Chef Report

Anthony Bourdain is stuck in Beirut

US TV STAR STUCK IN BEIRUT

Anthony Bourdain in Beirut

LONDON - New York chef Al Yeganeh, who inspired the brusque “Soup Nazi” character on “Seinfeld,” is taking his recipes to Britain.

Yeganeh and his partners plan to open 50 Original SoupMan franchises during the next year, chief executive John Bello said Wednesday. He said the first franchises would be in central London, Manchester and Birmingham. more…

Usually, it’s the aspiring chefs who suffer a daily roasting while working with Gordon Ramsay.

But when the celebrity chef took a team of four doctors into his kitchen for the Channel 4 show The F-Word, he certainly felt the heat.

The evening reached boiling point when one of his amateur chef’s splattered hot liquid in his eye - by accident of course. more…

Jeri Ryan is engaged to her boyfriend, French chef Christopher Eme. The two are partners in Ortolan, an award-winning West Hollywood, California, restaurant where Eme is the head chef. The 38-year-old star announced her engagement while promoting her new TV series “Shark” at the Television Critics Association press tour in Pasadena, California. more…

Celebrity chef, author and TV personality Anthony Bourdain ran into a snag filming an episode of his “No Reservations” series for the Travel Channel.Bourdain and his crew were in Lebanon, and had just finished shooting in Beirut when Israeli airstrikes began. In a posting on the eGullet.com forums, Bourdain stated that the crew had been due to film in the Bekaa Valley on Thursday, but the violence forced them to cancel plans.In a posting late Wednesday night, he said, “The Israelis just bombed the airport. Looks like we won’t be going anywhere soon.” more…

Chef Jay James, who runs Chef Jay’s Bistro at 122 E. Broughton St., told police he warded off a man who came into his kitchen on the morning of Thursday, July 13, and demanded money.

According to James, the suspect, who had his hands hidden in the pockets of a sweatshirt, stated, “Give me all your money or I’m gonna hurt you.”

James said he held up his knife and told the robber to leave or else he would hurt him, at which point the robber fled down the alley on foot without taking anything. more…

Gordon Ramsay is to present a new chat show for the FOX network in the US.

The celebrity chef, who hosts The F Word for Channel 4, has also bought an apartment in New York to work from while he is in America.

He said: “They want me to do a chat show. Irreverent stuff. It’s very interesting.” more…

Police investigating a series of bomb attacks on the luxury Basque country resort owned by the French master chef Alain Ducasse have arrested and questioned a member of his staff.

Mr Ducasse, who at 33 became the youngest chef to win three Michelin stars, holds a record for simultaneously running three three-starred restaurants in Paris, Monte Carlo and New York.

Now 49, he has designed food for astronauts with the European space agency and catered for Prince Albert of Monaco’s trek to the north pole, but has focused on expanding his group of restaurants and country inns across the world. more…

“What, are you blind?” TV chef Alton Brown deadpans into the camera. Whoosh! On cue, a Venetian blind drops down in front of him. Brown is whipping up a lemon meringue pie for Good Eats, his weekly romp in the kitchen for the Food Network, and the prop is supposed to help aspiring bakers visualize chemical reactions they can’t actually see.

“Let’s just say for a moment that this is a microscopic cross-section of our pie crust in the oven,” says Brown, reaching around to run his hand along the closed slats. “By the time the layers of fat start to melt, the protein structure formed by the flour and water needs to be set. That way, when the fat melts, it’ll look like this,” he says, twisting the rod to open the blind. Brown grabs hold of two slats in the middle and wiggles them up and down. “These are the nice flakes in our flaky crust. If the fats melt before the protein sets, we’ll have a real mess on our hands. Ten minutes in the refrigerator will keep that from happening.”

Protein structure? Microscopic cross-section? It sounds more like a half-baked high-school science lesson than a half-hour cooking show about pie. Who is this geek? And why doesn’t he tuck in his shirt? more…

Richard Petty was standing next to one of the country’s best chefs, but he wasn’t at all impressed with what he was dishing up.

It was the night before a 2004 NASCAR race at Dover (Del.) International Speedway and Petty, king of the stock car racing circuit, came to a private dinner that Food Network host, restaurateur and cookbook author Mario Batali was preparing for drivers.

