Competing to Compete at Bocuse D'Or USA's Live Screening of Top Chef: Las Vegas

A ballotine is a piece of meat stuffed with other meats and rolled into a bundle -- a protein inside a protein inside a protein. That the Top Chef: Las Vegas contestants were asked to make this many-layered dish on Wednesday night's show was appropriate, as the episode was a kind of metaphoric ballotine itself -- a competition within a competition within a competition.

The winner of the episode's elimination challenge, in which the chef whose food fares worst with judges is dismissed, was to win a spot to compete in the prestigious Bocuse D'Or USA,  a competition to represent America in the Bocuse D'Or culinary tournament held every two years in Lyon, France. Fittingly, a screening of the episode at New York City's Astor Center Wednesday night was a veritable meta-smorgasbord, where attendees at the benefit for Bocuse D'Or USA, watched the show's host, judges, and one of its remaining contestants, the uber-likeable Kevin Gillespie, watch themselves in a live screening of the episode.

A surprinsgly dry "Quick fire chardonnay" was served and party-goers admired a large round of bread into which the words "Top Chef" had been carved. "It's too fancy to eat," the woman next to me proclaimed. Though guests managed to keep their hands off the bread, no one was turning down the plates of sea bass tartare, a variety of pâtés, and corners of croques messieurs, supplied by Feasts and Fêtes, Daniel Boulud's catering company. Chef Boulud also happened to be a guest judge on Wednesday's episode, and was on hand to provide an additional layer of meta-fun to the benefit. 

Although the pairing of Top Chef and Bocuse D'Or might seem as perfect as a pinot noir with a pungent piece of roquefort -- since the Top Chef alum who would eventually go on to compete in the Bocuse would have a season of high-stakes competition under his or her toque -- most of the chefs on hand agreed that the Bocuse is in another league.  

While Boulud acknowledged that "in terms of dealing with pressure" filming the show would prepare some contestants for the intensity of the international stage, the night's victor would still face a difficult learning curve. "The hardest thing [about Bocuse]," he told me, "is knowing all the chefs are as good as you, if not better, and you don't know who you're up against. After several weeks on Top Chef, you know what to expect."  

Padma Lakshmi, looking gorgeous and pregnant in a super-short, black empire-waist dress, agreed. "These chefs have gained some experience of working in a hot house pressure cooker situation," she said. "But chefs in the States can be at a natural disadvantage because they're not used to cooking in a French culinary vein. Norway has always done well for some reason."  

Meanwhile, crowds of women surrounded Gillespie to ogle his tattoos ("Someone actually kissed one of them the other day," he told me), and as Tom Colicchio, Boulud, and Lakshmi moved around the room, even those intently watching the program were distracted.  The episode, however, wasn't without its captivating moments. When the show's curmudgeon Michael Voltaggio said of Gillespie's food,"[it's] the food I cook on my day off," boos erupted, several attendees' heads swiveling from TV Gillespie to live Gillespie through out the screening.

Before the episode started, Gellespie told me he was nervous to watch himself in front of a crowd. "It's a little foreign," he said. "You don't know what you said in the heat of the moment. You might fly off the handle a bit, so tonight will be an interesting moment."   

He managed, however, not to rub any of his co-stars the wrong way. When he was announced as the episode's winner, and a future entrant in the Bocuse D'Or USA , the crowd, including Coliccho, erupted in enthusiastic applause.  

As the show neared its conclusion, a woman near me, who was thoroughly enjoying the fried risotto fritters we had just been offered, turned to me and said, "Well this is fun isn't it? They all seem so nice." It turned out, however, that she wasn't there simply for the star gazing and the fritters. She was there to compete herself -- passing out resumes for her son, a recent cooking school grad, to Colicchio and Boulud.