Top Chef (US)

Filmed out of the Fontainebleau in Miami Beach with a two-part finale on Aspen Mountain, Season 3 is where the show finally starts behaving like a professional cooking competition rather than a house-share with knives. Ted Allen joined the panel and alternated with Gail Simmons across the season, while Season 1's Lee Anne Wong came aboard as a food consultant helping design the challenges, the first sign of the alumni pipeline that now runs through everything. The season is unusually long at 17 episodes, immunity was withdrawn from Quickfire winners from Episode 9, and Restaurant Wars that year ended with no elimination at all because the judges found both teams equally flawed. Notably, the result was revealed live at an event in Chicago after the pre-taped finale, the only time the franchise has done that. The cast, including Hung Huynh, Dale Levitski, Casey Thompson, Brian Malarkey, Tre Wilcox, Howie Kleinberg, CJ Jacobsen, Micah Edelstein and Sara Nguyen, is strong and quotable, and several of them recur in later all-star runs, though critics find the Miami food itself a bit anonymous.

Shot in New York City with a finale in New Orleans built around Mardi Gras World and Commander's Palace, Season 5 is the franchise's warmest and most personality-driven early run: Carla Hall, Fabio Viviani, Stefan Richter, Hosea Rosenberg, Jeff McInnis, Leah Cohen, Jamie Lauren, Radhika Desai and Ariane Duarte gave it a cast of characters rather than just competitors, and the interpersonal storylines are the most talked-about of any season. British critic Toby Young joined as a fixed third judge from Episode 7, replacing the rotating-guest model and bringing a much harsher critical voice to the table. The season is oddly accident-prone in ways that shaped episodes: a refrigerator failure spoiled ingredients in Episode 6 and no one went home, immunity ended at Restaurant Wars in Episode 9, and Episode 13 ran a comeback twist in which three previously eliminated chefs competed for a place in the final stretch, an early ancestor of Last Chance Kitchen. Critics rate it upper-third; IMDb-derived episode scores are noticeably cooler, which usually signals a season people remember more fondly than they rewatch.

New Orleans is the season with the widest gap between how beloved the cast is and how the season is remembered, and it is a genuine fan flashpoint. Filmed in Louisiana from May to July with a finale in Maui, it made unusually heavy use of the city's culinary identity, including Creole and Cajun technique, Gulf seafood and second-line traditions, funded in part by $375,000 of Louisiana tourism money that included BP Deepwater Horizon recovery funds. Emeril Lagasse and Hugh Acheson again sat with Colicchio and Simmons, giving the panel a genuine Louisiana anchor. A new web series, Padma's Picks, ran ten New Orleans chefs against each other for two extra spots in the main cast, and Last Chance Kitchen returned with a returning chef re-entering the competition. The roster, including Nina Compton, Nicholas Elmi, Shirley Chung, Carlos Gaytán, Stephanie Cmar, Brian Huskey, Justin Devillier, Louis Maldonado, Sara Johannes and Travis Masar, is one of the best-liked in the show's history, but the season's outcome remains one of the most argued-about, and reviewers who rank it highly and reviewers who rank it low are usually reacting to the same thing.

Boston was filmed in May and June 2014 with a finale in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, and it is the season where the show's format tinkering became most aggressive. It introduced the Sudden Death Quickfire, in which the judges' least favourite performers were dropped into an immediate cook-off against a previously eliminated chef, with the possibility of a reinstatement, a mechanic that runs alongside the fourth season of Last Chance Kitchen, which itself ran six challenges through to the first part of the finale. Richard Blais joined as a recurring judge here, his first turn on the other side of the table, alongside Colicchio, Simmons and Hugh Acheson. The Fan Favorite vote was dropped for the first time. The cast, including Mei Lin, Gregory Gourdet, Melissa King, Doug Adams, George Pagonis, Katsuji Tanabe, Adam Harvey, James Rigato, Joy Crump, Aaron Grissom and Stacy Cogswell, is quietly one of the strongest of the decade in terms of later careers, but critics find the New England challenges awkward and say the season only comes alive once it reaches Mexico.

Charleston ran a structural experiment the show has never repeated in quite this form: eight brand-new chefs competed directly against eight returning competitors from previous seasons, integrated into the same field from the start rather than kept on separate tracks, a format that gives the veterans an obvious advantage in reading the judges and pacing a season. Filming began in South Carolina in May 2016 and finished in Mexico, taking in Guadalajara and the Yucatán Peninsula, and the Lowcountry challenges, including Gullah cooking, oysters and whole-hog barbecue, are among the best regional work the show has done. Graham Elliot joined Colicchio and Simmons as a recurring judge for the first time. From Episode 9 the show again moved away from immunity, shifting Quickfire rewards towards cash and other prizes. The returning field included names like Brooke Williamson, Shirley Chung, Sheldon Simeon, Casey Thompson, John Tesar, Katsuji Tanabe and Sylva Senat, set against newcomers including Emily Hahn, Jamie Lynch, Silvia Barban and Annie Pettry.

Houston used one of the most genuinely multicultural food cities in the US, including Gulf seafood, Viet-Cajun, Tex-Mex, Nigerian and South Asian cooking, with a detour to Galveston Island and a finale in Tucson, Arizona. It kept a modified version of Portland's alumni-judge idea: each episode paired the three regular judges with both a former Top Chef competitor and a local or nationally known guest chef, giving the panel a rotating fifth and sixth voice. A companion web series, Top Recipe, launched with Dale Talde recreating the dishes that took each week's challenge, and Last Chance Kitchen ran as usual. One competitor took part having lost his senses of taste and smell to COVID shortly before filming and kept his place in the cast. The roster, including Buddha Lo, Damarr Brown, Evelyn Garcia, Sarah Welch, Ashleigh Shanti, Nick Wallace, Jo Chan, Jae Jung, Stephanie Miller, Luke Kolpin, Sam Kang, Robert Hernandez, Jackson Kalb and Monique Feybesse, is technically excellent but critics found the season short on personality and on inspired challenge design.

Wisconsin is the handover season: Kristen Kish, herself a former Top Chef competitor, replaced Padma Lakshmi as host, the first new host in nineteen seasons, with Colicchio and Simmons unchanged. Filming ran through Milwaukee and Madison, leaning on dairy, supper clubs, fish fries and Midwestern brewing culture, before a finale staged aboard the MS Eurodam in the Caribbean with stops in Curaçao and Aruba. The rules were rebuilt around Kish's arrival: immunity can no longer be won in a Quickfire at all and must be earned in an Elimination Challenge, cash prizes are attached to every Quickfire, and from the season's midpoint Colicchio and Simmons joined Kish in judging Quickfires with those results feeding into elimination decisions. A new digital aftershow, The Dish with Kish, launched alongside the returning Last Chance Kitchen, and one competitor began in Last Chance Kitchen before entering the main cast. The roster, including Danny Garcia, Savannah Miller, Dan Jacobs, Michelle Wallace, Manny Barella, Laura Ozyilmaz, Kaleena Bliss, Amanda Turner, Kenny Nguyen, Charly Pierre, Soo Ahn, Alisha Elenz, Cesar Murillo, Rasika Venkatesa, Valentine Howell Jr. and Kevin D'Andrea, is likeable, but critics found the location short on culinary excitement.