clean up after them.
\"It’s not the most glamorous part of my job,\" Lee Anne said laughing. \"But someone’s got to do it.\"
Lee Anne has continued in her position at the executive chef of event operations for the French Culinary Institute in New York City. She also has pitches for her own TV show in the works – but nothing is set yet. In the mean time, viewers can check videos out at Bravotv.com where Lee Anne hosts cooking lessons in \"The Wong Way to Cook.\"
\"So many people are passionate about food and want to learn,\" Lee Anne said. \"But there is only so much good food television out there right now. I want to bring substance to the content.\"
";
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Health guru Andrea is still teaching others how to eat better, but since appearing on “Top Chef,” her efforts have been on a much larger scale, teaching and doing cooking demos across the country.
She is the host of a health and wellness travel show called “Wise Up!” and “Fed Up,” which shows viewers how to cook food to help ease various ailments. Both air on the Veria channel on DISH Network. She's also working on her third cookbook, which she hopes to publish in 2009
Andrea wants to stick with teaching rather than opening a restaurant.
\"When I first started teaching, the people who had other people cooking for them, or me cooking for them, didn't get as healthy as the people who took their health into their own hands and got into the kitchen,\" she said. \"Those who got in there had a better understanding about food.\"";
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Season one runner-up Tiffani Faison is working on a restaurant called Workshop that will open up in the San Francisco Bay area later this year. It will center around new American food with a focus on sustainability and using local farm-fresh ingredients.
Tiffani said that she’s glad she waited and didn’t immediately open up a restaurant after \"Top Chef\" aired.
\"I didn’t buy into my own hype,\" she said. \"There were things I wasn’t ready for and wanted to learn, and I definitely feel more prepared now to open my own restaurant.\"
In the meantime, Tiffani does restaurant consulting, as well as public speaking appearances on behalf of sustainable farmers as well as gay and lesbian organizations.
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The season one winner has opened up a successful New York neighborhood restaurant in Greenwich Village called Perilla, which serves up seasonal American fare like Spicy Duck Meatballs and Pan Roasted Golden Snapper.
The restaurant, which has received solid reviews, is full most nights, but Harold still reserves tables for walk-ins because he wants it to stay accessible to the neighborhood, he said.
The notoriety from the show definitely brings people in, he said.
\"People see you cooking food on TV and it makes them want to come in and taste it,\" Harold said.
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Michael, who provided some of the funniest moments of season two – like cooking on painkillers after having a tooth removed – has continued with his culinary career. He’s currently living in Stockton, Calif., and working at Italian-Mediterranean restaurant Paragary’s. He also has a catering company, does cooking demos throughout the country, and helps his wife out with her real estate business.
\"Cooking is so much fun,\" he said. \"I’m going to do that until I get my own place rolling.\"
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Season two champ Ilan relocated from New York to Los Angeles in March, and has a Jewish-Scottish gastropub, The Gorbals, in the works and set to open in January. The food is inspired by fare he would eat as a kid with an Israeli mother and Scottish father.
\"It's where kilts and yarmulkes are equally welcome,\" Ilan said. \"Bacon-wrapped matzo balls, Manischewitz-braised pork belly -- real sacrilegious stuff. Rabbis will be breathing down my neck.\"
He's also been writing a column for Complex magazine.
\"The whole crux of the magazine is to sell you stuff and get you laid,\" Ilan said. \"My last column was on how to impress your girlfriend's family for Thanksgiving.\"";
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After wrapping season three of \"Top Chef,\" Howie worked for Chef Alfred Portale of the Gotham Bar & Grill in New York City, before he decided to open a restaurant of his own in North Miami. Playing off the nickname Sara Mair gave him for being so frustrating and tenacious during challenges, Howie is starting up Bulldog Barbecue that will dish up pork, ribs and chicken. It’s slated to open this summer.
Howie was at the South Beach Wine & Food Festival in February, giving attendees a preview of the fare, as well as giving cooking demonstrations to fans.
";
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Season three runner-up Dale is planning to open up an upscale diner in downtown Chicago in the late summer called Town and Country with fellow alums Sarah Ngyuyen and CJ Jacobsen.
\"If I could open a restaurant where all 15 of us are there I would love it,\" Dale said. \"Cooking is so personal ... it will be a great environment to learn together, and those two in the kitchen will totally have my back.\"";
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The self-effacing and hilarious season three chef with the worst broccolini ever has gone on to do several appearances at wine and food festivals, including the James Beard Celebrity Chef tour. He also hosts instructional videos that teach basic recipes, such as how to make egg salad, on the British Web site videojug.com.