The redheaded, pony-tailed culinary star’s spread included penne all’Amatriciana - pasta that’s usually tossed with guanciale, or dried, salted hog’s jowls, tomato sauce and red pepper flakes. The dish might be appreciated by the adventurous diners jamming the reservation book at Babbo, Batali’s New York Italian ristorante, but it apparently didn’t spark Petty’s appetite. more…

Hot cars, hot food: Chef Mario Batali (right) entertains NASCAR driver Michael Waltrip during practice day for the Nextel Cup race in Long Pond, Pa.

What’s a well-known chef to do when he feels that a nation’s taste buds and kitchens are under attack? In the case of Robert Gadsby, proprietor of the restaurant Noé in the Omni Los Angeles Hotel, it’s time to stage a so-called Outlaw Dinner.

On Thursday, July 27, Gadsby will preside over a seven-course menu built around foie gras (Chicago has come down against the delicacy because of its impact on geese), hemp seeds, absinthe and sous vide (a process, under fire in New York, that reduces food shrinkage). Gadsby will host a similar dinner at the 676 Restaurant in Houston. more…

CHICAGO

HOMARO CANTU’S maki look a lot like the sushi rolls served at other upscale restaurants: pristine, coin-size disks stuffed with lumps of fresh crab and rice and wrapped in shiny nori. They also taste like sushi, deliciously fishy and seaweedy.

But the sushi made by Mr. Cantu, the 28-year-old executive chef at Moto in Chicago, often contains no fish. more…

NASCAR has its own style of tailgating. Celebrations often last for a week and meals include overflowing platters of homemade food, opulent decorations, and great spirit.

Lifetime Products, a manufacturer of folding tables, will name “America’s Ultimate Tailgater” at the Tailgate of a Lifetime 2006 Tailgating Championship Aug. 19 at Michigan International Speedway.

Five finalists will be selected to join the official chef of NASCAR, Mario Batali, an author and New York restaurateur, for a trip to MIS. The finalists will create their ultimate tailgate parties, including a three-course meal, over-the-top decorations, and all the trappings that make NASCAR Tailgates so unusual. The contest is judged by Batali, NASCAR legend Ernie Irvan, and Richard Hendrickson, president of Lifetime Products; the prize is $10,000 in cash. more…

TO SOME he is an annoyingly hyperactive cook who sprinkles mockney words over his recipes and television programmes. Others credit him with ushering in a revolution in school dinners. But now Scottish academics have hailed Jamie Oliver as the creator of modern masculinity.An entire morning of a three-day event, sponsored by the Association for Consumer Research, has been dedicated to exploring the cultural meaning of the celebrity chef. more…

Here’s a keeper: a genial host on an out-of-the-way show on an obscure network who brings a light touch to his passion.

The subject is food. And comedy. Make that comedy involving food and people’s reactions to it.

The warm and unpretentious style belongs to “Ham on the Street,” 9:30 p.m. Wednesdays (moving to 9:30 p.m. Mondays mid-July) on the Food Network, a series deserving a wider, hungrier audience.

The ham in question is George Duran.

An entertainer and chef, Duran is developing a following for his inspired, uplifting gig. more…

When asked to come aboard the Borgata’s new expansion, chef Bobby Flay asked who else signed on and was told Wolfgang Puck and Michael Mina.

“At that point, the conversation was over for me. I was sold,” Flay said.

On Friday, Bobby Flay Steak joined Wolfgang Puck American Grille and Sea Blue, Michael Mina’s seafood restaurant, as the Borgata’s $200 million addition debuted. The expansion, the first of two, premiered almost three years to the day the Borgata Hotel Casino & Spa brought a strong Las Vegas flavor to Atlantic City. more…

Borgata’s first phase of expansion features restaurants opened by celebrity chefs (from left) Michael Mina, Bobby Flay and Wolfgang Puck. Their restaurants are called Sea Blue, Bobby Flay Steak and Wolfgang Puck Grille.

