Bobby Flay is a NYC native who has become one of the most successful chefs today. He had a passion for cooking since he was just 17 years old. From then on his career seemed to nothing but rise.

Bobby Flay was cooking in the Joe Allen Restaurant when Allen noticed his culinary talent and was so much impressed that he paid for Bobby’s training at French Culinary Institute. He graduated in 1993 and started working for Jonathan Waxman in NYC. With him he learned to love the flavors of American South-western cooking. He was later on hired by Jerome Kretchmer and made Bobby his partner and executive chef of Mesa Grill.

With his talents and passion for cooking Bobby has gained a celebrity status. He is praised not only for his cooking or culinary abilities but also for other various reasons. In addition to cooking bobby started hosting a television show. He has starred in six cooking TV shows on Food Network and three of them – Boy meets Grill, Iron Chef America and Throwdown!, are still on air. His great time managing skills and expertise at cooking has made him own and design six top-notch restaurants too. If you think this is it then think again as Bobby Flay is not done yet. He has written eight well acclaimed cookbooks too. The guy has earned an Emmy award for his shows and also became a food correspondent for CBS on The Early Show. Phew!!

At present he owns five very renowned restaurants, Bar Americain in NYC – serving regional American delicacies; Bobby Flay Steak in Atlantic City, New Jersey – is a classic steakhouse; Mesa Grill Bahamas of Paradise Island- offers American Southwestern; Mesa Grill Las Vegas at Caesar’s Palace- serves American Southwestern and Mesa Grill NYC- also serves American Southwestern.

Bobby has earned a lot in his career and has become an icon for many of the aspiring individuals who are aiming for a career in cooking. When he was asked about his food philosophy, he said, “It’s gotta be bold, zesty, and always fun".

His work, books and shows have always impressed and inspired people. When asked what or who inspired him, he replied, it was Wolfgang Puck who made savory food but his preparations were whimsical and fun too, and Jonathan Waxman was the first chef who defined and explained him what was meant by good food. His latest career move is an upcoming show called as Grill It, which will air on Food Network, showcasing newbies who will come on the show to share their grilling recipes.

It is a surprising fact that even chefs make big money. There have been surveys conducted to learn how much is the net worth of several top and well known chefs across the globe.This list was released by Forbes, with the top ten celebrity chefs in terms of money.

As expected Rachael Ray, turned out to be the richest amongst all, with her day time TV shows, four shows on Food Network, magazine, and of course the Dunkin’ Donuts deal, all comprising to a huge total of $18 million. Next in the line is, the Oscar famous and a well known caterer named Wolfgang Puck who earns around $16 million preceding Gordon Ramsay who earns around $7.5 million.

However, owning a restaurant is definitely not the criteria of this list as, Ray doesn’t own one. This clearly states that having countless exposure and numerous endeavors one can pile up huge amount of money.

For example, Wolfgang Puck’s empire constitutes of 15 restaurants, a soup line available at grocery stores, an assortment of knives that are sold on Home Shopping, many restaurants and also successful television shows both in UK and in the US.

All of these famous chefs have had a great exposure through television that helped them get the fame they acquired but it is again interesting to note that the next to follow, Nobuyuki Matsuhisa (fourth), and Alain Duchess (fifth) had a very little to absolutely no TV exposure, but still both of these great men each own more than 15 restaurants all around the world.

Following is the list of the top ten celebrity chefs of today:

1. Rachael Ray ($18 million)
2. Wolfgang Puck ($16 million)
3. Gordon Ramsay ($7.5 million)
4. Nobuyuki Matsuhisa ($5 million)
5. Alain Ducasse ($5 million)
6. Paula Deen, (4.5 million)
7. Mario Batali ($3 million)
8. Tom Colicchio ($2 million)
9. Bobby Flay ($1.5 million)
10. Anthony Bourdain ($1.5 million)

From this you can easily see how different chefs have charted their careers in such a manner and have become the world’s most famous and rich chefs.

There have been great movies in the past about food and chefs. We have loved them all and enjoyed them, some less some more. Now on the silver screen is a new movie called, ‘Julie & Julia’. The message the movie conveys is that everyone and anyone can become a chef, the only thing you need is the love for food.

When we look at the various movies about chefs we can never forget some of the very few that marked an impression on our minds. One of those is ‘Ratatouille’ where a chef who is a rat named ‘Remy’ overlooks his rat heritage.

