‘Top Chef’ Blasted for Naming Winner Fired from Restaurant for Inappropriate Behavior

Warning: Major Top Chef finale spoilers ahead.

Top Chef crowned its latest winner last night, but his victory was quickly clouded by controversy. Gabe Erales, the Texas-based chef who took home the grand prize on the Bravo cooking show, beat out finalists Dawn Burrell and Shota Nakajima on the Season 18 finale. However, shortly after the episode aired, reports began to remerge online about Erales’ past, specifically his firing from his latest restaurant gig, Yahoo Entertainment reports.

While some fans on social media congratulated Erales on his win as the first Mexican Top Chef, others were quick to bring up a report from the Austin Chronicle published last year which detailed Erales’ exit from his job at Comedor, the Austin restaurant where he used to work. The article, which was published in December 2020, only shares that Erales was fired from his job “due to his misconduct.” Comedor owners Philip Speer and William Ball shared the news with staff in an email that provided similarly sparse details.

“Effective immediately, Comedor Executive Chef Gabe Erales is no longer with the restaurant due to repeated violation of our policies and for behavior in conflict with our values,” they wrote at the time. Despite the report from last winter, Top Chef has not officially addressed Erales’ firing or the accusations against him.

“Is #TopChef going to address the Gabe Erales issue? I love this show but people are coming forward with their stories and it’s not looking good,” one fan wrote after last night’s finale aired. Another added, “ok but for real #topchef not addressing Gabe being fired from his job and the allegations against him AT ALL is really irresponsible. I just discovered this today, and people like me have been watching and (not me) rooting for him all season with no idea.”

Season 18 of Top Chef wrapped filming in October 2020 while Erales was still working as executive chef for Comedor. He was crowned winner and walked away with the $250,000 prize months before he was fired from the restaurant. Top Chef judge Padma Lakshmi shared on Twitter that while the show was filming, they were “not aware of the allegations now coming out about Gabe.”

She added, “As someone who has been sexually harassed, this topic is a serious one and merits openness … This should be investigated & the network should consider its best action. To be clear, no one has alleged sexual harassment on the record or otherwise to Bravo/Top Chef and we judges didn’t have any indication of inappropriate behavior from Gabe during his time on set.”

Both the Bravo and the Top Chef social media accounts stayed silent on Erales’ win, and he was absent from last night’s Watch What Happens Live, which featured the Top Chef judges and typically includes the season winner.

UPDATED 7/2/21 AT 12:00 PM ET: In a report published this morning by the Austin-American Statesman, Erales said he had a consensual sexual relationship with a Comedor employee in summer 2020 and cut her hours based when he returned from Top Chef in November. While Erales claimed he cut the woman’s hours due to job performance, Speer told the outlet he did not think the woman’s work was a sufficient reason to cut her hours.

“After I returned from Top Chef, I made some business decisions as a manager that affected this employee and were found to be discriminatory and I realized that those were bad decisions,” Erales told the Statesman. “I’ve spent the last six months really reflecting on these mistakes and taking the necessary steps to be a better husband, a father, a chef and a leader, through therapy, through spirituality.”

A source close to Top Chef told the Statesman that the show knew Erales had been fired from Comedor in December, but the restaurant did not share additional details surrounding his firing. The show conducted a background check on Erales and looked into his behavior on the set and made the decision to go ahead with the season as previously planned.

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