Juliette Rossant

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SPECIAL REPORT: CELEBRITY CHEFS

Lights, camera, cooking!

April 12, 2004
Volume 16, Number 15

New crop of celeb chefs act out to gain fame

NEW YORK (March 22) - Bright lights, big kitchen?

Onstage at the Supper Club in Times Square, a trio of Broadway performers rehearses songs and dances alongside a grand piano and a kitchen set. The song, "A Meal to Remember," is the opening number of a new dinner theater show starring real celebrity chefs.

With a booming voice and sparkling smile, top toque Michael Lomonaco of New York's Noche is preparing ingredients for rum-marinated pork chops. His star turn on the Great White Way marks yet another high-profile landmark in the lucrative - but challenging - world of celebrity chefdom, which stretches from cookware endorsements, international restaurant chains and branded grocery lines to high-paying consulting gigs and network TV series.

"Ever notice that garlic likes to be treated rough?" Lomonaco quips to his on-stage sidekick, Broadway veteran Paige Price. "You take a knife and just thump it, just smash it, like this," Lomonaco intones. Price jumps back in feigned fright as the chef smashes and then peels the garlic.

Following an intermission during which the 150-person audience eats the meal that was prepared onstage, the singers reappear for a second number. Then Lomonaco takes the stage again, performing kitchen tricks, deftly dicing mango, pitting avocados and filleting chile peppers.

Chef's Theater, which will debut in Times Square March 30, is just the latest opportunity in an ever-expanding roster of options for celebrity chefs. Among the show's rotating cast are famed culinarians Todd English, Tyler Florence, Andr¬ƒZ Soltner, Jacques P¬ƒZpin, Mary Sue Milliken and Susan Feniger.

The celebrity chef phenomenon has so permeated American pop culture in the past decade that Wolfgang Puck is right up there with NBA stars Alonzo Mourning and Juwan Howard on the celebrity scale, according to the 2003 Forbes magazine "100 Top Celebrities" list. Flipping through the television channels on any given day, one can see Emeril Lagasse delivering his trademark "Bam!" on Crest toothpaste advertisements, performing cooking segments on ABC's "Good Morning America" and "kicking things up a notch" at least twice daily on the Food Network.

In the expanding and rapidly changing landscape, a new generation of chefs is venturing further from the restaurant than ever before, industry observers say.

While Puck and Lagasse first cooked for years below the radar of a national audience, younger chefs are attaining national fame at an unprecedented pace.

Such chefs as Rocco DiSpirito and English say they look to media maven Martha Stewart, rather than other chefs, as a model for career growth, referring to their restaurants as the "bricks-and-mortar" representations of their respective brands.

And while not every aspiring culinarian is looking to become a business mogul, the traditional model of a chef whose singular focus is the restaurant is becoming increasingly rare.

But that sea change concerns veterans of the industry who say the quality of the craft will suffer as the focus intensifies on celebrities in the culinary arts.

Moreover, others - including chefs who have weathered media backlash and failed restaurants - point out that there is no recipe for success in building a restaurant empire. The business is fraught with pitfalls, including overexpansion, ownership disputes, management gaffes and other potentially brand-breaking issues.

From back-of-the-house to center stage

In the past decade the culinary arts in the United States have become more prestigious and financially rewarding than ever before. During that period The Culinary Institute of America has seen an explosion in cooking-school applications, says CIA president Tim Ryan.

In 1972 the CIA was the only cooking school granting degrees. Today there are more than 300 schools and 55,000 students studying culinary arts, he says. At the CIA alone there are about 2,500 full-time degree students.

In a historical context, "we're in the second phase of the culinary revolution," Ryan explains. The first phase began with the generation that came of age in the late '70s and '80s, who started out carrying the banner of American cooking, he continues. That generation, including Jeremiah Tower and Alice Waters, comprised "American chefs cooking American food, showing that we could be as good as Europeans, if not better."

The second generation of chefs is "no longer content with the Soltner model, which previously was what we all looked at, having one great restaurant," Ryan says, referring to the renowned founding chef of Manhattan's long-running but recently shuttered Lut¬ƒZce.

Rather, they are ambitions entrepreneurs, building upon the accomplishments of pioneers such as Puck. "It's a fascinating thing to see," Ryan says. "It's self-perpetuating. We're attracting better talent than ever before."

Correspondingly, Americans' appetite for celebrity chefs and the cooking media has grown exponentially. The Food Network, a major outlet for cooking shows, now reaches 80 million households, up from 6.5 million households at the time of its 1993 launch.

"There are no celebrity chefs without television," observes Malcolm Knapp, a New York-based restaurant consultant and columnist for Nation's Restaurant News. "There's a vicarious participation. People buy all these cookbooks, and they watch all of these shows and they're not cooking. In fact, they're cooking less. But it provides an understanding so that when you do go to restaurants, you understand what they're doing. Its like the old adage that the more you understand something, the more you enjoy it."

