Chef Report

Cameron Cuisinier’s dreams of a catering career led him to culinary school. Now he’s unemployed and $43,000 in debt, and he’s not alone.

From TV chefs to reality shows where the winners get their own restaurants, it’s a hot time to be in the kitchen. Record numbers of would-be chefs are enrolling in culinary schools, some of which charge $20,000 a year or more. But the restaurant business has always been a tough way to make a living, and many graduates find themselves saddled with debt and working long hours at low-paying, entry-level jobs.

“When they’re trying to get you enrolled in these programs, they tell you you’re going to come out making top dollar,” said Cuisinier, a recent graduate of the California Culinary Academy in San Francisco. “I’ve just been way disappointed.”

Industry observers say celebrity chefs like Rachael Ray and Emeril Lagasse — with his trademark exclamation, “Bam!” — helped launch the craze. The rising popularity of cable TV’s The Food Network and reality shows like “Top Chef” and “Hell’s Kitchen” are fueling it.

“It looks really fun on TV,” said Tim Ryan, president of the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, N.Y., one of the country’s premier training grounds for chefs. “You’ve got an audience adoring you. You say, ‘Bam!’ and throw some stuff on a plate and everyone goes nuts.

“That’s not what happens,” he said. “The work is long and hard. There’s a lot of pressure.”

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Cameron Cuisiner poses for a photo at home in Monterey, Calif., Tuesday, Dec. 19, 2006. Cuisinier is $43,000 in debt. And it wasn’t a fancy car or credit cards that got the 24-year-old there, it was dreams of a catering career. Cuisiner spent the money on culinary school. (AP Photo/Marcio Jose Sanchez)

SEOUL, Dec. 20 (Yonhap) — U.S. restaurant chain Hooters will open its first restaurant in South Korea next month, the company’s local unit said Wednesday.

Hooters, known for its brand image of waitresses with tight shorts and low-cut T-shirts, is scheduled to open its first restaurant in Seoul on Jan. 18, Hooters of Korea Inc. said in a statement. full story…

It was a lunch that would horrify a dietitian: a bag of Tropical Skittles, a Jones soda, two Little Debbie marshmallow treats, a deep-fried pizza stick and a bottle of sweetened iced tea.

The high-calorie, sugar-packed treats are standard fare for Cleveland High School freshman Tikisha Spires, who travels off campus for lunch each day.

It’s certainly not what the Seattle School Board had in mind two years ago when it adopted a rigorous nutrition policy and canceled a lucrative vending contract with Coca-Cola. Chips and cookies were replaced in vending machines with granola bars and trail mix; sugary drinks are no longer sold in schools. Cleveland fell into line with other schools, offering healthier foods in its cafeteria and vending machines.

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CHICAGO, Nov. 29 PRNewswire — Five-star chef Charlie Trotter will bring his superlative-culinary experience to the Elysian Hotel and Private Residences, flagship of a new ultra-luxury brand, under construction at 11 East Walton Street and scheduled to open in 2008. The venture marks Trotter’s first collaboration in the U.S. and the latest success for the Gold Coast development.

“We talked with some of the nation’s foremost chefs about creating a restaurant truly attuned to the quality and character of the Elysian. In Charlie, we found the ideal partner, whose standards of excellence equal our own,” said David Pisor, founding partner and chief executive officer of the property’s developer, Elysian Worldwide. “Widely regarded as one of America’s finest chefs, Charlie is an icon and true innovator in the worlds of food and service. We couldn’t be more thrilled about our association with him.” more…

MIAMI BEACH, Fla. — A south Florida couple was happy to not be sharing their home with millions of bees. Jesus Molina said he and his girlfriend were ready to buzz off after a swarm of bees invaded the kitchen wall of their Miami Beach apartment.

Molina said the bees were there for at least two and a half years. The couple finally had enough and called in the professionals.

“So we’re trying to, like, get rid of most of them, but without professional help we can’t. So now we almost … They’re biting me!’” Molina screamed, running from the home during an interview with reporters.Beekeepers removed more than 3 million bees from the apartment. They also extracted nearly 60 pounds of honey. more…

Rachael Ray is everywhere. She’s on TV, on bookshelves and now you can even buy the Food Network personality’s cookware.

To Lansing resident Misty Lane, it’s too much, and through a Web site she has created she has found out she is not alone.
Originally conceived as a joke, Lane started the “Rachael Ray Sucks Community” (http://community.livejournal.com/rachael_ray_sux/) in 2003 half expecting others to share her disdain for Ray.
“I got really fed up watching her show,” Lane said. “I really didn’t think anybody would join.”
The online group dedicated to Ray-bashing existed under the radar for about two years, until web magazine Slate.com ran a piece in defense of Ray in July of 2005 with a link to the site. Now 1,332 members strong, Lane, who has never met Ray, said the community receives about 300,000 hits every month. more…

Celebrity Chef Daniel Boulud screamed vicious obscenities at Hispanic workers and promoted unqualified white workers who fit the upscale image of his four-star French eatery Daniel, a lawsuit claims.Seven Latino and Bangladeshi busboys and runners who worked at Daniel sued Boulud in Manhattan Federal Court yesterday, accusing the award-winning chef of racial and ethnic discrimination.