\"It's American sort of food,\" CJ said of what he was demonstrating. \"It's a lot of white trash numbers that I try and make accessible and normal.\"
CJ also created a \"Big Day Breakfast\" for Hilton Garden Inn that is on menus across the country. He recently accepted an offer to open a restaurant called Blue, in Orange County, Calif., which will be a gastropub that focuses on small plates.";
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Season-three contestant Brian Malarkey came back to The Oceanaire in San Diego, where he was executive chef before taking time out to compete in the show.
\"The restaurant was busy before, but it has been extremely busy after,\" Brian said. \"The show really exposed San Diego as a great food city, and we have a really supportive community here.\"
Brian hosts a cooking show on the San Diego Fox affiliate, and has been making appearances and cooking demonstrations across the country. He's planning a cook book that will focus on his specialty – seafood.
\"I want it to be unintimidating food for cooking at home,\" he said. \"It will be fun and very entertaining.\" ";
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Season three champ Hung has been working as a chef at Solo in Manhattan since March. He has been preparing the restaurant’s signature dishes, such as maple-glazed duck with savory chestnut sausages, but also adding his own specialties to the Mediterranean-Asian fare. The catch? Everything Hung makes at Solo must also be kosher.
He recently earned the price for \"Best Fish Dish\" at the Bocuse d'Or semifinals in Orlando, Fla., a contest that is considered to be the Olympics of food. He also has plans for a New York City restaurant in the works.";
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Season four \"villain\" Lisa has been working on a cookbook that \"expresses a lot about me as a person,\" she said. \"I'm trying to give people an idea of who I really am. Selective reality TV focuses on one small aspect of each person, and there's a lot more to me than what you see on television.\"
After the show ended, Lisa did consulting work for Mai House, a Vietnamese restaurant in New York. Now, she's taking time off and doing charity events, as well as working on some restaurant concept ideas.";
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Andrew, whose line \"I've got a culinary boner\" was immortalized on a Bravo T-shirt, went back to his job working six days a week at Le Cirque following season four. He decided to head to a quieter scene and work at a private dining club in New York City.
He said being on the show doesn't give you any leeway in high-intensity kitchens.
\"It comes down to your skills and ability in the kitchen,\" he said. \"If I was a slob, I'd just be that guy who was on TV who is a slob. The celebrity would fizzle quickly.\"";
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Dale continued working at Buddakan, an Asian restaurant in New York City’s meatpacking district that serves as many as 1,100 covers on a Saturday night. He's been saving up money to travel through Southeast Asia next summer to gather ideas for a restaurant he's planning, DQN (Dale's Quality Noodles), which will feature fare like Vietnamese sandwiches and noodle soups.
One moment on “Top Chef” he'd like to do over: The butterscotch scallops.
\"I just saw it landed on Bravo's worst dish list,\" he said. \"But give me one more chance to do it and I'd knock it out of the park.\"";
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Nikki recently celebrated the three-year anniversary of her restaurant 24 Prince in Soho. She also signed with a literary agent to represent a cookbook she's writing, which will show readers how to make dishes at home, and what extra touches they can add to bring them up to restaurant quality. She also has a line of clothing in the works that will offer server and bartender uniforms as well as chefs coats and pants.
She said being on the show has helped her business, but that you still have to work hard.
\"We don't come home and expect to be Jean-Georges after a six-week competition on television,\" Cascone said. \"Your life changes, but it changes because your expectations of yourself become much higher.\"";
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Season four contestant Ryan has been working as executive chef at Mission Beach Café in San Francisco since June, as well as operating his own catering company.
\"It's doing extremely well,\" Ryan said of the restaurant. \"In this economy I feel so blessed.\"
Ryan also has been traveling on his days off, appearing at food festivals and events.";
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After season four, Richard returned to Atlanta and worked at Home restaurant. He's currently opening FLIP, a burger restaurant, also in Atlanta.
He's blogging for Bravo about this latest season of \"Top Chef\" and is pitching TV shows focused on creative cooking techniques.";
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This summer Spike opened a burger restaurant, Good Stuff Eatery, with his family in Washington, D.C., that also serves hand-spun shakes and homemade fries. He's planning to open a second location and to work on some other restaurant concepts.";
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In addition to a full roster of appearances at food festivals and charity events, season four “Top Chef” winner Stephanie is working on opening a new restaurant in Chicago that she describes as “funky and casual, with Mediterranean-inspired small plates.”
She's been meeting with production companies to talk about future TV possibilities, and has a cookbook in the works that is geared to the home cook but will also offer insight on how chefs develop dishes."; // END editorial data