Top Chef is headed to the Great White North — and for Toronto native Gail Simmons, the show’s 22nd season was “an amazing homecoming.”

Simmons, who spoke with PEOPLE along with fellow longtime judge Tom Colicchio and host Kristen Kish, describes the new season as “very Canadian.” 

“It was sort of this ‘worlds colliding’ moment of my Top Chef family and my actual, real family, like my brother, and his kids, and my parents all hanging out in one room, which was pretty awesome,” Simmons says.

“But also just to see how much Canada has changed,” adds Simmons, who’s appeared on the Bravo hit since its first season in 2006. “Toronto, where we were based for most of the season, how much it’s grown, how much great food there is, diversity, how it just really welcomed us. And also I think it gave the show overall just like a fresh new feel.”

The trailer for the new episodes includes nods to poutine, but the show’s stars say the cheesy dish was only featured in one Quickfire Challenge.

“I don’t think I had poutine the whole time I was there,” Collicchio admits.

“It’s a cliché for a reason,” says Simmons, who also serves as guest editor of Food & Wine‘s all-Canada digital issue. “It’s definitely a Canadian dish, obviously, but people outside of Canada talk about poutine a lot more than the people inside of Canada.” 

While it’s the culinary showdown’s first season up north, it’s Kish’s second as host. The former cheftestant stepped into her new role last year after previously winning season 10.

Kish says she came into this season with more confidence, as her nervous energy “floated away.”

“I think I had to do a little bit of work to feel less pressure,” she says. “And I think going into the second season where I felt in solid footing, it felt like my job.”

“I mean, it’s the difference between your first day on the job and your last day on the job,” she explains. “The first day you are scared and nervous and you want to live up to the expectations for yourself and other people around you. And then your second year on the job, you just feel better. And I think that’s really what it was.”

This season, Bravo announced another shakeup for the show: a new rule that puts “guardrails on overused concepts” for the fan-favorite Restaurant Wars challenge.

“One of the things that happens in Restaurant Wars is that they have to choose a leader,” Simmons says. “And that’s a lot of pressure. And historically, either the chef or the front of house person goes home. But they all want to be the leader, but they also all want to be nice to each other. And it becomes this sort of power struggle where you don’t want to assert everything, but you want to stake your own claim to a dish because you have to.” 

She adds, “What we have seen in that pattern, because of that dynamic within our restaurant teams, is that it kind of washes everything out, and certain themes emerge so that they can placate each other.”

One example, according to Simmons, is the idea of “global seafood.”

“Everybody can cook a piece of fish,” she says. “So then we can all do it the way we all want to do it individually and we don’t have to talk to each other and make it cohesive. Things like those themes that end up reoccurring every season as the easy way out for a team to work together. And we wanted to push their limits a little more and make them be a little more creative and actually communicate better.”

There were other surprises for the judges this season — starting with the cast of 15 chefs competing, whose talent Colicchio calls “exceptional.”

“It is often halfway through the season, all the food starts to look the same because I think the chefs … try to tailor their food to what they think we want,” he says. “This season I felt that they’d stayed true to themselves throughout the entire season.”

Kish also weighed in on what impressed her about this season’s culinary talent.

“Their ability to form an idea, think it all the way through, have a reason or purpose, and an actual direction in creating the food,” she explains. “And then stand there and tell you about it in just this clear delivery.” 

“I know that everyone has something to prove, everyone does, but it really all felt like they had something to prove within themselves,” she adds. “And so in that moment it just felt like everyone was really present, and available, and willing to share so much of their stories.”

So, what’s the secret to keeping Top Chef fresh after nearly two decades? The judges say it lies in the series’ changing locations.

“Every season there’s a totally new backdrop that informs the challenges, that determines the ingredients, that teaches us about history, and geography, and terroir, and culture, and history,” Simmons says. “That’s just all built in. There’s no two places that are the same. We get to do such a deep dive through the food of that place.”

Colicchio agrees, adding, “I think we’d get bored if we were a studio show, so it’s great to go shoot in a castle one day and the next day you’re in a brewery, next day you’re out in some vineyard.”