Agassi's Star Palate: Celebrity Chefs

By JULIETTE ROSSANT Kudos to Andre Agassi. Not only did he just play the Legg Mason Tennis Classic at the ripe old age of 34. Not only does he have his own charity, the Andre Agassi Charitable Foundation. He is also supporting his mother and sister in contributing a recipe to Star Palate, a cookbook. Launching officially next month, the cookbook raises money for cancer charities and will be for sale at Costco, Sam's Club, and Barnes & Noble, and other stores. Proceeds go equally to the Breast Cancer Research Foundation and the Marsha Rivkin Center for Ovarian Cancer Research in Seattle: I hope my readers support this. Andre's sister was diagnosed with breast cancer at 30, followed by their mother within a few months. Five years later they are cancer free. Today, sister Tami Agassi is executive director of the Marsha Rivken Center. Star Palate is Tami's concept, supported by Kathy Casey, one of Food & Wine magazine’s "hot new American chefs." Star Palate features recipes from celebrities like: Robin Williams, Katie Couric, Jay Leno, Quincy Jones, Celine Dion, Bill Gates, Phil Mickelson, Tim McGraw and others. There is even one chef (!) tossed into the big PR mix for good measure -- Emeril Lagasse, of course. A little hunting reveals more names, including Lidia Bastianich, Todd English, Thomas Keller, Graham Kerr, Nobu Matsuhisa, Iron Chef's Masaharu Morimoto, Paul Prudhomme, and Martin Yan. I was glad to find Todd English in the fine print: his sister Wendy also survived cancer. In fact, I interviewed Wendy for Super Chef, and she described how much Todd supported her and helped her recovery, often cooking special meals for her (later reported in The Boston Globe). Since her recovery, Wendy has worked with Todd in developing new products like Olives' olives. Meanwhile, Todd has joined Men With Heart and has even donated a pizza recipe. Star Palate helps more than just breast cancer: it also helps to define the differences between being a great chef, a celebrity chef, and a super chef. Of all the chefs participating, today only Emeril Lagasse (and formerly Paul Prudhomme) has anything close to the national celebrity to merit inclusion with the other celebrities. Many argue that he has the full bag of ingredients: great chef, celebrity chef, and super chef. (On my checklist, he most certainly has the latter two sewed up, but last time I ate at one of his restaurants -- Emeril's New Orleans -- I was underwhelmed everything but the fat of a roast duck entree -- a matter of personal taste, perhaps.) Technorati Tags: chefs restaurants food cookbooks charity branding -> back to superchefblog