According to Jacques P¬ƒZpin - who served as personal chef for French president Charles de Gaulle and later as research-and-development chef for Howard Johnson Co. - people once went to the restaurant and then to the theater. "Now the restaurant is the theater," says TV series star Pepin, who now is a dean at New York's French Culinary Institute. "Everything is celebrated with food now, whether you're raising money for AIDS or celebrating the Academy Awards."

In that climate chefs never have had more opportunities, the CIA's Ryan says. "People are attracted to the culinary arts because they view it as being prestigious, as having excellent potential for financial reward," he observes.

"When I graduated [from the CIA] in the '70s, you were either a chef or a pastry chef," Ryan recalls. "Your options were to do your work in a restaurant, private club or hotel. Now students are research-and-development chefs, high-end chefs, cookbook authors, television stars, and they have multiple units. These are all things that have happened in the past 10 to 15 years."

In addition, chefs have become memoirists, tour operators, product manufacturers, and consultants for the food and beverage programs of hotels, restaurants and cruise ships.

While many high-profile chefs embrace the growing menu of opportunities, they also face new challenges and increasingly complex decisions. With heightened profiles, many chefs no longer are just individuals but often are brands with a public image, making decisions not just for themselves but also for their partners and companies.

"It's hard for a creative person to all of a sudden become an astute businessman," observes DiSpirito, who gained nationwide fame on the NBC reality show "The Restaurant."

"Yeah, [celebrity chefs] get some attention, but with that comes a whole new host of expectations," DiSpirito says. "We have to be expert marketers. We have to be incredible PR people. We have to be great leaders in the kitchen. You're expected to be talented, creative, moving forward constantly. We have to be superhuman."

Risky lifestyles of the rich and famous

Many celebrity chefs, including DiSpirito, say they now are striving to develop mass-market brands. However, most, unlike Puck and Lagasse, have had only limited success branching beyond kitchen goods and food products, according to former Forbes reporter Juliette Rossant, whose book "Super Chef: The Making of the Great Modern Restaurant Empires" is being published by Free Press this May.

"Chefs keep expanding further away from the kitchen, in a way that is similar to sports stars," Rossant says. "I'm not sure if that will be successful. Getting away from a core brand identity risks confusing customers."

With multiple commitments and responsibilities, Rossant adds, chefs also risk overexposure and spreading themselves too thin, resulting in suffering restaurant operations.

Puck, English and DiSpirito each cite Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia as their corporate model for brand growth. However, branding exclusively around a central personality has its drawbacks, as evidenced by Stewart's recent conviction for lying to federal investigators, which has left her company in crisis. Several industry experts, in fact, predict that the Martha Stewart Living brand might not survive, especially if Stewart goes to jail.

In terms of culinary talents who license products, Puck has had the most success thus far. In 2001 he sold $15 million worth of Wolfgang Puck brand pots and pans in just one weekend on the Home Shopping Network, according to a passage in "Super Chef." That same year Puck's line of frozen pizzas was licensed to ConAgra Foods for a reported $20 million. In 2003 the catering and events portion of Puck's business recorded sales of $28 million, Rossant says in her book.

DiSpirito is following in Puck's footsteps, with a line of Rocco Cookware that soon will be launched on the QVC cable channel. He also is working to develop more opportunities in television, books and product licensing.

"When you can create a product and put it in a box and sell it, that's ultimately going to be the best way to make money," DiSpirito says, noting that restaurants are just one component of the brand presence he is trying to create. "For many people, because restaurants are such a difficult way to earn your dollar, they end up becoming a bricks-and- mortar representation of the brand."

Boston-based chef-restaurateur English says his top priority is "managing the brand," as he grows it into a lifestyle company. In addition to Stewart, English cites Calvin Klein and Ralph Lauren as "branding heroes" after whom he models his brand. English, who once starred on the pilot episode of the ill-fated "Iron Chef American" cook-off show with William Shatner, has his sights set on expanding into kitchen design and decor. "Kitchens are very fashionable," English says. "I think it would be an oversight not to look that way."

A line of Todd English brand frozen foods, olive oils, vinaigrettes and seasoned salts is set to launch in April. According to author Rossant, other name-brand products English reportedly has considered licensing include travel packages, hotels, clothes, watches, cologne and gadgets. In addition, English is planning a television series due out in fall, the details of which are being negotiated.

At the same time English is pursuing restaurant growth and currently owns 17 units of various concepts, including his flagships Olives and Figs - although his net returns from his multiple restaurant concepts have been relatively slim, according to Rossant's "Super Chef." In 2001, the book reports, English's restaurants grossed more than $70 million, netting him $1.5 million, less than a 2.5-percent profit.

