'Top Chef Seattle': 20 Questions With Carla Pellegrino and Chrissy Camba

The Hollywood Reporter: How are you?

Chrissy Camba: Pretty good. Lots of stuff happening right now.

THR: Like what? 

Camba: I’m trying to save myself. Cook, do interviews, Twitter, all this other social media crap.

THR: Did you ever think you'd be on a reality show?

Camba: No! Not ever! I mean, sometimes you hope. And maybe they’d be like, "Cuttin’ Up With Chrissy." But I’m not that interesting and not that good looking. It would never get to pilot stage.

THR: Who convinced you to do Top Chef?

Camba: A bunch of friends told me to try out for the show.

THR: Were there a lot of hoops to jump through? 

Camba: Not really. I had to send an audition tape in, and I didn't think I was going to get picked. I was a hot mess in that tape. My boyfriend taped it, and he really doesn’t bring high-energy. So he was like, “What are you making?” I’m like, “Kimchi.”

THR: So about last night's challenge.

Camba: You mean my nightmare?

THR: Describe your nightmare. 

Camba: I picked the salad. I thought it would be a challenge, because they made a note that it hadn’t been on the Canlis menu since the restaurant’s inception. I looked at the ingredients and thought, “I can do this!” But apparently I couldn’t!

THR: How specific were they in telling you how to re-create it?

Camba: They were kinda vague, kinda specific. I looked at the items in the dish and just had questions about the dressing. So I asked the Canlis brother and he said, “It’s a thick dressing.” That stuck in my head, and I made a thick, Caesar salad-ish dressing. Turns out the dressing is not supposed to be thick at all! It’s light and lemony. 

THR: Do you feel were you led astray at all by the brother? 

Camba: Yes! And I don’t know why that happened.

THR: Are you happy at all with what you did accomplish? You made it to third round of competition.

Camba: Not really, because I had gone on the show to win. And then to get kicked off for a salad that’s the golden child of the restaurant is annoying.

THR: How intense are those judges’ table sessions? 

Camba: They look so angry. I had only been in the bottom three once, but it’s very intense, and you think you’re going home, and I’ve never seen a frown so large on any person than was on Emeril [Legasse]. It touched his toes it was so large.