Why subscribe?
“ … it’s perfect. I usually only listen to podcasts with at least three jokes per minute, but this is my one exception: a data-driven, smart-guys-talking situation about one of the best food competition shows on TV.” -Bon Appetit’s Best Food Podcasts of 2023
“...the weekly Top Chef recaps combine fanaticism with sports-style analytics.” -Selected as No. 9 on People Magazine’s 50 Food Faves of 2023.
Top Chef, the cooking competition show on Bravo, offers as many thrills and upsets and as much talent and intrigue as any pro sports league, so why shouldn’t it get the Sports Talk treatment?
That’s why national NBA reporters and massive Top Chef fans Tom Haberstroh and Kevin Arnovitz in 2017 launched PACK YOUR KNIVES -- a weekly podcast of hot takes and analysis of Top Chef action, including interviews with Top Chef contestants, mock NBA-style drafts, ‘fantasy Top Chef,’ and even Quickfire and Elimination stats & analytics.
What started as a crazy idea to tape weekly hour-long phone calls about their favorite show is now moving onto its next chapter.
In 2024, Tom and Kevin are launching a Substack, where the weekly recap PYK podcast will continue as Pack Your Knives’ flagship vehicle during the Top Chef broadcast season. But joining the lineup will be a ton of new stuff -- more interviews with Top Chef insiders, “test kitchen” video content featuring our favorite Top Chef dishes, more mid-week stats and analysis, a place where subscribers can offer up their own commentary and takes, restaurant recommendations from the Top Chef family, updated maps highlighting Top Chef-alum restaurants around the world, and occasional screeds of our least favorite food and restaurant trends.
More than anything, Pack Your Knives will serve as a clubhouse for all things Top Chef, a place where those who believe that Top Chef is one the greatest contributions to reality TV, foodie culture and celebrity chefdom can hang out and entertain themselves — and each other.
