Bravo's "Top Chef Just Desserts"

Now that Project Runway has migrated to the Lifetime cable network, occasionally affording pop culture junkies the opportunity to savor the worldly insights of Tim Gunn and Reba McEntire back-to-back, the Emmy-winning Top Chef and its spinoff Top Chef: Masters lead the pack of Bravo! series one can admit to liking without feeling a bit, well, embarrassed (apologies to Kathy Griffin!).

Sure, like its reality television brethren, the two Top Chef programs have catered to the lowest common denominator for ratings points - best exemplified by the mother ship's season two episode in which hard feelings and alcohol nearly spelled the end of Marcel Vigneron's cartoonish mane - but, on the whole, Top Chef impresario Tom Colicchio and the rest of the show's producers can take real pride in featuring something rarely seen in the realm of real housewives, Donald Trump wannabes, and Italian stereotypes: actual talent.

Winning formula

Apparently looking to create a reality television franchise that rivals the scripted successes of Law & Order and CSI (formula, formula, formula!), the Bravo! String-pullers are now launching Top Chef: Just Desserts, which delivers exactly what its subtitle promises.

Hosted by Gail Simmons, a familiar face to long-time Top Chef viewers, this latest iteration of the competition show holds to the same structure as its two top-rated predecessors: each episode begins with a "Quickfire" test of the competitors basic culinary skills and ends at judges' table where one person is crowned the winner and one is sent home. In between, as the so-called cheftestants prepare their "Elimination" challenge dishes, they also reveal their professional aspirations, personal histories, and crippling insecurities. And sometimes they shout or glower at each other, which the skillful Top Chef cameramen and editors always exploit for maximum narrative impact.

Simmons is joined on Top Chef: Just Desserts by DailyCandy Editor-at-Large Dannielle Kyrillos, Top Chef: Masters contestant and renowned creator of exceedingly expensive hamburgers Hubert Keller (absent from the first episode), and, as head judge, famed pastry chef Johnny Iuzzini, whose rockabilly pompadour is a striking, if not altogether comic, visual change from Colicchio's assertive chrome dome.

Unfortunately, at least initially, many of the competitors on Top Chef: Just Desserts seem to lack Colicchio's professionalism and, as is common on reality television, tend to confuse rudeness with wit. Hopefully, however, Iuzzini and superstar confectioners like Jacques Torres, who guest judges a chocolate challenge on the first episode, can eventually, following Collichio's serious-minded example, impart some maturity to the proceedings. Otherwise, Top Chef: Just Desserts could devolve into Gordon Ramsay-style buffoonery.

Top Chef: Just Desserts premieres Wednesday, September 15, 2010 at 11pm Eastern/10pm Central on Bravo. For more information visit top+chef+just+desserts+premiere|Brand|G_TCJD&sky=ggl|top+chef+just+desserts+premiere|Brand|G_TCJD&gclid=CLnNya7-_6MCFQo65QodEiOcLA:the show's website.