To understand what people felt about great movies about chefs, a random poll was conducted. Some of the chef movies that took a front position as one of the best liked chef movies includes ‘No Reservations’, with Catherine Zeta-Jones playing the no nonsense chef Kate Armstrong. Then there was Adam Sandler’s ‘Spanglish’ where he played the part of John Clansky. In the movie ‘Babette’s Feast’, Stephane Audran played the role of Babette. One other movie, a romantic comedy called ‘Women on Top’, presented Penelope Cruz as Isabella Oliveira, who was struggling with motion sickness and turns to cooking.

Movies area a great way to play with human emotions and senses, and the greatness or so to say the success of the movie depends on how deeply you touch those emotions and senses. Mostly the senses that play part are hearing and sight but, movies like ‘Julie & Julia’ take an extra leap and inspire us to create, imagine and even savor the rich flavors of the food we happen to see.

With the world booming with food lovers, people automatically compare them to the great chefs in real-life like Emeril Lagasse, Gordon Ramsey, Paula Deen, Bobby Flay and of course the famous chef of all time, Julia Child. With a number of television cooking shows that air today, the idea of cooking as a passionate art form has now taken hold in the minds of people.

These great chef movies no doubt inspire us to look at cooking as not just something which one does in order to have food, but as something more alive and full of life. These movies present to us an aspect of cooking which has long since been ignored – the passion, the zest for life and the ultimate pandering to one’s senses of touch, smell and taste – all of which come together when one cooks even a simple dish.

Altogether, cooking has thus become transformed into a form of self expression, which was previously very ignored. These great chef movies are also a great source of inspiration for many among us who aspire to work professionally as chefs and cooks.

No matter how much one lives to eat, unless one combines it with the passion for life that food embodies, one cannot completely understand the magic that cooking is all about.

Bon Appetit!

Anthony Bourdain is an American author and chef. He has authored the book ‘Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly and is the host of the show called ‘No Reservations’. The show was based on American food and travel and aired on Travel Channel, and it was also telecasted on Discovery Travel and Living Channel.

Anthony Bourdain was born on the 25th of June, 1956 in New York City. However, he grew up in Leonia, New Jersey. He attended Vassar College and graduated from the Culinary Institute of America in 1978. At present, Anthony Bourdain is the honorary Chef-at-Large of the Brasserie Les Halles, where he worked as an executive chef for over a decade.

On his show, Anthony Bourdain was shown touring different countries, cities and places all round the world and the places that are within US too. He was shown savoring the regional culture of the place and the delightful cuisine. The show was premiered in the year 2005 on the travel channel.

A special episode of his show which aired in between Season 2 and Season 3 and which was shot in Beirut, was nominated for the Emmy Award for the most ‘Outstanding Informational Programming’, in the year 2007. 

Anthony Bourdain, a man who had the ability and knack to make people understand the special relation between eating and traveling, and the way he puts all that and more together to create an amazing show is worth taking notice.

His great expertise and wild and exciting eating instincts yet apparently inoffensive presence on the show was the first thing that made him such huge success. It was his travel experiences and great sense and expertise with mixing cuisine that highlighted the show the most. He created the perfect balance and equilibrium with travel and food that produced such amazing documentaries for the Travel Channel.

In one of his shows that were shot in New Zealand he confessed that writing one book has turned him from a simple cook to a legend. His ability to get completely involved in experiencing the extravagant culinary experiences trespassing every border and entering and falling into the lap of every tradition and culture is beyond explanation.

Each show depicted a different life at a different place, not just explaining it from a tourist point of view but instead giving the wide scope depiction of life at each place.
And finally the way he used to say that eating is the experience which helps to get people together at the same table. It is the way to create new bonds and to understand different cultures better.

Ace of Cakes is one of the first reality documentary-soap television shows that presently airs on the Food Network channel. The show depicts the working of a custom cake shop of Duff Goldman, Charm City Cakes, in the city Baltimore of Maryland. It covers everything, i.e. constructing cakes, tasting them with the customers, working with the various vendors and buyers and of course the final delivery of the product.

As the name suggests, this show is actually an Ace among all cake shows. The reality series showcases the regular workings at the cake shop and the frantic activities that surround the place with the production of large number of cakes.

The staff at Goldman’s shop consist of his close personal friends. From the preparation and decoration of the cake to the final delivery, that may be miles from the place, all is performed by these staff members.  The highlight of the show is the way Goldman uses the non-traditional and informal methods of preparing cakes, like using blow torches, power saws, belt sanders etc. to construct creative patterns.

