‘Top Chef’ quest ends for Hawaii’s Lee Anne Wong

When “Top Chef” came calling last year, Lee Anne Wong was preparing to open a new dining spot on Maui while navigating the demands of life with a toddler.

Was it the best time to commit to a grueling cooking competition?

“Of course, why not? You get a chance to win $250,000, you know you’re competing with the best of the best,” Wong said in a call from Maui. “Just being on the show is great press and marketing. It’s such an incredible brand.”

Wong’s journey on Season 17 of the Bravo competition ended last week. She had made it to the top seven “cheftestants” in a field of 15.

Ironically for the chef of the brunch restaurant Koko Head Cafe in Kaimuki, she was eliminated in a brunch showdown, putting out dishes she knew were faulty.

“I’m so embarrassed. Brunch is what I do,” she told the judges afterward. “Oh my god, I’m so sorry.”

The episode had started on a high note: Wong won the opening Quickfire Challenge to make a dish with canned beans, taking a $10,000 prize for her black bean empanadas.

But her imperfect berry clafoutis and cinnamon nutmeg doughnuts got her eliminated in the end.

This season, subtitled “All Stars Los Angeles,” featured previous competitors who had finished near the top. The quarter-million-dollar prize money is the most ever for the show.

Wong said she meant to play to win, then saw the other competitors and reassessed her chances. “Yeah, probably not.”

Instead: “I’d like to get past halfway and I’d like to win Restaurant Wars. And I did that.”

Restaurant Wars, the show’s signature event, divides the chefs into teams to open a restaurant in a couple of days and serve a room full of guests. Wong’s team of four split a $40,000 prize.

Her history with “Top Chef” goes back to the first season in 2006, when she made the Top 4. She stayed on behind the camera for six seasons as supervising culinary producer, a job that covered everything from building the pantry to setting up on-screen challenges, to doing the dishes.

She returned in Season 15, when she was pregnant with son Rye, but had to withdraw, suffering altitude sickness during filming in Colorado.

While it was great to return, she said, it took a lot to “get back into that mind frame that is ‘Top Chef.’”

Although still active with Koko Head Cafe, Wong stepped back as a new mom. “I’ve been home cooking with an Instant Pot for two years.”

Living on Maui now, she had planned to open Papa‘aina at the Pioneer Inn in Lahaina last September — a debut delayed first by “Top Chef” and now by the coronavirus.

The season began March 19, but filming ran from mid-September to the end of October, months before the world went into quarantine. The contestants had been looking forward to reuniting for some post-show culinary events. “Then the pandemic happened,” Wong said.

“We’re just happy the show can provide some sense of normalcy and entertainment while people are stuck at home.”