Chefs, what I have prepared for you today is…

Well, what is After the Chopping Block?

The fruition of an idea that I first talked about out loud eight months ago on a long drive in April 2022. During the pandemic, my household developed a weekend morning routine that includes coffee and breakfast on the couch while watching old episodes of Chopped. One of the great things about Chopped is that episodes are timeless. So we randomly started watching them all in order somewhere around season ten.

Since the episodes we were watching were already years old, I became curious about these competitors’ lives in the present. Frequently, I’d find myself reaching for my phone and searching the internet for these Chopped chef competitors. Were they running restaurants? Duh. Writing cookbooks? Maybe. Appearing on more cooking shows? Some of them. Posting gorgeous food pics on Instagram? Hell yes. Missing in action? A few.

Image by Wokandapix from Pixabay

Answering the question – where are they now

However, in all my searches, I didn’t find a place I could return to for updated biographies on the chefs. Existing Chopped fan sites focused on episode recaps with the competitors’ details frozen in time. Fresher information was scattered. But I kept thinking I couldn’t be the only person with this curiosity.

In my head, ideas of what I could create and share began to turn. A project focused on the stories of these chefs, who are real people with real careers. People whose lives are so much bigger than the one day that they filmed an episode of a reality television competition cooking show. Soon, I was filling spreadsheets with information about Chopped episodes and chefs, reading articles about SEO, and teaching myself how to use a website builder.

Sharing stories and more

With over 2,000 chef competitors and over 600 episodes of Chopped aired to date, there will be no shortage of research to do and chef profiles to write for a long time to come. Then I can circle-back to the beginning and start updating them! (Only half-joking.) As fun as never-ending research and writing sounds, I hope this is just the appetizer round. I’m not sure where the next basket ingredients will take me and this project, but interviews with chefs, restaurant reviews, and possibly even some Chopped-inspired recipes are all possibilities.

In the meantime, if you found this site because you share my curiosity about former Chopped chefs, I hope you bookmark it and come back often. If you found this site because you are a Chopped alumni and I’ve written about you, please reach out if I’ve made any errors or you’d like to share more.

Best wishes for a prosperous and delicious new year,

Susan

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