In recognition of their outstanding contributions and accomplishments in the hospitality industry, especially at The Venetian’s exclusive Paiza Club, Chef Simon To and Ken Wong were inducted into Les Amis d’Escoffier Society of China. Known for their professionalism and excellent reputation within the Asian and American Hospitality field, the Society selected Chef To as Honorary Chairman for his achievement in the culinary arts and Ken Wong as Honorary Chairman for his outstanding service in hospitality.In a ceremony held at the Four Seasons Hotel Hong Kong on June 21, 2006, Mr. Pascal Escoffier, chairman of the Escoffier Foundation; Sir Henry Schielein, Founder and Chairman; Johnny Yuen, Chairman Asia Pacific and Dr. Christian Rassinoux, Chairman USA, Chef To and Ken Wong were presented with The Society’s Commandeur Membership Medal. more…

(CBS) Bobby Flay, The Early Show’s resident chef, is opening his fifth restaurant, called Bobby Flay Steak, at the Borgata Hotel Casino and Spa in Atlantic City, N.J. more…

Can Daniel Boulud cook his enemies in court? The chef has filed suit against the Restaurant Opportunities Center, an advocacy group that has picketed Daniel four times in the past month. The center, which has conducted similar campaigns against Cité, the Redeye Grill, Shelly’s, and Café Fiorello, accuses Boulud of paying at least ten nonwhite employees less than their peers and of not promoting them as quickly. The campaign included having 40 ROC-ers invade his restaurant “during the height of dinner service” to deliver a letter to the manager while telling patrons “shame on you.” Then there was the twelve-foot inflatable roach parked out front, the supposed effort to remove him from the board of Meals on Wheels, and the MR. DANIEL BOULUD—STOP BEING SUCH A RACIST DUDE picket signs. more…

WORRIED telly chiefs are taking a new step to protect viewers from Gordon Ramsay’s swearing - by blurring his mouth.

Channel bosses in America are so concerned about Ramsay’s foul-mouthed rants on Hell’s Kitchen they are doubling their censorship.

So not only will the chef’s expletives be bleeped out, viewers won’t be able to guess what he’s saying as his mouth will be out of focus. more…

When I finally talk to Emeril Lagasse at the recent Food & Wine Festival in Aspen, I skip the questions on cooking and opt for the one people have been asking since Katrina: Where was he during the perfect storm? And I don’t mean it in a kindly way.After the hurricane struck the Gulf Coast last summer, Emeril was skewered for being missing in action, notably by his adopted hometown newspaper but by other media as well. One of the most visible faces of New Orleans, he kept a low - almost nonexistent - profile. more…

Newswise — “Food is related to just about every single challenge people have living on this planet,” is the perspective of Alton Brown, television personality and author of the popular book, I’m Just Here For The Food, who spoke Sunday at the opening of the Institute of Food Technologists Annual Meeting + FOOD EXPO®, the world’s largest annual scientific forum and exposition on food.

Brown brings the science of food chemistry to a broad audience as host of the Food Network program “Good Eats” and “Iron Chef America,” two food shows that Time magazine named as “worth their salt.” more…

Show host and author Alton Brown signs copies of his book in Orlando after his address at the IFT Annual Meeting Food Expo, the world’s largest annual scientific forum and exposition on food.

Finally! Chef Gordon Ramsay says what I - and most of America, I’m sure - have been saying since the first episode: these contestants aren’t chefs, they’re just a bunch of fast food cooks, and none of them are fit to run a multi-million dollar restaurant at a billion dollar hotel. Yes! One of the truer moments in reality TV show history.

This week the teams not only have to get through their fourth service, but also have to make lunch for the first time - for several screaming, hyper kids. more…

Bad-boy chef and globe-trotting gourmet Anthony Bourdain gets frank about rude vegans, Rachael Ray and why restaurants are America’s last meritocracy.

“I don’t think there was a mouthful of food I had in two days that didn’t have sand, fur or shit in it.” Celebrity chef Anthony Bourdain has a lot to say about his recent trip to Namibia, where he filmed a segment for his Travel Channel show, No Reservations — and where he didn’t exactly get the Brangelina treatment. (more…..)

ASPEN, Colo. — His youngest daughter was about to be christened, his middle daughter was going to be married in a week and there was a death in the family.

