206 replies to this topic

[Blanky]

I love LeeAnne. Most of her awesome confessional comments mirrored my interpretations of certain situations and certain contestants. What other viewers took as mean-spirited snark I took as candid truth doled out with a wry smile, a wink, and a nod. LeeAnne ain't nobody's fool.

Even though she never gave off such an air on the show and was always enthusiastic, LeeAnne has bigger fish than Top Chef to fry; thus no motivation to, and nothing to gain from, maliciously bad-mouthing the other contestants. Preach it, LeeAnne!

Speaking of which, her infamous short-lived blog that haunted the Google cached pages is gone from those ghost-pastures, too, but if anybody would like to read it, email me--I saved a copy (don't want to post it outright, though, 'cause there's no link to attribute it to).

Edited by Blanky, Jul 14, 2006 @ 5:15 AM.

[Nutjob]

I like to think that I would probably make similar comments to LeeAnne's if I were on a show like this, so I can't be too critical. She was funny without being too mean, honest without getting too personal, and just kind called things the way she saw them. I was pretty bummed when she got cut.

[ThatBadgerChick]

I loved her too. And I will maintain until my dying day that she wuz robbed. I liked Dave okay and all, but LeeAnne so should have been in the final three with Harold and the grill bitch.

[bettylynn]

LeeAnn was totally robbed. I was pulling for her to win the whole thing. She seemed like someone I would want to cook my food AND be my friend. :)

[Elphaba]

She was favorite from day one and I, too, think she should have been in the Top 3 at the end. I'm glad she's successful anyway, as she would have been even without the show.

[cherry malotte]

Go ahead and e-mail the blog to me Blanky. I wonder if maybe the responses to her blog, via e-mail and the outpouring of attention she got maybe spooked her a bit, plus by this time she's over all that. I kind still wish she had blogged all the episodes but you can't have everything.

Lee Anne is a total class act. You just know things will get better and better for her career wise.

[Puds38]

I liked LeeAnne & early on I wanted her to win, but she did make a few errors.

Edited by Puds38, Jul 14, 2006 @ 8:07 PM.

[OmahaMtLion]

Lee Anne wasn't crowing about her victory, she had fun working the line and, yes, she won. The first challenge. It must have been a nice moment for her and she wanted to enjoy it. Tiffani and Ken were the ones bickering about the double-dipping and making the situation unpleasant for everyone and harshing Lee Anne's buzz. I think she was maybe just trying to make conversation.

But, yeah, the blog was bitteriffic.

[biakbiak]

Also, I wouldn't be surprised if she had a Joey Potter-ish crush for Harold.

Does this mean that both Harold and Stephen are eventually going to fall in love with her and have it drive a wedge between their friendship and she is going to have to make the choice that changes everything?

Yeah, I don't think she was crowing about her victory. Both Tiffani and LeeAnn did well on the line and had fun and it probably reinforced the idea that it was a good idea to be on the show.

[sweet potato]

Does this mean that both Harold and Stephen are eventually going to fall in love with her and have it drive a wedge between their friendship and she is going to have to make the choice that changes everything?

I'm so confused. lol

Edited by sweet potato, Aug 10, 2006 @ 1:24 PM.

[soapygirl]

Also, I wouldn't be surprised if she had a Joey Potter-ish crush for Harold.

Does this mean that both Harold and Stephen are eventually going to fall in love with her and have it drive a wedge between their friendship and she is going to have to make the choice that changes everything?

If we are going for the extended metaphor here then really Stephen = Dawsons. Both were such douches.

But in terms of love triangles its Harold trying to decide if he loves Lee Anne more then Stephan. There was some definete HoYay going down between them.

Ahem.

Back to Lee Anne yeah she had her moments of pettieness and from what little I read of her blog I could tell she was pretty bitter that she didn't make it to the final round. But no one's perfect and out of all the Cheftestants she would be the one I'd most like to hang out at a bar and knock back drinks and hear all the good stories about what happened behind the scenes. She has a very magnetic personality, she seems like a very acessible person more so then Harold who always seemed a bit removed. I think her talent and her personality have helped her to have a good job in the cooking world and by her own admission she didn't need the top chef title the way some of the other chefs needed it. But I think it would have been really interesting to see what she would do in such a position.

Edited by soapygirl, Aug 10, 2006 @ 2:33 PM.

[isiscloud]

In the first episode, she's sitting in a car with Tiffani and Ken. She says something like, "I had a lot of fun today," and Tiffani agrees with her. Of course you had a lot of fun -- you won the Quick Fire! Ken's behavior was his own fault, but it wasn't necessary to rub it in his face or antagonize him. All things considered, I think Ken handled it with some grace (in the car).

That doesn't sound snotty to me, but I didn't see the episode. There are more ways to have fun than just winning. If Tiffani didn't win and wasn't annoyed at Lee Anne's comment then I don't think her comment was trying to be bitchy - she doesn't really act that way during the rest of the show. From what I hear, Ken's an ass and if he felt that she was rubbing it in that's his problem.

