'Top Chef' finale scores second-best rating ever

Wednesday's "Top Chef" season five closer (3.7 million, 2.1 adults 18-49 and 6 share) became the show's second-highest-rated episode ever, growing 11% over the finale last year. The episode fell just a tenth of a point behind Season 2's record high, but was easily the most-watched episode in recent years. Overall, season five ranks as the highest-rated season of the show yet.

Given its numbers and accessible competition format, one could almost imagine the NBC mothership beaming up "Chef" to run on the broadcast network. But NBC-Uni executives say they would never want to do anything that takes away the show from Bravo. Plus NBC is taking its own stab at a cooking competition series with the upcoming "Chopping Block," an interesting entry in the genre that I plan to write about in the coming days.