And while English has embarked on multiple projects, his restaurant operations have, at times, struggled, an indication, some say, that he has spread himself too thin. Around the same time that English made Esquire magazine's March 2002 list of Best Dressed Men in America, his original Olives restaurant in Charlestown, Mass., was closed twice by the health department for numerous food safety violations, Rossant recounts in her book.

While expansion doesn't necessitate a decline in restaurant quality, it does require a solid operational infrastructure. Industry observers often point to Jean-George Vongerichten as a chef-restaurateur who has maintained the quality of his establishments while expanding from one restaurant, New York's JoJo, to 12 restaurants in five cities, several of which are different concepts.

Vongerichten's restaurant group requires about 2,000 employees and an internal management company for functions such as sourcing and purchasing services, human resources and financial operations, according to his partner, Phil Suarez.

What's in a name? Money

Some celebrity chefs have turned to endorsing products for additional income, although endorsements also can be a sticky issue among culinary talent in the industry.

Noted cookbook author and cooking-show star Rick Bayless of Chicago's Frontera Grill and Topolobampo last year encountered criticism from many of his high-profile colleagues for appearing in advertisements touting Burger King's line of low-fat chicken sandwiches.

"Personally, I'd draw the line at what Bayless did," says Anthony Bourdain, the Food Network star who penned the international best seller "Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly."

"When you espouse [a sustainable-farming] philosophy loudly for most of your career and then really betray it to sell a product that is the antithesis of what you've talked about, then I think that is crossing the line," explains Bourdain, who also is executive chef of Brasserie Les Halles in New York.

Bayless was unavailable for comment by presstime. Lidia Bastianich, another New York chef- restaurateur and TV series star, agrees that endorsements can be a slippery slope. "You have to really be careful endorsing products, because there are many opportunities that come in front of you," says Bastianich, owner of the restaurant Felidia. "If you consider the economics, you'd take everything. So you have to set priorities and limits for yourself."

Milliken and Feniger of the Santa Monica, Calif.-based Border Grill currently endorse a line of Kohler professional sinks that they themselves use, according to Milliken. Endorsements are "something that we take very seriously," she says. "We're not actresses, and so we wouldn't be good at endorsing something we didn't believe in and really like. It has to hit that standard."

Other chefs, such as Eric Ripert of New York's Le Bernardin and Food Network's Tyler Florence, say they are wary of endorsing products.

"It took 20 years to build my reputation and the reputation of Le Bernardin," Ripert says. "Why spoil that for a couple thousand dollars?"

Florence, star of "Food 911" and former executive chef of Cafeteria in New York, adds: "I would never want to put my name on a line of pots and pans. Everything eventually ends up at a yard sale, selling for 50 cents. To build your own brand, that short-term cash payout is probably not the best idea. It could easily come back to haunt you."

To avoid that pitfall, Florence says, his new, licensed line of cookware is called Real Kitchen. The pots and pans sell at Mervyn's and are set to sell at Target stores nationwide in October.

Take some advice, for a price

Last year Ripert launched a consulting company as a way to make additional money without dedicating lengthy periods of time away from the restaurant, he says.

"It's a lucrative way of making money," he says, explaining that he charges clients an annual fee in most cases. When the name of Le Bernardin or Eric Ripert are used in association with a project, Ripert and his team charge more and take more control of the project's operations, he says.

Ripert has worked on five projects since founding Ripert Consulting, including creating the menu and managing dining-room operations for Azur by Le Bernardin at the La Quinta Resort in La Quinta, Calif.; collaborating on menu creation at New York's Geisha; and developing menus for the hotel restaurants and poolside dining of two Miami properties, the Lido and the Raleigh Hotel.

Ripert recently signed a five-year contract with the Ritz-Carlton in the Cayman Islands to open a restaurant that will be branded with his name. For that more extensive project, Ripert will train the staff for the opening and send chefs from Le Bernardin to the hotel's restaurant for one week each month to ensure food quality and to update menus.

Ripert says he would not be interested in opening any restaurants himself, for fear of spoiling the reputation of Le Bernardin, where he is a partner. "When you have the responsibility of a luxury restaurant like Le Bernardin, you have an image to uphold," Ripert says. "You cannot just sabotage your restaurant. You still have to give a lot of attention to the restaurant, or it will suffer."

Consulting has its drawbacks in that "selling your ideas is not the smartest way to make the most amount of money," Rossant says. "It's good for making money in the short term, but not in the long term."

Other chefs, such as English and New York restaurateur Daniel Boulud, also have worked as consultants. English once worked with fast feeder Long John Silver's to develop new menu selections, and Boulud, chef-owner of Daniel, recently acted as culinary adviser for the development of food and beverage operations of Cunard's cruise liner Queen Mary 2.

