Melissa King is an award-winning chef, television personality, and author of Cook Like a King: Recipes from My California Chinese Kitchen, which won a 2026 James Beard Award. Best known as the winner of Bravo's Top Chef All-Stars: Los Angeles Season 17 and the winner of All-Star's Fan Favorite, King holds more challenge wins than any other competitor in the show's history. She is the host of Tasting Wild, the National Geographic docuseries and serves as a guest judge on Top Chef, Food Network's The Julia Child Challenge, Pamela Anderson's Cooking with Love, and America's Test Kitchen: The Next Generation. Along with being a chef-entrepreneur, event curator, television personality, philanthropist, and model, she is an activist who speaks publicly on issues of women's empowerment, LGBTQ+ rights, sustainability, food education, and diversity in entrepreneurship. Out Magazine named her one of the 100 LGBTQ+ individuals making a groundbreaking impact on the world.

JJ Goode helps people write books, and mostly cookbooks, which are the best books. He has coauthored several New York Times bestsellers and has been nominated for several James Beard awards.