Celebrity Food Fight: Daniel Boulud

By JULIETTE ROSSANT Daniel Boulud has made some promising and welcome remarks about Celebrity Food Fight. As one of the mentors on the upcoming new Food TV show Celebrity Food Fight, he has been working with producer and host Al Roker for a few years now, appearing regularly on NBC's Today" show. So, why did Daniel choose to partake in Celebrity Food Fight? Georgette Farkas Trapp, Director of Public Relations for DINEX Group, Daniel's company, told Superchefblog: Daniel has the highest respect and admiration not only for Al Roker but also for the extremely professional team that supports him at Al Roker Productions. He had absolute confidence that any thing they produced would be of a level of quality he would be proud to be associated with. The partnership with TVFN also made this a very substantial project that would reach a broad based audience. Last but not least, the show cast Daniel in the role of mentor and teacher, a role that is very natural, comfortable and authentic for him. Georgette added that being paired with Mario Cantone was some of the most fun Daniel has ever had. "He was laughing so hard, he was in tears," she said. In fact, ever since he expanded his restaurants from one to three in New York and made a splash with his "DB Burger" (see previous article), Daniel has been raising his media star higher and higher, from obvious parts in Julia Child: Lessons with Master Chefs to The Charlie Rose Show to Mark Bittman's How to Cook Everything and even on to the Oprah-produced show Making It Big (see previous article). Daniel has also just taped two segments for Martha (and Martha Stewart had Todd English, Daniel's opposing mentor-chef on Celebrity Food Fight, appear several times on one of her shows in the late 1990s, see Super Chef, p. 112). Interestingly, Daniel and Todd just went tete-a-tete in the producut marketplace, having launched cookware and kitchen products branded with their own respective initials ("DB" and "TE") almost simultaneously last year for the 2005 Christmas sales season (see Daniel Boulud v. Todd English: Initial Branding). Meanwhile, Daniel is working on an eight-episode show for INHD TV. He is also in discussion with a producer for a more traditional cooking series, to name just a few of his ongoing TV projects, according to Georgette. Interestingly, she says, Daniel is not considering any cooking shows for French TV: the brain drain and flow of talent has been from France to the U.S., not vice versa. Super chefs: Daniel Boulud Todd English Previous articles: Celebrity Food Fight Celebrity Food Fight: New Game Celebrity Cooking Showdown [Food Television - complete] Technorati Tags: superchefblog, Juliette Rossant, super chef, celebrities, chefs, food, restaurants, cooking, branding, cuisine, blogging, food blogging, food television --> back to superchefblog