Hung on a budget

The prize money gets the attention, but winners of Bravo’s Top Chef also get the often-mentioned feature in Food and Wine magazine, where Top Chef judge Gail Simmons is an editor. The feature on Season 3 winner Hung Huynh is just out today.

We learn he quit his job as sous chef at Guy Savoy in Las Vegas shortly after winning and plans to open a restaurant, but won’t say where. He also wants to donate some of the money to temples in Cambodia and Vietnam, his native land; a “who knew?” in the profile is the nugget that his father escaped Vietnam after the war thanks to the sponsorship of Arlo Guthrie.

And, as the Season 3 winner, Hung sat at the judges’ table for an episode of Season 4 in Chicago. He claims he was a humble judge and not hyper-critical — is this the same Hung we came to know and not hate? — and that a contestant’s dish of sweetbreads was one of the best he’s ever tasted.

But hyper-expensive ingredients were part of Hung’s MO on Top Chef, so F&W challenged him to wow them with a meal on very little money. The amount’s not specified, but Hung went straight to Chinatown for ingredients, advising us to seek out similar ethnic enclaves to save cash. His meal centered around fish and he reveals a trick I’m going to try for getting crispy edges in a pan of rice. His dish is called Lemongrass-Marinated Pompano with Dipping Sauce and you can find the recipe here. The profile is here.

F&W online has recipes from other Top Chef winners and a baker’s dozen from Head Judge Tom Collichio. For Season 3 highlights and some bonus videos, go here. Those, too, are at F&W in a presentation far more agreeable than Bravo’s.