Celebrity chefs can turn anything into a gourmet meal — even the lowly burger.
Of course, it comes with a gourmet price tag. The $5,000burger is made of Kobe beef, foie gras and black truffles, and served with a 1990 bottle of Chateau Petrus. (Or you can skip the wine and order the champagne cocktails with 24K gold flakes.)

Gee, wonder what kind of toy they give away with that? A diamond?

A sugar rush by any other name is just as sweet.

Well, maybe not. According to Steve Ettlinger’s book, Twinkie, Deconstructed there’s more to this snack than a toothache. The author combines humor and thorough reseach on this American icon. He conveniently avoids talking about health benefits (we all know there is none) but, like the Twinkie itself, sometimes we just need a lot of fun, useless reading.

The White House kitchen, run by
Cris Comerford, certainly created a holiday feast fit for a king (or president). Cris is the first female chef to hold the position. Here’s what was served at the buffet:

Artisanal and Local Cheeses served with Crackers, Winter Fruits and Spiced Nuts
Chilled Gulf Shrimp Cocktail served with Cocktail Sauce and Remoulade
Bourbon-Glazed Virginia Ham served with Cheesy Stone-Ground Grits
Crispy Chicken-Fried Steak Fingers with Creamed Pan Drippings
Roasted Lamb Chops with Rosemary Sea Salt with Mission Fig Chutney and Mint Jelly
Fruitwood Smoked Copper River Salmon served with Fresh Potato Pancakes and Traditional Garnitures
Maryland Crab Cakes with Lemon Caper Sauce
Orzo Salad with Roasted Artichokes, Tomatoes and Olives with Feta Cheese Vinaigrette
Homemade Tamales with Roasted Poblanos and Vidalia Onions with Black Beans and Tomatillo Sauce
White and Green Asparagus and French Green Bean Tier with Garlic Aioli
Barney and Miss Beazley Cookies (Chocolate-Dipped with Gold Collars)
Decorated Animal Cookies (Grizzly Bear, Elk, Fox, Wolf, Eagle, Mountain Lion,
Moose, Road Runner, Buffalo, Coyote, Deer)
Park Trees and Leaves Cookies (Gold Magnolia Leaf, Pine Cone, Acorn, Oak Leaf, Aspen Leaf, Elm Leaf)
Maple Cookies
Park Arrow Head Cookies
Long-Stemmed Fresh Strawberries
Orange-Spiced Infusion with Mixed Tropical Fruits and Berries
Chocolate Truffles with Forest Flavors (Honey, Maple, Huckleberry)
Chocolate Mice
Log Cabin Cake (Chocolate Dolly Sin Cake, Chocolate Buttercream Frosting)
Lemon Meringue Sequoia Cake Tree
Coconut Cake with Seven-Minute Frosting
Yule Log – Bûche de Noël
Brioche Bread Pudding
Walnut Pound Dundee Cake
Gingerbread Crown Cake
Mackintosh Apple and Sun-Dried Cherry Cobbler

Now, how exactly does one get invited to these things???

James Beard is considered the first ever celebrity chef. Test your knowledge of him (abd whether you can consider yourself a hardcore celebrity chef fan) with this quiz

Food and WIne magazine recently released the list of the best new chefs in the United States. These are the next generation chefs, in their mid-20s, and yet already showcasing brilliant talent and drive. Watch out for them!

Every year, WOlfgang Puck prepares the meal for the prestigious Oscars Governors Ball. Everybody who’s anybody is there. The ingredients must be perfect, the flavors perfectly orchestrated. After all, there are 1,500 celebrity guests there, and they will raise hell if the chicken is even the slightest overcooked.

Puck created a very elaborate menu
that included pizza with white truffles and kumamoto oysters. There were appetizer trays, tapas, sushi bar, seafood bar, buffet. Just a whole lot of food — and madness in the kitchen.

Consider the numbers;350 kitchen staff,6,000 Pieces of hand polished Flatware, and a really long shopping list:

500 Bottles of Laurent Perrier Champagne
2,000 Bottles of Sterling Wine
300 lbs. Smoked Wild Salmon
100 lbs. Natural Certified Angus Beef
600 ea. Spiny Lobster
10 lbs. French Farm Raised Osetra Caviar
250 Whole SMART Organic Chickens
16 lbs. Black Truffles from Perigord, France
10 lbs. White Truffles from Alba, Italy
15 Whole Yellowtails
150 lbs. Big Eye Tuna
25 ea. Thai Snapper
100 Dozen Kumamoto Oysters
100 lbs. Black Farm-Raised Mussels
150 lbs. Little Neck Clams, Farm Raised
300 lbs. Jumbo Shrimp
550 lbs. Snake River Farms Wagyu Beef (American Kobe)
25 Whole Wild Striped Bass

Celebrity chefs have huge pantries at their disposal—but what’s the one ingredient they can’t live without? Six of them share their secret.

Clarissa Dickson-Wright: Heinz tomato soup. She also depends on chicken stock, but prefers to make her own. For regular blokes, she says, “”There’s a place for the stock cube in every kitchen.”

Richard Corrigan: Organic Swiss vegetable bouillon. This is something he only uses at home, since he makes his own stock from scratch in the kitchen.

Antony Worrall Thompson: ketchup, worcester sauce and anchovy essence

Delia Smith: Sainsbury’s fresh bolognese and freshly made gnocchi. “This is a total cheat - but utterly gorgeous”

James Martin: Supermarket’s own-brand fresh stock. “It’s my favourite thing at the moment. It makes a great sauce”

Sam Stern: Marmite. “The best shortcut for stock is having the real thing around in your freezer whenever you want it”

A perfect gift for anyone who loves cooking shows and celebrity chefs. No, not kitchen knives or another “Kiss the Cook” apron — but Celebrity Chef the Game. It’s been described as “a combination of Cranium and Bravo’s Top Chef.”

This trivia-based board game lets you test your trivia knowhow and navigate the tricky ladder up to stardom: endorsements, awards, TV deals, and the occassional mad critic. It’s fun and educational. Sample question:

Q:Which of these is a possible designation for wine?

A) Dolphin safe
B) Rabbit safe
C) Salmon safe

We all want to cook like a celebrity chef — and hopefully not burn the meatloaf in the process. But which of the many celebrity chefs does your natural cooking style come closest to? Take this quiz to find out — and share the results with us!

(I turned out to be a Jamie Oliver: :It’s crash, bang, wallop when you’re in the kitchen. You’re an inspired cook and you’re not afraid to throw flavours together. You’ve got a hands-on approach and rule out anything too fiddly.”

It’s funny: while women are traditionally seen queen of the kitchen, the professional culinary world tends to be very discriminating of female chefs.

Daniel Rogov, wine and restaurant critic says: “Many men who encourage or ‘allow’ women to enter the kitchen often do so only at an entry level and rarely allow them to rise to that point where they will become serious competition for themselves.”

He adds that since 17th century America, the belief that women can only be chefs in taverns and corner restaurants, while the more exclusive places were ruled by men. In England, women handled the kitchens of Princes, Dukes and Earls, while men handled the meals of the King and Queen. “Not a single woman has ever been admitted into the ranks of the Royal Society of Chefs,” he says.

The belief is that women lack the management skills to handle the chaos of a large kitchen, even if in equally creative and pressure-packed industries like publishing and TV, they consistently lord over staffs much larger than the typical restaurant crew.