LeeAnne did get hosed on the wedding challenge. Yes, her menu was difficult, but it isn't her fault if she had excellent presentation ("I'm a chef, not an artist") and sounded good. If the guys wanted to pay for a real wedding and not do it cheap and on television, they would have picked something else.

At the time, I did have a problem with a box-cake as a friend calls them, but looking back at it not being an issue, and especially because of the time issue, I have no problem with it now.

[Mandy P]

Blanky, please, if you could, email me that blog, too.

I agree, I don't think Lee Ann was trying to be snotty or snide with her comment, I think she was just trying to break the tension in the car. It was the first day, after all, and the contestants didn't really know each other that well.

[ersatzreality]

Watched most of the marathon today - and LeeAnne seemed to be the most genuine and heartfelt competitor.

[nowrite2000]

Based on the breadth of cuisine she displayed, I agree with those who think she was robbed. She was one of the few contestants, along with Stephen and Harold, who seemed to understand the contributions of Eastern civilization to the global palate.

ETA agreement on the Stephen point. Though not many of the other chefs even showed awareness at his superficial level.

Edited by nowrite2000, Oct 14, 2006 @ 11:22 PM.

[Lady Marmalade]

She was one of the few contestants, along with Stephen and Harold, who seemed to understand the contributions of Eastern civilization to the global palate.

Except that Stephen merely took the components of various Asian (well, mostly Japanese) cuisines and threw them together indiscriminately, like a kid with both a chemistry set and a Spin Art thingy. That "infused/confused" tamale comes to mind - I didn't see a whole lot of understanding in his cooking.

Lee Anne definitely should have been in the top three instead of Dave. She was my favorite cheftestant, with Harold a close second. I wish she'd been able to better edit herself - one or two ideas on the plate, rather than five or six. Hmmm... does that make her the Kayne of TC1? Without the rhinestone belt, of course.

Edited by Lady Marmalade, Oct 14, 2006 @ 2:11 AM.

[desdamonab]

She's back!! And helping us make sense of this season's winning recipes.

Marking the first originally produced cooking program of its kind, Bravo unveils "Top Recipe: The Wong Way To Cook," a new webisode series dedicated to the broadband space that will showcase the winning recipe from each week's episode of "Top Chef." "Top Recipe: The Wong Way To Cook" will be hosted by Chef Lee Anne Wong, one of the most popular and highly-regarded chefs featured on the first season of Bravo's "Top Chef." Each week, Chef Lee Anne will demonstrate for viewers the winning recipe unveiled on "Top Chef," which makes its second season debut Wednesday, October 18 on Bravo. A new webisode of "Top Recipe: The Wong Way To Cook" will debut on BravoTV.com every Thursday. The announcement was made by Lauren Zalaznick, President, Bravo.

More here:

The Wong Way to Cook

[Cubbie]

Wow. That's great!

[sweet potato]

Awesome.

[belligerent]

Hells yes. I might actually use bravo's dumb website to watch these.

[Orion7]

This should be a lot of fun. It's hard to imagine how LeeAnne could have done any better, careerwise, had she won. I liked her food, and I liked her on-camera personality, so I will brave the wilderness that is Bravo's website to watch these.

[LizDC]

Lee Anne's Blog - Time Flies

[Elphaba]

Thank you, LizDC. What a great entry! LeeAnne is funny and a little scathing and knows her stuff. Her blog is really going to enhance this season for me.

She is one of my favorite reality TV contestants ever. I'm so glad she's benefited from the show, as I knew she would. Yay, LeeAnne!

[nowrite2000]

Just checked out the video for episode one. Is it my imagination or did she has she loss even more weight since the reunion? Her face looks slimmer. She looks good!

Edited by nowrite2000, Oct 22, 2006 @ 2:45 AM.

[Puds38]

When I saw the special she did on the Fine Living TV Channel , I thought she looked slimmer as well.

[LizDC]

Lee Anne's Blog - Lycheegate

[Fukui San]

Two quotes of note from LeeAnne:

and it’s because it was my second time watching the episode while writing this blog that I caught Marisa putting TABLESPOONS of knox gelatin in her recipe. If she miscalculated, even by a teaspoon, it can make all the difference in the world for the texture of your panna cotta.

Betty, however, gets the prize of the series, the Kyocera limited edition ceramic sushi knife. Not too many of us from Season 1 got something for winning an elimination challenge, let alone a Quickfire. I’ll tell you what we got...we got to not go home. Once in a while you even got 16 hours to cater a wedding for 100. They’ll be giving away Volvos on Season 3.

Bwah!

[safranal moeity]

From the Lycheegate addition:

So then comes the moment when he calls himself a “round eye from Cleveland, Ohio” in interview. Not sure if I was offended or amused, and I thought to myself, “Did he really just say that on national TV?” It gets better later when he assumes that the Project by Project event will be feeding the needy and hungry Asian community of Los Angeles. I’ll say nothing more on this subject. Just think about it.

It truly is a pleasure to read her blogs.

[Elphaba]

After every episode of Project Runway, I eagerly awaited Tim Gunn's blog and podcast. I am quickly becoming as addicted to Lee Anne's blog. She's adding a lot to my enjoyment of this season without even being on the show.