The main event of Tournament of Champions VII is finally here with the first eight chefs out of the field of 32 battling it out in four matchups to see who advances to round 2—and who packs their knives and leaves. Plus, the first of four “Secret Culinary Icons” will be revealed in the last matchup of the night.
Ahead of the bracket reveal to the contestants, Jet Tila expressed his dismay at the “culinary icons” being No. 1 seeds because he (rightly) thought he’d be a No. 1 since he has reached the semifinals so many times.
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But one thing I will say as someone who watches a lot of competition cooking shows—if these secret icons haven’t brushed up on competition cooking (which is VERY different from developing dishes for a 3-star Michelin restaurant or what have you), they might be pretty rusty to competition cooking. I would not assume that the No. 1 seeds, no matter how renowned and decorated they are, are just going to breeze through this competition.
It’s actually why TOC is so much fun—these chefs are all extremely talented, so on any given day, anyone can win.
In fact, I’m going to predict right now (and I might be wrong, I promise I have not seen any episodes before writing this) that there is going to be at least one No. 8 seed that upsets a No. 1 seed.
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Anyway, the judges for this episode are Alex Guarnaschelli, Antonia Lofaso and Dominique Crenn.
Beware of spoilers ahead: Don’t keep reading if you don’t want to be spoiled.
Matchup 1: No. 2 Jet Tila vs. No. 7 Ashleigh Shanti
Ahead of the cook, Jet said that he keeps coming back to TOC because he wants to show his kids “that you can get beat down and you can always come back and try your best and that’s all that matters.” I just love him. There are SO many chefs that I want to see win this and Jet is at the top.
What’s Next on ‘Tournament of Champions’ Season 7?
The first-round battles continue with four more matchups: Nini Nguyen takes on Joe Sasto, Kevin Lee battles Adam Greenberg, Britt Rescigno goes up against Giuseppe Tentori and the second Secret Icon is revealed as they take on TOC newcomer Katsuji Tanabe.
Tournament of Champions season 7 airs Sunday nights at 8 p.m. ET/PT on Food Network,
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