New Top Chef host won't be a pushover
Kristen Kish aims for empathy with `tough love' on reality show
You do not have to tell Kristen Kish, the new host of Bravo's Top Chef, that crowns can be heavy. She knows, people.
Picking up the mantle of hosting duties of the top-rated show from longtime fan favourite Padma Lakshmi isn't as easy as reciting the show's signature line: “Please pack your knives and go.”
But Kish, a former Top Chef winner who operates the acclaimed Arlo Grey restaurant in Austin, is finding her own way — by leaning into her strengths (hint for future competitors: she's empathetic, but no pushover) and quirks, including her innate dorkiness (her words!).
Ahead of the show's 21st-season première, Kish talked to us about learning to stop worrying so much, whether she has a dealbreaker dish and about how American chef and Top Chef judge Tom Colicchio helped her conquer her nerves.
Q Obviously you're filling some big shoes, and people have expectations. How are you thinking about that?
A The first thing was sheer panic, to be completely honest. It's a show that has defined a lot of culinary competition shows, and it's been around for a long time. I know what it can do for your career and how important this show has become. So knowing all that, of course, there's pressure on your shoulders and then knowing that you're also taking the spot of someone that carved out that role and defined it. All I can do is go in there with the knowledge that I have, with the empathy that I have, with — in some cases — the dorkiness that I have. All I can do is be me in the context of what Top Chef needs from me, and so when I think about it that way, it lessens the expectation I put on myself.
Q How do you think having been a competitor informed you as the host?
A There's one side where I feel for them, like when it gets hard — I know what it feels like, when you feel stuck and you're not clicking into it. The other side is that I also know when you can do more.
You know where someone can be better, where someone could try a little harder or dig a little deeper. But at the end of the day, we're all there to champion their process. When we think of judges' table, we always say it's more feedback than anything. It's not placing judgment. It's giving feedback in order to do better next time, even when you leave the show.
Q I know there are some unwritten rules of Top Chef, like no one should make rice. Or that competitors were always nervous to serve Padma Indian food. Do you have things like that?
A No, you're just looking for technically sound dishes with creativity and a chef 's point of view.
There are foods that I don't like to eat in my normal life. I'm not a smoked-salmon person, but I'm going to eat it and I can
judge it fairly. As long as it's good, I'm cool. I love deep-fried food. It's just my jam. But poorly done deep-fried food? I don't want to eat that.
Q What are the challenges of eating on camera?
A Whether you're on TV or not, we all know what it feels like to put a big bite of food in your mouth, and then someone starts talking to you and then everyone's waiting for you to finish chewing. If that happens, it happens — it's television, so they're going to cut out the part where I'm chewing my food for five minutes.
Q What do you see as the big challenges in the industry right now?
A I don't know what every restaurant across this country looks like. But I imagine that there are some that are still being run with ego over community. Fear over connection. Head over heart. Obviously there are some with a lack of diversity, but all I can say is that looking at my restaurant, and what we've created is something that I'm very, very, very proud of. And when I go into my friends' restaurants, I'm very, very, very proud of great chefs, great leaders making positive changes.
Q Are you hard on the Top Chef contestants?
A I'm the same way that I am in my restaurant. You hold people accountable for the decisions that they make. You give feedback if things need to be better, and you want to encourage them to be the best that they can be. Sometimes that requires tough love, and sometimes you're like, “why are we making the mistake five times in a row?”
I actually don't think it's tough at all. I think it's encouraging, and I feel like when you hold someone accountable they want to do better for you — there's this, like, “I don't want to mess up again” kind of vibe.
Q So we won't see you Gordon Ramsay-ing anybody?
A Oh, my voice never raises. The Washington Post