“They don’t want to see anyone who is a captain who is Bengali or Latino,” said Mir Kadir Mamun, 30, a Bangladeshi busboy from Queens who says he was fired in May after airing complaints with federal officials. “They are never going to promote us.”

The workers say they were also forced to remain in back-breaking, low-paying jobs that require lifting heavy trays of food. more…

Christina Bayens — 26 and born with cystic fibrosis — needed a double lung transplant but she and her middle-class Louisville parents faced a dilemma.

How would they pay thousands of dollars of bills not covered by insurance?

Sitting on a hotel bed in St. Louis after visiting doctors in January — laughing and crying at the prospect of raising money — Christina and her mother, Linda, saw a television news report.

Twelve men from a New York Moose Lodge had posed partially nude for a calendar to raise money for a children’s charity.

“Naked chefs,” Linda blurted out.

Thus was born the “Louisville Chefs’ Best Kept Secrets” calendar — featuring male and female chefs from the city’s top tables, showing off their ingredients — which is now on sale at various local restaurants. more…

While luminous Yanks like Michelle Pfeiffer continue storming our restaurants — she was at Opus in Toronto the other night, FYI — an admirable Canadian has just taken up the task of feeding Americans.

Gabriel Aubry, who has a bedroom smile but is also adept in the kitchen and known best, of course, as the beau of one Halle Berry, just opened a restaurant in New York City. The theme is Cuban, and the locale is the East Village. Cafe Fuego is what they’re calling it.

Two years have passed since the French-Canadian Versace model and the Oscar-anointed Catwoman became an item, and things seem to be in that calm, settle-down place for both. Last week, at a party sponsored by Hennessy Cognac at Gabriel’s new spot, Halle even made an appearance and gave the restaurant the best, highest-wattage shot of publicity it could ever ask for.

“I was a cook before I was a model,” the tousled-haired hunk told InStyle magazine’s Party Hopper column. “I have a metabolism, so I can eat anything,” he boasted when the question of models-who-eat naturally came up. more…

Gabriel Aubry and erstwhile Catwoman Halle Berry

The first orders Walter Scheib III remembers receiving from Laura Bush’s new social secretary, Lea Berman, still ring in his ears: “We need to stop serving this country-club food.” Scheib, who was then the White House executive chef, was speechless for several moments before he finally blurted out, “We are not serving what we want; we are serving what the first family wants to have.”Within two months of Berman’s arrival, in December 2004, Scheib was asked by the chief usher, Gary Walters, who is in charge of White House operations, to hand in his resignation. Scheib agreed to stay on until his replacement was found, but the next day he told The New York Times that he had been fired. As soon as the article was published the White House asked him to clear out immediately.

Quite a comedown, he admitted in a recent interview, from his days in the previous administration, when Hillary Clinton had charged this fiercely competitive, meticulously organized chef with bringing “what’s best about American food, wine and entertaining to the White House.” His sophisticated contemporary food was generally considered some of the best ever served there.

But he was quick to say he would only talk about his difficulties as long as it was clear that he has no complaints about Laura Bush. more…

A Florida woman has told the National Enquirer that she carried on a five-year affair with TV cook Rachael Ray’s husband.

Rachael Ray is the talk show circuit’s newest darling, so you can see why Jeannine Walz would pick now to cash in on her dirt. Why Rachael Ray, the mouse-voiced spaz attack who laughs at her own jokes, is popular, though, is still a secret.

Walz says she did drugs with John Cusimano, Ray’s husband and a lawyer, and then the two got their freak on. Maybe Ray has some recipes for food to slather on your lover’s body she can share?

In any case, Cusimano’s sexual requests aren’t sugary, but they sure are spicy. Walz says he shelled out cash for her to spit in his face and rub her bare feet on his face, amongst other things.

“Sometimes he’d be naked. I always kept my clothes on,” Walz says. “John paid me up to $500 for a session. We’d often have sessions at least twice a month … I virtually supported myself by spitting on him. But there was never any normal sex involved. He once offered to pay me $1,200 to perform a kinky sex act with him, but I refused.” more…

Jeri Ryan’s chef fiancé thrills her in the bedroom because he’s the first man she has met who really appreciates her lacy lingerie. The actress, who was previously married to politician Jack Ryan, insists her French lover Christophe Eme is a cut above most men because he makes her feel extra special when she wears sexy undies for him. more…

Homeless Philadelphians, Chef Foo may soon be teaching you the finer points of cooking.

