The mise en place relay race has long been a staple challenge on "Top Chef." A chef's mise en place refers to any ingredients needed by a chef before they start cooking and can vary from night to night. These creative challenges forced contestants in each season to work quickly, cleanly, and professionally.
"Top Chef Masters, " Season 4
In this season of "Masters," the chefs were tasked with a pretty tricky mise en place challenge that was far harder than the challenges in past seasons. Each chef needed to work alone, grating a block of Parmesan to the rind, seperating 18 egg whites from their yolks, and cutting a beef tenderloin into four filets weighing between 7.5 and 8.5 ounces without using a scale. The two chefs who did the best in the challenge then faced off against each other using the ingredients they had prepped: Kerry won with a Parmesan-crusted filet of beef.
"Top Chef," Season 3
Th Season 3 mise en place race involved the chefs working in two competing teams. After shucking 15 oysters and finely chopping five large onions (a task that Casey was famously slow to complete), the teams also had to break down four chickens and separate three whites. Then they had to beat the whites into stiff peaks. The winning team got a special advantage going into Restaurant Wars.
"Top Chef," Season 4
Going into the Wedding Wars episode, the chefs split into Team Fork (Andrew, Antonia, Richard, Stephanie) and Team Spoon (Dale, Lisa, Nikki, Spike). The teams had to pull apart five oranges, two artichokes, and filet a whole monkfish. On top of that, they also had to make mayonnaise from scratch. Team Fork won.
"Top Chef," Season 6
In the very first episode, the 17 competing chefs were divided into four teams for their mise en place relay race. The tasks included shucking clams, peeling spot prawns, cleaning lobsters, and butchering chops out of a full prime rib. This was just the first part of the Quickfire: The winning Blue Team (Jennifer, Bryan, Jesse, Mattin) then had to cook a dish using whatever ingredient they were responsible for in the relay race. Jen, not surprisingly, took the win by making a clam ceviche dish ."Top Chef: Just Desserts," Season 1
In the seventh episode of this season, the chefs needed to work in groups of three to complete the following tasks: forming 12 tart shells, piping eight roses from buttercream icing, whip six egg whites into stiff peaks, and stretching and rolling a table-sized piece of strudel dough. The winning team was Heather H., Yigit, and Zac. Sadly, Heather H. was eliminated during the elimination challenge later in the same episode.
