Talenti Just Dropped Another Top Chef-Inspired Flavor

The grand prize of Bravo's "Top Chef" is a $250,000 check, but the smaller trials that punctuate each season of the show can feel just as high-stakes as the finale. One such challenge is called Quickfire, which allots the final seven contestants with a tight 45 minutes to create dishes based on a specific theme. In addition to a $10,000 cash prize, the winner of the challenge is promised immunity from the episode's elimination round. 

One Quickfire challenge had chefs make a dish using roses, and another had them zhuzh up cans of Campbell's soup. In 2021, the challenge centered around Talenti. In about the time it takes Rachael Ray to cook up a speedy weeknight dinner, chefs were tasked with creating a brand-new flavor for the gelato purveyor's decadent Layers collection.  

The winner was Avishar Barua, whose "Buckeye Bon Bon" flavor took the form of Talenti Layers Peanut Butter Crunch, which featured peanut butter gelato swirled with graham cracker pieces, "brown butter sugar sauce," vanilla gelato, and chocolate peanut butter cups. This month, the company is releasing a second flavor based on its most recent challenge on "Top Chef: Houston."

Caramel gingerbread is the newest Talenti flavor inspired by the winner of its latest "Top Chef" Quickfire challenge. With a base of salted gingerbread gelato, the pint is mixed with cinnamon cookie pieces and swirled with ribbons of dulce de leche, according to Talenti. With colder weather on the horizon, the flavor is in good company with brands like Cold Stone, which recently released a line of cozy ice cream flavors for fall.

The challenge came out of Season 19's "Texas Trailblaze-Hers" episode that aired in April, which paid tribute to influential women from the Lone Star State — and which Eater called the series' "most emotional episode yet." Talenti took some liberties by paring down the profile of the final product, maybe because the original winning flavor combo ("gingersnap bundt cake with lemon ice, salted molasses buttermilk, and brown butter pork rind mulberry crumble," per Eater) wouldn't fit on a pint-size label.