This Top Chef Mentor Confirms What We Suspected All Along About Todd English's Behavior
In 2006, Boston Magazine described Todd English as a striking celebrity chef whose schedule is so jam-packed that he can barely make time for an interview. They note that the self-proclaimed adrenaline junkie's rambunctiousness has gotten him into trouble, but he lets the scars quickly heal before diving right back into the thick of it. Perhaps that is why, in 2014, rather than slowing down, he was arrested for drunk driving, which he denied was true, and was entangled in sexual harassment suits in 2017 (via Eater).
He's been a host at the first ever SoBe Wine & Food Festival, and as his own site notes, has come out with numerous restaurant concepts, cookbooks, a TV show and more. But as with any chef, perception matters, and perception of him is not always positive, especially in his antics outside of the kitchen. And recently, many have taken to publications to speak out.
A Top Chef mentor speaks her truth
Mass Live notes that Barbara Lynch, a restaurant owner from Boston, served as a guest judge on an episode of Top Chef in 2019. But a few years earlier, in 2014, she was addressing a very different topic for the New York Times, namely, calling out misbehavior of a certain well known chef, Todd English. English lost his temper several times with Lynch, who confirmed it was fairly normal behavior for the chef, but he denied the allegations each time.
Lynch recalls him upending a plate over an earring, and she witnessed him hit a manager with a stick of butter, throwing it at the worker for "moving too slowly." Under the supposition of "tough love", English was also recounted to have thrown a Coke bottle at her head once he'd warmed to her and she told him she had been tapped to become "head chef at a competing restaurant." When she ran into him again, she called the encounter "the restaurant-equivalent of a shootout in a spaghetti western." And while English denied each of these claims, it does seem there is truth to the rumors of his temperament.