Food Network Live tour, Las Vegas Sun, Sept, 15, 2000

‘Food Network Live’ tour makes a stop in Las Vegas Lisa Ferguson Friday, Sept. 15, 2000 | 8:46 a.m. What: "Food Network Live!" tour When: Noon-5 p.m. Sunday. Where: Las Vegas Convention Center. Tickets: $33.50. Information: Call (800) 949-CHEF. These days celebrity chefs and their high-end restaurants are worshipped by some at levels once reserved for movie stars. Several big-name chefs have found homes on the Food Network (Cox cable channel 42), with its wildly popular food-fueled format that has them hosting live cooking shows, taping installments in front of sometimes rowdy studio audiences, making food the subject of game shows and traversing the globe in search of delicacies, among other antics. On Sunday, a handful of the network's culinary stars will appear at the Las Vegas Convention Center for the local stop of the "Food Network Live!" tour. The tour will also include stops in Phoenix, San Diego and Honolulu, continues through December. It features a rotating lineup of Food Network personalities who conduct cooking demonstrations while local restaurants and national sponsors host food- and wine-tasting stations. Cookbooks are sold. Autographs are signed. Among the food personalities scheduled to appear here are Emeril Lagasse, host of the hit show "Emeril Live" and the owner of two Las Vegas restaurants (Emeril's New Orleans Fish House and Delmonico Steakhouse); Bobby Flay, host of "Hot off the Grill" as well as two other Food Network shows; Sara Moulton, host of "Cooking Live," a call-in show; and Tyler Florence, host of "Food 911," in which he helps people work through their culinary emergencies. Richard Gore, president of Food Network Live, explains the decision to include Las Vegas as a tour stop this year made "a lot of sense ... It's become a very important culinary destination." He says the network is expecting an audience of 4,500 at the convention center on Sunday. Lagasse held a press conference Tuesday at Delmonico at the Venetian to discuss the installments of "Emeril Live" that were taped at the hotel-casino this week, as well as his role in the "Food Network Live!" event and the relaunch this fall of "Essence of Emeril," the show that brought him to the network in the mid-'90s. "Emeril Live," is taped before a studio audience that is encouraged to holler "Bam!" along with Lagasse when he tosses seasoning onto entrees (thus "kicking it up a notch," as he likes to say); cheer as he adds "40 or 50 cloves of gah-lic" to a dish; and chant his mantra, "Pork Fat Rules." "The 'Food Network Live!' is really just an awesome event," says Lagasse, who has participated in previous stops on the tour during its nearly four-year history, but not many recently due to scheduling conflicts. "I know the talent (the chefs) will have a great time. It's really an amazing thing to get out there in front of 3,000 people and sort of do a demonstration, sort of show." Lagasse's demo on Sunday will be filmed and aired on the Food Network on Sept. 30 -- the finale of the network's weeklong prime-time salute to Las Vegas that begins Sept. 25 with the "Emeril Live" episodes. While Lagasse may be the main attraction this weekend, Flay also boasts a growing fan base. He owns a pair of New York restaurants -- Mesa Grill, specializing in Southwestern cuisine, and Bolo, featuring Spanish-influenced dishes. Besides "Hot Off the Grill" (his co-host, Jacqui Malouf will also be at Sunday's event), Flay also co-hosts "Grillin' and Chillin' " (outdoors and over an open flame) and recently launched a new show, "Food Nation," which has him traveling the country, exploring regional food flavors and traditions. "I am learning a lot about this country," Flay, who trained at the French Culinary Institute, says. "I think that sometimes chefs, when we look for for inspiration, we automatically think of Europe and Asia, and we just kind of forget that what we have right here (in this country) is pretty great." Hence the Southwestern flavors favored at Mesa Grill. "The use of chili peppers and corn, both fresh and dried, things like citruses -- tangerines and limes -- all of those flavors work really well and the colors are incredibly vibrant naturally," he says. "I think people are really looking to eat more flavors these days and that's what Southwestern food is able to achieve." Rather than a celebrity chef, Flay considers himself "a personality in my restaurants. I think celebrity is a very strong word. I think that movie stars are celebrities. I don't know if chefs cooking on television ... I think it's a little strong (of a word) to use." Moulton also has reservations about the term. Schooled at the Culinary Institute of America, she worked in the late '70s behind the scenes as associate chef on "Julia Child and More Company" on PBS before working a restaurant apprenticeship in France. In the early '80s Moulton was an instructor at a New York cooking school and went to on work for "Good Morning America" where she did the prep work for every cooking segment seen on the show for nearly a decade. In 1987 she was appointed executive chef at Gourmet magazine, a position she juggles with her Food Network duties. "I still don't consider myself a star," Moulton says, despite the fact that she hosts "Cooking Live," another of the network's most popular shows. Each night around the dinner hour, she cooks recipes and takes phone calls from viewers throughout North America. On the tour, "Occasionally somebody will come up and say, 'Oh, I can't believe I'm meeting you.' But people come up to me and say, 'I've learned so much from you,' or 'You got me cooking again,' and that makes my day ... I'm certainly not like those other (chefs) -- I'm not glamourous." Its fitting that the petite Moulton, a mother of two children ages 10 and 14, is usually described "as a mom. I've been described as Betty Crocker, which makes me want to throw up. "I'm happy to be described as a Julia Child protege. But people just don't see me as this glitzy, fancy rock 'n' roller. They see me as this sort of down-home person." The tour, she says, provides her an opportunity to learn "what America's thinking, because that's what my show is all about, and sort of to address the issues that people are dealing with daily." Despite her years spent working with food, Moulton is the first to admit she doesn't know everything abut cooking. And on a live show, that can sometimes be a problem. "If somebody asks me a question and I don't know the answer I'll say I don't know the answer. Nine times out of 10, another viewer calls in with the right answer ... So it makes me feel more relaxed not to have to be perfect. And let's face it, we all make mistakes in our kitchen at home. It happens to the best of us." Even to legendary TV chef Child. Having worked with her on projects since the late '70s, Moulton says, "I learned from the master about making mistakes and actually how important it is to make mistakes. Julia, I think, really made people feel that they could go in and make a recipe because if she was gonna drop it on the floor or slop it over the edge or burn it a little bit and still carry on, then they could." Moulton has been called "the next Julia Child." Like "celebrity chef," it's a title that makes her uncomfortable. "There will never be another Julia Child. I hope that I carry on some of the things that she did in that I want people to get back into the kitchen and cooking," she says. "My real goal is to empower people to make dinner and to sit down and to dine ... It's not just about sustenance. It's about sitting down and sharing and having a conversation and I think people have really lost sight of that." archive