Top Chef: Texas -- Top 10 Insights from Tom Colicchio & Padma Lakshmi on a Conference Call

Via NBCUniversal

Top Chef: Texas judges Gail Simmons, Padma Lakshmi and Tom Colicchio.

We've heard everything's bigger in Texas. That's a stereotype, and boy do those tend to piss off people. People like certain Dallas-based reporters who were on the Top Chef: Texas conference call with judges Tom Colicchio and Padma Lakshmi. Irritated that the show is attempting to encompass all of Texas cuisine when it's been city-centric in previous seasons, the reporter quipped, "I guess [there's] not enough in any single Texas city because you said 'Oh, Miami' and then Texas as if it's a city." (Translation: "Why not Top Chef: Dallas?") Take that Tom and Padma, who have nothing to do with where these shows take place or how they're marketed.

We sat in on this media-frenzy mostly because we were curious what craft service is like with so many chefs around. But we learned many surprising things about the upcoming season, its new secret webisode component and what Padma keeps in her suitcase. Check out our 10 favorite Top Chef: Texas secrets after the jump.

Via NBCUniversal

10) Mass elimination
There are a whopping 29 chefs at the beginning of the competition this year, but don't expect that to last. There's a huge cut made in Episode One that brings that number down to about half. When asked why, Tom and Padma indicated the goal was to bring the audience behind the scenes of the casting process, showing what it's like in the final rounds.

9) Chefs have a chip on their shoulder.
When asked how this crop of chefs compares to seasons past, Padma remarked that they seem to "have something personal to prove to themselves or to an audience back home, rather than just those of us who are standing in the kitchen."

8) Nathan Myhrvold is a paleontology expert.
As well as a guest judge, the man behind Modernist Cuisine and a personal friend of Padma, who clued us into his love of dinosaurs.

7) Padma keeps a jump rope in her suitcase.
Padma's been asked many times how she keeps so trim despite a job that requires her to eat so much, and in addition to boxing and running up and down flights of stairs, she carries as jump rope in her suitcase wherever she goes. Why not two? Double dutch anyone?