Around halfway into Top Chef Masters season, the regular and, some say, more exciting Top Chef goes back to Bravo late August with the premiere of Top Chef: Las Vegas. Bravo has recently revealed the identities of the 17 new chef-testants in the sixth season of Top Chef, three months after it was renewed.

Set to kick off on August 26, Top Chef: Las Vegas will reportedly feature a pretty impressive batch of guest stars, the likes of Natalie Portman, Penn & Teller, Wolfgang Puck, Todd English, Daniel Boulud, Tyler Florence, Laurent Tourondel and Nigella Lawson. Padma Lakshmi is also set to return as host, alongside head judge Tom Colicchio, Food & Wine magazine's Gail Simmons and food critic Toby Young. It was shot at The M Resort Spa & Casino.

On tonight's episode of Top Chef Masters, four new chefs will slug it out in the kitchen for a place in the final six. This time it's John Besh of Restaurant August in New Orleans; Douglas Rodriguez, the so-called Godfather of Latin cuisine, thanks to his restaurants all over the country; Mark Peel of La Brea Bakery fame in Los Angeles; and Anita Lo of Annisa in New York.

For the quickfire challenge, Top Chef Masters will continue with its best-of series, this time picking up from season 3 all star's "cook an egg with one hand" challenge. The event will reportedly prove to be very hard for others, while a walk in the park for some. As for the elimination challenge, the four chef-testants will be cooking for How I Met Your Mother star and Doogie Howser himself Neil Patrick Harris, and his friends. They will be assigned a magic word on which they need to base their dishes.

With just three spots up for grabs before the final stages on Top Chef Masters, New York, New York chef Anita Lo is set to compete with Douglas Rodriguez, John Besh, and Mark Peel for a highly coveted place in the final six.

Just before the episode airs on Bravo tomorrow, however, The Examiner reports that chef Anita's restaurant Annisa was razed by fire Friday night causing it to close down indefinitely. The fourth episode favorite, for her part, confirmed that she is determined to rebuild the restaurant.

Top Chef season 5 winner and New Mexico native Hosea Rosenberg is set to be featured on the BlogTalkRadio show entitled "A Little LightWork with Jen & Amy" on July 9 Thursday, to dabble on the connection of "cooking and intuition" by exploring his spiritual side.

"Hosea exhibited remarkable focus and a calm confidence during last season's Top Chef," says co host Amy Grant. "He was such a pleasure to watch that I was excited to see him win. Meeting him in person was like meeting an old friend - he seems very much the same as he appeared on television."

The judges of Top Chef reportedly made a number of references on intuition throughout the season, which Grant describes as "a natural part of great cooking." She adds that, "anyone can follow a recipe, but it is only through intuition that new flavor combinations can be created."

Prior to his sting on Top Chef, Rosenberg was the head chef at Jax Fish House in Boulder. For winning Top Chef, he received a cash prize of $100,000, on top of a showcase at the Food & Wine Classic in Aspen.

Rick Bayless, the chef who won on the third episode of Top Chef Masters, apparently found a way to communicate with his potentially growing fan base, thanks to, what else, Twitter.  The Chicago-based chef-testant recently discovered the micro-blogging site, and revealed that after his victory Wednesday on the Bravo reality show, he sent a heartfelt Tweet to those who supported him.

"A huge, heartfelt thank you to everyone who sent congrats on tonight's Top Chef Masters win.  Wish I could respond to each of you but am a little overwhelmed by response. Thank u, thank u!! Will be posting more tomorrow w pics."

On tonight's episode of Top Chef Masters, four new chefs take center stage in order to advance on the Bravo cooking reality show for world-renowned chefs.  Cindy Pawlcyn, the queen of Napa Valley; Wilo Benet, the king of Puerto Rican cuisine; Ludo Lefebvre, the prodigy from France; and Chicago's authority on Mexican cuisine, Rick Bayless, all slug it out to follow the footsteps of two former episode winners Hubert Keller and Suzanne Tracht.

For this week's episode, the elimination challenge is to create "Street Food" - something very timely because of the increasing popularity of gourmet food trucks around the country.  News has it that all four chef-testants opt to make street food inspired by Mexican and Latin cuisine. Pawlcyn, the lone woman, decides to make a menudo soup with tripe.  It is also said that Top Chef Masters should expect bickering between young and cocky Lefebvre and Bayless, who is a multiple James Beard winner.

After a mere two episodes, the food-lovers community is abuzz with speculation that the winner of Top Chef Masters was leaked.  According to published reports, seasoned San Francisco-based food journalist Grace Ann Walden revealed the winner of the Top Chef upgrade in her Yummy Letter newspaper. She did put in a spoiler warning, but in the same paragraph revealed the identity of the winner, attracting blame for single-handedly ruining the Bravo cooking show.

Asked by Bravo's PR company FerenComm why she openly published the winner knowing the nature of Top Chef Masters, Walden simply said she was in the news business and "it is news."

On tonight's episode of Top Chef Masters - "The Lost Supper" - another four chef-testants take center stage and duel it out with the best of the best.  Among those competing are Elizabeth Falker (Citizen Cake, San Francisco), Suzanne Tracht (Tracht's, Los Angeles), Graham Elliot Bowles (Graham Elliot, Chicago) and Wylie Dufresne (wd-50, New York).

Starting off the episode is a quickfire challenge reminiscent of the amuse bouche vending machine challenge from Top Chef's sophomore season.  As for the elimination challenge, the Top Chef Masters contestants start off with a counter full of protein, including animal heads, chickens, etc. The task is to create a meal for the writers of ABC sci-fi series Lost (which is from a rival network).  We also learn that Tracht is a huge Lost fan, while Dufresne has never heard of the show.  Nevertheless, the challenge is to create a meal as if they were one of the survivors of Lost. So that explains all the fresh protein and all the canned and preserved goods labeled "Dharma approved."