Charm City cakes delivered cakes to some of the most popular events like the Preakness Stakes (Horse race) at Pimiloico, Baltimore Zoo, or to the premier of the show Hairspray. In one of the shows, they created a replica of the Radio City Music Hall for the Rockettes. Other notable cake creations are a Hat box Shaped cake for an 80 year grandma. On the event of the fifth Harry Potter installment they designed Hogwarts. They have also created a replica of a shark ray, Wrigley Field, Hubble a Space Telescope for NASA and so on.

In the first year (2006) of its telecast the show was the nominated as the highest rated one in the Food Network’s entire history, and thus came the second season of the show with an hour long special feature on the NFL cake created for the Super Bowl XLI. After the second successful season, came the third season in the year 2007, followed by the fourth one in year 2008.

The show, Ace of Cakes, had been a huge success, and has been loved by all; fans as well as critics. This paved the way for the Sixth season of the show that began in January, 2009.

The show is also broadcasted on the Good Food channel in United Kingdom. After the huge success and soaring ratings that made the show the highest rated series, each season better than the previous. It even gave a lead to other similar shows that aired so that they could hog on the success achieved by Ace Of Cakes, such as a series called: Cake Boss.

Hooked on to reality shows? Like to cook? How about combining both of them, and watching reality cooking shows? Cook up a storm, stir up some emotions and add a dash of competitive spirit and there you go – just the right mix for a perfect dish!

Reality shows are a trend that have become the norm amongst most television audiences. But if you are a good cook and you want to get some publicity for your culinary talents, then getting on to a reality cooking show is probably a good idea. So lets take a peek into some of the popular reality cooking shows on television and see just what’s cooking!

Hell’s Kitchen

Hosted by Fox, and already into its fifth season, Hell’s Kitchen has renowned celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay dishing out tough and often hard-to-take ‘advice’ to chefs wanting to become a part of this show. The winner of the fourth season of the show, Christina Machamer, went on to join Gordon Ramsey as the senior chef at The London West Hollywood. In each season, the winner gets a life changing opportunity towards charting his / her way towards culinary greatness.

Top Chef

Bravo TV has a celebrity round-up of host Padma Lakshmi with Tom Colicchio, Gail Simmons and Toby Young for the fifth season of their reality cooking show Top Chef. A total of 17 chefs compete for their chance to be in the spotlight for their culinary talents. In each episode, the contestants face two challenges, and one contestant is sent back home each week. Hell’s Kitchen promises to test the participating chefs not only for their culinary talents, but also for other aspects involved in the culinary business like customer service, team work and managerial ability. The winner takes home a prize of $100,000 and is featured in the Food & Wine Magazine.

Chopping Block

NBC’s series Chopping Block, seems to offer a complete and all-round test of cooking expertise and restaurant management to its contestants. Celebrity chef and restaurateur, Marco Pierre White tests the mettle of two teams made up of four couples each. Each of these teams is given a restaurant space, next to each other, and in Manhattan. Within a time frame of a week, these teams face the challenge of designing and executing a complete makeover of that restaurant space, planning the menu, and even generating the publicity. Both these restaurants will open on the same day and compete not only with each other, but also with the thousands of eating establishments in New York City. Food critics observing the ensuing chaos will also provide reviews. The wining team gets a grand prize of $250,000.

The Next Food Network Star

The Next Food Network Star, hosted by the Food Network – results in the winner having his / her own show on the Food Network. Bob Tuschman, the host of the show, jumps the contestants through the hoops as each of these professional chefs battle it out to so that they can host their own cooking show.

If you fancy a career in the high-flying, fast-paced restaurants and hotels – if you want to be where the action is – watching these reality cooking shows can show you some insights and give you a great perspective of some real behind the scenes ‘realities’ involved in pursuing a career towards becoming a professional (and even celebrity) chef.

Culinary Career Spotlights: Major Culinary TV Personalities

Rachel Ray, Emril, Julia Childs, Paula Dean & Wolfgang Puck

As Americans we are drawn to food, and many of us are drawn to cooking shows and the television personalities that host them. We watch Paula Dean and Rachel Ray, and in generations past they watched Julia Child. We watch in awe of the simplicity of making the meal and attempt to do it on our own. Each of the major television personalities received their start in different ways. We will focus on a few of the most well-known.

Julia Child

When Americans are asked who the most famous female chef is, they automatically name Julia Child. She attended the famous Le Cordon Bleu cooking school while in Paris with her husband in the late 1940’s, where she developed a liking to French cuisine. Upon graduation, she formed the L’Ecole de Trois Gourmandes with two fellow Cordon Bleu graduates. They wanted to adapt traditional French entrees for Americans and wrote a two volume cookbook, Mastering the Art of French Cooking. The cookbook was considered groundbreaking at the time, and has become a staple in the culinary community. (more…)