The QM2 will have 10 restaurants, including a 156-seat namesake restaurant from English, featuring Mediterranean cuisine.

On-air fame yields big paydays

Television has made household names of many chefs, including Lagasse, Bobby Flay, DiSpirito and Puck. The medium is unparalleled for its broad reach but has its drawbacks as well, according to Steve Dolinsky, a media trainer for culinary talent and a food reporter for ABC 7 News in Chicago.

"The Food Network has led a lot of chefs to believe they can be the next Bobby Flay," Dolinsky says. "While that's unlikely, what [television] can provide is a lot of free advertising, if you're a good communicator. And on a national scale, it can really help turn celebrity chefs into branding machines."

In combination with the bricks-and-mortar presence of restaurants, television has helped make chefs some of the most visible celebrities in the country, according to the 2003 Forbes "100 Top Celebrities" list, which gauges annual earnings and media coverage.

At No. 81 on the list, Puck ranked the highest of all restaurateurs, having made an estimated $12.2 million between June 2002 and June 2003. Lagasse ranked No. 85, having netted an estimated $7 million among his restaurants, television shows and products.

But some chefs say they are drawn to television as a teaching vehicle rather than as a tool for increasing their celebrity status. Such is the case for Milliken, Bastianich and Florence.

For Bastianich, "celebrity is not the goal," she says. "In my time you became a chef because that's what you wanted to be and because you loved it. It was about knowing your product and knowing your profession. So I was very well versed in my profession before I ever got the opportunity to teach someone else."

Bastianich notes that she worked in restaurants for 20 years before her first book was published.

Feniger and Milliken became multimedia personalities through their Food Network show, "Too Hot Tamales," public-radio programs and cookbooks in addition to their restaurants.

"We taught hundreds of people, our staff, cooking courses, etc., before we ever appeared on TV," Milliken says. "For us teaching is the main reason we do TV. If you like to inspire people to cook, the [medium offers] you a great way to reach people. It helps you build your brand, too. And if you build your brand, more opportunities come your way."

According to Florence, teaching people culinary skills is "the ultimate feeling of satisfaction.

"It's one thing to have a restaurant; it's another to inspire people to cook," he says. Though Florence plans to open his own restaurant in New York in the coming year, he plans to continue hosting cooking shows.

For other chefs media involvement "is really just a prolonged exit strategy," observes Bourdain, who hosts Food Network's "A Cook's Tour."

"People have offered to set me up [with my own restaurant]," he says. "I would never, ever do it. No matter what I tell myself, I know I would end up obsessing over every detail of the restaurant. I'd have to give my life totally up to it."

'Instant' fame breeds confusion

Regardless of a chef's interest in appearing on television or other media outlets, the CIA's Ryan cautions, "Today if you're going to be a chef or restaurateur and you don't have a solid foundation of how to deal with the media, you're just not going to be successful." In recent years the culinary school's curriculum has focused more on communications and marketing, he adds.

However, some industry veterans think the media attention given to celebrity chefs is too much.

"Students going into school are being disillusioned into what this craft is all about," says Rick Moonen, chef-partner at New York's rm. "You have to apprentice and put in your time in any craft. You can't expect to go to school, work a couple of years and then be head chef with your name splashed all over the place, then franchise your restaurant out, write several books, have your own television show and tour the world as an expert. That's not how it works."

P¬ƒZpin agrees. "The media attention impacts students in a negative way," he says. "They want to go into the business to become famous. But we [culinary instructors] tell them they should expect to work 14-hour days, to sweat in the kitchen and to get varicose veins by the time they're 40. Most will make a good living, but few will have the success of a Wolfgang Puck or Todd English."

Despite the increasing number of chefs focusing on opportunities outside of the kitchen, the craft of the culinary arts and quality of cuisine available at restaurants in the United States are not likely to suffer, observers say. To the contrary, the rise of the celebrity chef and the country's growing interest in the culinary arts has led to a heightened awareness and demand for good food and cooking.

Still, there are many chefs who say they are uninterested in pursuing celebrity. "The best example of what a chef can be is the guy who stays in the kitchen and really makes his food remarkable," says Michael Romano, chef of New York's noted Union Square Cafe. "I like the feeling of being steward in one establishment."

Soltner, chef-owner of New York's Lut¬ƒZce for 34 years and now an instructor at the French Culinary Institute, says he wouldn't have done things any differently. "Nothing could distract me from the restaurant," Soltner says. "My philosophy is that you have to be in your restaurant. I thought that I owed it to my customers to be there.

"All of the press and the glory [that chefs receive] these days goes a little overboard," Soltner continues. "And that is a change that is not good. I would like to give this message to star chefs - we make and sell soups. We are soup merchants."

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