Thanks to a deal reached with prosecutors, Susanna Foo, a nationally acclaimed chef and restaurateur, is to teach cooking to the city’s poor and homeless instead of facing trial for allegedly striking a Parking Authority ticket writer.

Foo, 63, of Villanova, was to have had a hearing yesterday in Municipal Court on assault charges arising from the Sept. 29 incident. Instead, prosecution and defense attorneys told Judge Francis Cosgrove that they had agreed to drop a simple-assault charge if Foo stays out of trouble for six months and devotes 50 hours to community service.

She will perform that community service for Project HOME, whose cofounder, Sister Mary Scullion, said she was excited to learn of the idea yesterday from the law firm defending Foo. “We have different programs that could utilize her expertise,” Sister Mary said in a telephone interview. “She’s such a phenomenal restaurant person.” more…

Follow up to this story

Fiance: Officer Miscarries After Fight With Chef

Susanna Foo’s alleged victim has miscarriage

London, Nov 19 (ANI): She may be making millions of dollars now that she’s a A-List movie star, but for actress Renee Zellweger, her life had never been happier than when she was just a waitress. more…

A restaurant in the southwestern US state of Arizona that proudly admits to trying to finish off its customers has introduced a new item on its menu — the “quadruple bypass burger”.

The burger at the “Heart Attack Grill” restaurant is stacked with four beef patties, cheese, onions, tomatoes and fried bacon, and weighs in at only 8,000 calories, more than three times what the human body needs in one day.

Patrons who have no appetite for the “quadruple bypass burger” can opt for the “triple” or “double-bypass”.

“It’s not good for one’s health but it’s only a joke,” John Basso, who opened the restaurant 10 months ago, told AFP.

Customers who have room for more can also order French fries “fried in pure lard” and can purchase cigarettes off the menu. As a courtesy, the restaurant offers its “best customers” a wheelchair service to their cars by waitresses dressed in slinky nurses’ outfits.

The idea, however, has not gone down well with the Arizona State Board of Nursing which has expressed concern that some patrons may confuse the waitresses with real nurses. more…

Heart Attack Grill

JACKSON TOWNSHIP, N.J. (AP) — An Ocean County woman who police say tried to poison her live-in sister and her sister’s boyfriend by putting rat poison in their sandwiches has been charged with two counts of attempted murder.

Dana Simons, 43, was arrested Friday after her sister called police to report finding rat poison pellets in the couple’s sandwiches on two separate occasions.

The sister, 51, and boyfriend, 50, did not eat the sandwiches and were unharmed.
The first time Simons’ sister noticed something odd was earlier in the week, when Simons brought home sandwiches for the couple that appeared to have a blue-green pellets mixed in with the chicken. more…

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay opened his first U.S. restaurant on Thursday, with an assurance he would not try to push New Yorkers into their own kitchens as he did British women.

Ramsay said he would not interfere with the “fascinating scenario” in restaurant-loving New York, even though his television crusade for home cooking struck a chord in Britain, where he said young women had become a lazy “chardonnay and Pringle (potato chip) brigade.”

New Yorkers eat out at least four times a week, with the trend growing every year, a Zagat dining survey released last month showed.

Ramsay’s new restaurant, with formal dining for 45 people and a bar for more casual dining for up to 70, already is booked for the first two months. The menu feature dishes such as his signature Cappuccino of White Beans and lobster ravioli.

“I’m not here telling New Yorkers they have got to get into their kitchens,” Ramsay told Reuters as he stood in the sparkling $6.5 million kitchen of “Gordon Ramsay at the London” in the new luxury London NYC hotel. more…

A dead man had one final earthly act before moving on.

Fire officials said the six-hundred pound man was in being cremated when his body fluids were too much for the oven.

The body fluids seeped out onto the floor and ignited causing a fire at the Garner Funeral Home in Salt Lake City.

“Those fluids can be very flammable,” said Scott Freitag of the Salt Lake City fire department. “Sort of like a grease fire.”

An employee used an extinguisher to put out the fire. (more….)

We are closing in on another Thanksgiving Holiday and I was sent this video.  I figure I would post it here for all to enjoy. 

Video: How To Choose a Butterball Turkey

 Eric - TheSubReport.com

LOUISVILLE, Ky. — Chicken’s most familiar face is about to get a new look. 

Kentucky Fried Chicken is unveiling a new logo today for Colonel Sanders. He’s shedding his white suit jacket for a red cook’s apron. (More….)

AP) NEW MILFORD, Conn. Police were trying to determine who tossed a beer keg into an open fire at an outdoor party early Sunday, causing an explosion that sent shards of shrapnel slicing through a crowd of partygoers, killing one.

The explosion, whic