Top Chef Season 23: Carolina Queen Wins Restaurant Wars, Brandon Dearden Eliminated

Andrea ReiherTue, April 28, 2026 at 2:41 AM UTC

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Last week on Top Chef: Carolinas, things got a little chaotic because Jennifer Lee Jackson had to leave the competition for medical reasons and her partner Justin Tootla chose to leave the competition with her because at the time, she was in the hospital for several days.

Jennifer will have the option to join a future season if she wants; no word on Justin, but I feel like they should let them join a season together if they can make the schedule fit.

Anyway, that left the show in a bit of chaos because when they're down to the Top 8, they always do Restaurant Wars. But what do you do if you suddenly have an odd number of contestants?

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Invite the last person eliminated to re-join the show. But in this case, that was Justin and he chose to go be with Jen. So that meant they went to the last person eliminated before Justin, which means Sieger Bayer is back for Restaurant Wars.

Spoiler alert: The post below discusses the elimination and challenges from the Monday, April 27 episode of Top Chefseason 23. Don't keep reading if you don't want to be spoiled.

Who Went Home on 'Top Chef' Season 23 Tonight?

Brandon DeardenBravoBrandon Dearden – Hamilton, MT

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Advancing Contestants on ‘Top Chef’ Season 23 Episode 7Sieger Bayer – Chicago, ILSherry Cardoso – Brooklyn, NYOscar Diaz – Durham, NCJonathan Dearden – Alexandria, VADuyen Ha – Los Angeles, CAAnthony Jones – Alexandria, VALaurence Louie – Quincy, MA

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What Were the Challenges on 'Top Chef' Season 23 Episode 8?

Seeing as it's 36-hour Restaurant Wars, there was no Quickfire Challenge. The two teams divvied up the work thusly:

Executive chefs: Anthony (has immunity) for Team Carolina Queen and Sieger for Team Tierra Reina

Line cooks: Sherry and Laurence for Team CQ and Brandon and Jonathan for Team TR

Front of house: Duyen for Team CQ and Oscar for Team TR

Gotta say (and this comment was written before I saw how Restaurant Wars played out) — I think having the identical twin brothers as the line cooks is SUPER smart. Bryan and Michael Voltaggio were on the same team in Restaurant Wars in season 6 and even though Michael was the executive chef, I remember them working really, really well together on Restaurant Wars.

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Also, having Duyen do front of house is also super smart. She's incredibly personable and very pretty, that is huge.

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Courses for Carolina Queen (elevated Southern comfort food):

She-crab cake with bisque or cheese puff with pimento cheese and country ham

Red rice with seafood bearnaise or crispy pork belly with collard greens, corn bread and pickles

"PB & J" with peanut panna cotta, compressed fruits and cheerwine jelly or ruby sweet potato baklava with maple bourbon syrup

Courses for Team Tierra Reina (Latin-Carolina fusion):

Snapper aguachile verde or sweet potato tostada

Pescado a la veracruzana or Tongue & cheek barbacoa with collard greens and a salsa duo

Mole cremeux with benne seed cracker or arroz con leche with cheerwine gel

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When the judges show up, I can't help but notice how the women are sporting these bright primary colors and they all look amazing: Kristen Kish in white, Clare Reichenbach in bright blue and Gail Simmons looking smashing in a bright red suit. Seriously, she's maybe never looked better and Gail always brings it sartorially. Absolutely dynamite in that red suit.

Also, just as I was thinking that this Restaurant Wars went better than I've seen in a long time on Top Chef, that's exactly what the judges say. This Restaurant Wars honestly went pretty spectacularly compared to a lot of seasons. This is going to be a hard elimination. If Team Carolina Queen loses, I think Sherry's done—mostly because she hasn't been as prominent a "character" on this season as some of the other chefs and I think if Anthony didn't have immunity, he might be in trouble. If Tierra Raina loses, I think maybe Sieger's out again. (I wrote this before I saw judges table.)

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In the end, the winning team was Carolina Queen and the eliminated chef was Brandon from Tierra Reina. What's interesting is that he got dinged for having a very mediocre dish, but I wonder how much he did that contributed to the other chefs' dishes because that's what a line cook's job is.

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Source: “AOL Entertainment”