Silver-tongued smooth operator and newly queened, er, crowned Top Chef Ilan Hall, winks and clicks his tongue at Entertainment Weekly as he gives them the skinny on being a former fatboy, exposes his "girlfriend"'s eating habits, and demonstrates a surprising amount of adjectival self-awareness. As always, the cherce bits:Did you think you guys were portrayed accurately?
Yeah, absolutely. You can show a limited amount of things from so much footage, but I think our personalities came through.
Have you been getting more hate from fans, or more love?
I'm getting a lot of love. I'm getting a lot of hate on the Internet, but to my face, everybody's been really nice to me.
So you're keeping up with things on the Internet, then?
I mean, people send me things. My friends send me things here and there. What can you do?
...
Do you cook for your girlfriend?
Yeah, I do.
Does she do any cooking?
No, not really. She just eats a lot.
How did she feel about having a third of the restaurant that you, Mikey, and Sam created for that elimination challenge named after her?
She was very honored, and then upset with me when she found out that it failed.
[Miss XaXa's reaction: "Nice try, honey. I'll look for the 'topchef' screen name in the Water Sports chat room on Gay.com."]
...
Have you always been so skinny?
No. That's a funny question. No, actually. Toward the end of elementary school and through junior high school, I was quite heavy.
...
Have you ever done anything risqué while on the line, Kitchen Confidential-style?
[Laughs] I'm not gonna tell you that...
Okay then, a few quick-fire questions for you: Favorite protein?
Pompano fish.
Favorite fruit?
I don't know — these are hard! Honey crisp apples?
[Stop, E.W. You're killing us. We need to get our eyes checked, as when we first read the answer to his favorite protein, we saw the word "Pompadour fish," and immediately thought of Marcel. As for his favorite fruit, before we could say anything, Miss XaXa broke in soothingly, "Let it go, baby, let it go. It's too easy, even for you."]
...
Describe your style of cooking in five words.
Simple. Salty. Clean. A little greasy. Is that five words?
[Well, other than clean, we think the self-portrait hits the nail right on the head. "Oh, I think he's clean," said Miss XaXa, "since Marcel said he used to spend forever in the bathroom."]
12 comments:
shit - after reading this, my Ilan-crush is almost back on.
i love honeycrisp apples, incidentally.
i also love that dear old Ilan's travel plans include his parents, and not the eats-a-lot girlfriend.
how do you kids find the time to find this stuff??
If I were only 24 and just won $100,000, I'd go travelling around the world too.
Ilan is young. International travel will broaden his horizons and open his palette up to new ideas.
I think he'll love Japan. I think spending some serious time in Asia will be a good influence.
yes, but, isn't "flogging" still considered appropriate punishment in certain corners of Asia!?! Particularly for immature acts, oh, say like accomplice, er, I mean, cameraman to a crime??? For ONE, Ilan should consider staying away from Thailand! Some of the locals might confuse him for a “ladyboy”. Feel free to google:
Thailand ladyboy
Greasy? Like Betty Rizzo Greasy? and clean as a public toilet in the Port Authority.
PS. any "straight man" knows calling your GF fat is the kiss of death. good luck with that. your one "benefit of a doubt" is that she isn't Asian (aka - the Last Stop).
I love Ilan. I think he's a great chef and not bad looking either. If he came to my house to cook I wouldn't let him leave. So congrats Ilan.
I hated Ilan, he was mean, a bully, a brown noser, and a all around creep, and he's not top chep but top Prick
I know you guys will get a kick out of this. Here's a message that was posted on Marcel's myspace page:
Dude!!!
you should have soo won!!
they only let ilan win
because he sucks so much
they felt sad for him.
and they know that you will
make it really far without top
chef.. you are the best
ever!!!!! Good Luck in whatever you
do!!!
Love ya!!
♥julie!!!
This comment was posted by Ilan! WTF? My theory is he's trying to keep in touch with Marcel using a sockpuppet myspace account, but he posted under his real account by mistake.
EEEww!!! That other Myspace poster is right, Julie the Sockpuppet is SERIOUSLY whacked!!!
i noticed that message as well..is that really ilan? if so, then why does it say "julia"?
it's signed "Julie" because Ilan longs to be the woman in the "relationship." Maybe he was in drag at the time of posting? How's that for a visual?
Ilan is a TOP JERK, He copy all the recipes where he was working in CASA MONO, I'm from Puerto Rico, and I ate all those dishes that he made in every challenge including the finale in a Spanish Rest. . What a TOP COPY.
for me Marcel is the Top Chef . I hope someday he come to San Juan, Puerto Rico to taste he's food.
Ilan "copied" 2 recipes. All the rest were either his own ideas, or influenced by spanish dishes. Now where in the world would he get his spanish influence from?
Everyone on these boards are crazy. Hes in a competition with a ton at stake, and you expect him to go with what hes unfamiliar with?
Please, every single one of you would do the same thing.
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