How to Host a Top Chef Competition to Spice Up Your Next Dinner Party

The popularity of food and cooking shows has reached its acme with the Top Chef series on NBC's Bravo network. While the Food Channel has been captivating gourmands for several years now, since Top Chef's series debut in 2006, it has consistently been one of the top-rated cable programs. Its blend of reality programming, high-stakes competition and a compelling approachable subject matter - food - has made stars out of the shows competitors year-after-year, as well as its comely host, Padma Lakshmi.

And now, a trend towards throwing homespun Top Chef competitions is picking up where potluck dinners and chili-cook-offs left off. Without further ado, below are some guidelines for how you can spice up your next dinner party with your very own Top Chef competition. Let the cooking begin!

Find Your Willing Chefs. You may know who the cooks are in your crowd already, but if not, try to send out an email to your friends and family and ask for volunteers. If you have a large enough group, you may want to encourage each competing chef to choose a sous-chef to help with cooking and preparation.

Set the Rules of the Kitchen and the Budget. It's best to determine the rules of the kitchen well in advance of the big day. The idea is to make sure the competition stays fun, but that water in everyone's pot is level. Design the competition to suit your style and your friends, but some questions to consider: How many days in advance are chefs able to start preparing food? Can they only shop, cook and prep on the day-of, or can they have up to a week to acquire food and cooking implements? How many, and which courses will be served? A fun menu idea is to have one specialty cocktail, one appetizer and one main entrée, but is there any particular theme that the chefs should adhere to, or do you want to include a "Quick Fire Challenge"? Is assistance in the kitchen allowed? ? Do you require original recipes, or will tried-and-true family recipes be accepted? What exactly will the food be judged on Overall concept? Presentation? On taste alone? What is the budget for the food? The exact budget will obviously depend on the number of people attending the party. It's also completely acceptable to have everyone pitch in to participate - and pay $10-$15 a head depending on how elaborate the meal is envisioned to be. You may want to consider paying for the chefs since they're spending so much time in preparation and cooking.

Allot Cooking Time Appropriately. Depending on your kitchen size, you may need to apportion time in the kitchen, and assign shifts. Accommodations may need to be made to serve in shifts as well if you need to have your chefs cook at different times. Another option is to alternate cooking for each particular dish (i.e. the first chef cooks their appetizer and then serves, and while the first chef is serving, the second chef begins to cook).

Judge Lest You Not Be Judged. Select three of your most expressive party-goers to be the panel judges. You should encourage the judges to write down their thoughts about each dish, and be creative in their descriptions. Your judges are ideally not wallflowers, since the most fun you're likely to have during your Top Chef competition is when they judges share their reviews with the chefs and the other participants. And as with all reality shows, there should be extra consideration to those friends who can provide the best imitation of "snarky British judge." If you encounter problems with finding your judges, entice them by saying they'll be the first to be served fully plated dishes - the rest of the guests will merely be able to eat in the pedestrian "family style" manner.

Points for Audience Participation. Everyone loves to eat, and most people are always up for sharing their opinion. Get all of the guests to participate in the competition by having them score the entire meal. If you have the time or inclination, create fun, themed score cards for everyone to write on, but in a pinch, scrap paper will do.

Scoring and Fêting. The best format for scoring works very similarly to the method used on Top Chef Masters. Each of the three judges have up to five points to award to a chef and his or her meal. Each scoring audience member should also assign the chef a score of up to five points. A composite "guest score" can be determined by averaging the scores of all audience members. The winning judge will be the chef who has the highest point score out of twenty possible - fifteen possible points from the judges (five each), and an additional five points from the guests.

And with just these few simple rules, you could be hosting your own Top Chef-style competition in no time. But most importantly, in the immortal words of Dave Matthews Band: "Eat, Drink and Be Merry."