Top Chef Recap: Restaurant Wars! Buddha Lo Offers His Critiques

Buddha Lo is twofold A top chef winner, executive chef at Hūso in New York and brand ambassador for Saratoga Spring Water. He shares his thoughts after each episode of Top Chef Season 21, which takes place in Wisconsin, offering a unique perspective as a former chef.

Warning: This article contains spoilers.

It’s that time of the season again, it’s the Restaurant Wars! Surprisingly, none of the contestants could correctly guess the challenge. Restaurant Wars is something I’ve been preparing for regardless of the part of the season. Everyone knows that it’s Last Chef and that Restaurant Wars are the only guaranteed challenges in the modern era A top chef.

This time, the chefs chose their teams, and most of them gravitated towards Danny Garcia, so whoever didn’t reach him in time, created their own separate team. Because Michelle won the last challenge, she was able to pick her team after it was formed, which ended up giving that team a five-to-four advantage.

Manuel “Manny” Barella Lopez, Soo Ahn, Kaleena Bliss, Laura Ozyilmaz.

David Moir/Bravo

They went back to the old school A top chef where the teams had to open a restaurant with an a-la-carte concept. Diners had two choices for each dish instead of one set menu, which is more difficult than just serving what’s on the menu. After watching many seasons A top chefi learned that the key to success is to have a solid concept, otherwise it’s just another elimination challenge where the chefs cook whatever they want and design the dining room.

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Michelle, Dan, Danny, Amanda and Savannah’s team focused on Danny as executive chef and chose a global concept that drew on each chef’s strengths. The name of their restaurant, Channel, allowed them to use seafood as a link. Michelle expressed concern about the idea not being a cohesive concept and I agree. If Dan hadn’t switched from his beetroot tartare to a seafood dish, I personally think the results would have been different.

The team consisting of Manny, Laura, Kaleena and Soo chose the Mexican-Korean restaurant Dos y Deul. The combination of Mexican and Korean is not new to the culinary world, so there was plenty of inspiration to draw from. It was interesting to see the lack of balance in the kitchens when they cooked their meals. Dos y Deul also decided not to have dessert, and while it’s optional, it personally pisses me off when they don’t put desserts on the menu for Restaurant Wars or Last Chef. All restaurants offer desserts, so why should Restaurant Wars be any different?

Michelle Wallace.

David Moir/Bravo

Chef’s Day, Danny made the smart move of preparing the tickets in advance, which I think is key to success. Both times I competed in Restaurant Wars, I stayed up until 4 a.m. writing maps, drawing floor plans, listing server responsibilities, creating to-do lists, and fine-tuning the restaurant concept.

Michelle felt like the right choice for the front of house, but it was disappointing to see her not fully lean into that responsibility. She did not greet the judges, did not say goodbye when leaving and did not fully explain the concept. You have to drive it home on top of making the judges feel like VIPs because they are the ones who decide who goes home. It gave me Jackson flashbacks.

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The judging panel was a tough decision, as neither team nailed their concepts or service, but they produced some excellent food. This made it difficult to choose a winner. Dos y Deul could have done a lot more with the Korean-Mexican concept to afford the win. Kristen stated that they had a more cohesive theme, but the dishes confused her with the concept. I wasn’t a big fan of Kanal as a concept, because it seemed like everyone could cook whatever they wanted, as long as there was a marine element to the dish. I’d love to see them dive deeper by including chocolate sea salt or caramel with seaweed and fish sauce in their desserts, instead of two random offerings that can be served anywhere.

Dan Jacobs.

David Moir/Bravo

WHO WON

Channel ended up winning by producing better plates of food, and Dan took the win with smoked sutka, labneh, potato and harissa cake, and his maple dessert.

WHO HE LOST

The losing team, Dos y Deul, received a lot of criticism from the judges. Kaleen’s dish contained a non-crispy, greasy tortilla that Kwame Onwuachi described as boring. Manny did a shrimp dish that was described as bad, and while he did a good steak and mole dish, the judges felt that he really did the bare minimum for the fusion concept.

Kwame Onwauchi, Kristen Kish.

David Moir/Bravo

Kaleena was told to pack her knives, and I think it ultimately came down to a few factors: with her dish, she let the bland pork and tasteless pineapple leave the kitchen even though she was the head chef; and she lost control of the expedition, which led to a bad experience for the referees. It was another case of captains sinking their ship in Restaurant Wars, and now Kaleena is fighting to get back Kitchen of the last chance again again.

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Source: HIS Education