Emeril Lagasse certainly had his plate full, so to speak, the weekend of Aug. 29. But, like so many other residents along the Gulf Coast, the celebrity chef’s world was turned upside down when Hurricane Katrina roared through. (more…..)

The seventh annual Washington D.C. International Wine & Food Festival, Saturday and Sunday at the Omni Shoreham Hotel, 2500 Calvert St. NW, will feature more than 280 wineries from 14 countries; demonstrations from such celebrity TV chefs as Michael Chiarello (”NapaStyle” and “Easy Entertaining”) and Ted Allen (”Queer Eye for the Straight Guy”); and seminars on the wines of Uruguay, Australia, Portugal and South Africa. more…

The world’s largest event on food ingredients, which will take place between June 24-28, will this year feature four major themes: food defense and bioterrorism; functional foods; globalization; and food allergens.

The trade show will be opened on Sunday morning with a keynote address by the Food Network’s ‘Good Eats’ guru, Alton Brown, known for his combination of science, history and culture in his approach to food. more…

It also claimed the program had put an incompetent chef into place at Bonaparte’s, a struggling bistro in northern England that was featured in one episode. more…

It’s not every day I dine with someone who has noshed on iguana tamales in Oaxaca, swallowed the beating heart of a cobra in Vietnam, and feasted on raw, bloody seal innards and eyeballs with an Inuit family in the northern reaches of Canada.

But then, Anthony Bourdain is not your typical lunch date. more…

When Harold Dieterle won Bravo’s “Top Chef” title last month, he got $100,000 and a trip to the Aspen Food & Wine Classic.

On Sunday morning, he aimed his cooking guns at the festival’s closing event, the Classic Cook-off. Hundreds of people shoehorned into the ballroom of the St. Regis to watch Dieterle and his sous chef, “Top Chef” judge Tom Colicchio, bang their pots and pans against longtime TV cooker Jacques Pepin and his cooking pal Jean-Claude Szurdak and son-in-law Rollie Wesen. Ingredients included liver and Cap’n Crunch cereal.

“It’s good to flip the roles around,” said Dieterle of his judge turned assistant, Colicchio. “I told him to bring his running shoes. … This should be a lot of fun.”

Fun, yes, but they lost the contest to Pepin & Co. more…

Forget “Molto Mario,” it’s time to call Mario Batali’s popular TV show “Motor Mario.”

The James Beard Award-winning chef, cookbook author and all-around face of Italian cooking in the United States has gone nutty for NASCAR. His three-year obsession with stock-car racing has led to a cookbook, “Mario Tailgates NASCAR Style,” being named the official NASCAR chef and now a spot as a judge in “The Tailgate for a Lifetime Tailgating Championship.” (more…..)

http://www.austin360.com/

… Sports2Day found out in a recent interview that Batali, whose family owns and operates Pioneer Square’s Salumi, isn’t just a racing fan.

He loves the Seahawks, agonizes with the Mariners and has a bit of a competitive streak himself.

S2D: You coach your sons’ basketball teams, play golf. There’s the NASCAR connection. We’re betting you’re a big sports fan …

MB: I love it. As a matter of fact, I’m just sitting here right now in front of the 2006-07 Jets schedule deciding which games I want to go to. more…

NEW ORLEANS, LA [Thursday Jun.15.2006] /J98.com/ — Tim McGraw, Faith Hill and Emeril Lagasse will host a very special invitation-only luncheon, “FEED THE SOUL,” in New Orleans on July 5th at Emeril’s Restaurant.

Chef Emeril will be cooking up his signature New Orleans dishes for 120 guests, and net proceeds from the event will go to the Neighbor’s Keeper Foundation and the Emeril Lagasse Foundation, to continue efforts to help with hurricane recovery and the rebuilding of the Gulf Coast region. (more…..)
http://www.j98.com

Wolfgang Puck = $16M

The original celebrity chef oversees a vast empire that spans high-end restaurants, like the famed Spago in Beverly Hills, all the way down to Wolfgang Puck Gourmet Express kiosks at airports across the country. Puck, the highest-earning chef on the Celebrity 100, boasts his own line of soups, coffees and cookware and operates his own catering business. Last year he made appearances on NBC’s “Celebrity Cooking Showdown” and “Las Vegas.”

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