Think of the NBA bubble, but with kitchens instead of courts.
Last September, Season 18 of Bravo's “Top Chef” (premiering Thursday, 8 EDT/PDT) sharpened its knives and began filming during the pandemic, keeping its original location of Portland, Oregon, and reimagining some of the kitchen standards that make the Emmy-winning competition show sizzle.
This season’s “cheftestants,” as Bravo calls them, include 15 executive chefs and restaurant owners. All involved quarantined ahead of production, including the crew, host Padma Lakshmi, head judge Tom Colicchio and Gail Simmons.
Lakshmi's preproduction bubble in Portland included her 11-year-old daughter, Krishna. During Colicchio's own lockdown, “I had my dog with me, so I went outside to walk her. And that was it,” says the judge, who stayed solo in an Airbnb. Both say they were tested every other day during the two-month taping.