2-Time ‘Top Chef’ Winner Buddha Lo’s Next Goal? Revolutionizing the Restaurant Industry

Congratulations on your second win. How was the “World All-Stars” win different than your Season 19 win?Lo: Well, it’s very hard because [Season 19] feels like so long ago. Also, in order to get to this win, I needed the Houston win.

I knew that Season 20 was gonna be a milestone, but it didn’t know what they were going to do. And then I heard that they were gonna do it completely overseas. And I was like, “Oh, that’s really interesting.” And then I found out that it was going to be in England, I was like, “Well, that would be great if I could do that.” And then I’m like, “kind of like, “Oh, maybe I signed up for the wrong season when I did Season 19.” Well, they called me up and said it’s finalists and winners from all around the world.

And I was like, “Well, this sounds really good. I need to do this. So in terms of comparing the wins, that win [Season 19] doesn’t compare.

This was “World All-Stars” and that win contributed to this; it was a stepping stone. Without winning Season 19, I would not be here.What’s your next goal?My goal is to open up a beautiful dining space. And then once that operating, I would love to try and get a Michelin star out of it.In New York or…?It will be in New York.

And then, after that, there’s so many other different accolades that you can start to jump onto. But I would like to do that and then start mentoring the next generation of chefs and try and change the industry in a better way and advocate for them for the right things for the future of our industry.What does that mean?I started cooking for maybe like $6.31 an hour. It’s not really ideal, but it was seen as a normal thing for for a cook to be getting paid that much money.