Emeril Lagasse is one of America’s most celebrated celebrity chefs. Born on October 15, 1959, in Fall River, Massachusetts, Emeril was raised by his Portuguese mother Hilda and his French-Canadian father Emeril. He worked as a teenager in uniform work shirts at a local Portuguese bakery where he developed his lifelong interest in cooking. At age fourteen he enrolled in a culinary arts program at a local vocational high school, where he also played drums in the school band and played in a band at dances and parties. Upon graduating from high school, Emeril was offered a music scholarship to the New England Conservatory of Music, but he decided to pursue a career as a chef by enrolling in the culinary arts college at Johnson and Wales University in Providence. To help pay his tuition, he worked at a local restaurant, where he met his future wife, Elizabeth Kief. Over the next five years, the couple had two children, Jessica and Jillian. Shortly after graduating from college in 1978, the couple married and Emeril traveled to France to hone his skills.

Returning to the United States, Emeril worked for several years in chef’s pants at some fine restaurants in the Northeast, and also at Wisconsin’s Telemark Lodge with Tony Wise. In 1982 he was named executive chef of the famous Commander’s Palace restaurant in New Orleans. The demands of his job, which required Emeril to work 18-hour days, strained his marriage and led to a divorce. But it was at Commander’s Palace that Emeril began to rise to national fame, leading him to open his own New Orleans restaurant, Emeril’s, in 1990, which emphasized Cajun and Creole cuisine. In its first year, Emeril’s restaurant won Don magazine’s “Restaurant of the Year” award. Over the next eighteen years, Emeril opened thirteen more restaurants.

Emeril began his television career on the show big bosses, where he appeared in ten episodes. After appearing on several other FoodTV shows, Emeril started her own show, Emeril’s Essence. The essence in the title of the show refers to the name of a mixture of spices that he uses frequently in his kitchen and that is commercially available in several different flavors. One of Emeril’s teachings is that all cooks should create spice blends for themselves, reflecting their personal taste, to personalize recipes. Emeril has been nominated eight times for the Daytime Emmy Awards, but has yet to win. Emeril’s popularity as a television personality is due to his jovial style of hosting, as well as his famous catchphrases like “feel the love”, “Bam” and “raise the bar”, which he often says when adding something. spicy to a recipe. He exults in the use of lard for frying or making sausages, with the rallying cry “Rule the pork fat!” Emeril’s animated style in front of a studio audience led him to briefly star in an NBC sitcom in 2001, but the show was canceled after only a few episodes. Emeril was the Grand Marshal of the Tournament of Roses Parade in 2008, dressed in a business suit, a rarity for him, as his signature uniform is white chef’s aprons. Emeril’s latest project is a Discovery Channel daily series emery greenwhich airs on the Planet Green network.