Results tagged “celebritychefs”

Food world celebrities gathered at the Astor Center last night for a lively discussion on the phenomenon of celebrity chefs. Andrew Carmellini, Gwen Hyman, David Chang, Gail Simmons of Top Chef, and Mitchell Davis of The James Beard Foundation all weighed in on the celebrity craze, which has infiltrated kitchens everywhere like roaches. Only recently, some argued, has the idea of the celebrity chef become a prominent force in American culinary culture. Customers take digital pictures of every entrée, kids trade Iron Chef results like they were baseball statistics, and weirdos in Helsinki post wistful paeans to Tom Colicchio on Top Chef fansites. Some soundbites from last night:

Simmons on the pre-Top Chef world: “When I told my Mom I was going to be on a reality show, I had to convince her that I wasn’t going to be tied to a tree on an island in a bikini, eating maggots.”

Continue reading "Celebrated Chefs Discuss Celebrity at Astor Center"

Andrew Carmellini was most recently the chef at A Voce, which was awarded three stars by the Times. He left that restaurant in June, and is currently looking at spaces to house his next restaurant project.

Food Network fans are no stranger to Anne Burrell, whom they know as the spiky-haired blonde sous-chef to Mario Batali's Iron Chef. Now they will get to know her more intimately as the star of her own upcoming show, Secrets of a Restaurant Chef, where she'll take her years of restaurant experience and culinary expertise and distill them into practical techniques for home cooks to work with in their own kitchens.