TOP Chef executives have taken the show up a notch for the upcoming season.
New episodes of Bravo’s revamped Top Chef series are scheduled to premiere in March of this year.
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Wisconsin is the location where the cooking competition will be gathering this year’s contestants from when it returns on March 20.
Top Chef’s new teaser trailer for Season 21 debuted the show’s new host, Season 10 winner Kristen Kish.
Kristen opened the clip by exclaiming, “Top Chef is back!”
She continued: “We’ve gathered rising star chefs from across the country here to Wisconsin.”
The talented culinary artist was selected to take over for longtime host Padma Lakshmi, 53, who announced last summer that she was leaving Top Chef.
Padma disclosed that she was departing from Top Chef via Instagram.
She wrote in a post: “After much soul searching, I have made the difficult decision to leave Top Chef.
“Having completed a glorious 20th season as host and executive producer, I am extremely proud to have been part of building such a successful show and of the impact it has had in the worlds of television and food.”
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Padma added: “After 17 years, many of the cast and crew are like family to me and I will miss working alongside them dearly. I feel it’s time to move on and need to make space for Taste the Nation, my books and other creative pursuits.
“I am deeply thankful to all of you for so many years of love and support.”
TASTE OF NATION IS?
Taste the Nation is a Hulu television series starring the model that premiered on June 18, 2020.
The show — which explores American food — is on its second season, and, including its Holiday Edition, contains a total of 24 episodes.
The series’ description states: “In Taste the Nation, award winning cookbook author, host and executive producer Padma Lakshmi, takes audiences on a journey across America, exploring the rich and diverse food culture of various immigrant groups, seeking out the people who have so heavily shaped what American food is today.
“From indigenous communities to recent immigrant arrivals, Padma breaks bread with Americans across the nation to uncover the roots and relationship between our food, our humanity and our history – ultimately revealing stories that challenge notions of identity, belonging, and what it means to be American.”
OTHER BUSINESS VENTURES
In addition to being a TV star, she is also an author.
Padma has authored multiple books throughout her successful career, including cookbooks, a memoir, and a children’s book.
In 1999, her debut cookbook, Easy Exotic, was published.
According to her website, the best-seller received the Best First Book Award at the 1999 Gourmand World Cookbook Awards.
Lakshmi’s second cookbook titled Tangy, Tart, Hot & Sweet hit the shelves in 2007.
In 2016, she published her memoir called Love, Loss, and What We Ate, as well as The Encyclopedia of Spices & Herbs, a “culinary reference book.”
Lakshmi’s first children’s book titled Tomatoes for Neela was published in 2021.
As her website states, it won Best in the World in the D03 Children’s category for the 2022 Gourmand Awards.
Also in 2021, the award-winning author “guest-edited and wrote the introduction” for that year’s edition of The Best American Travel Writing.
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