The Real Celebrity Chefs

United States Postal Service Honors Celebrity Chefs with New Forever Stamps
Although I don’t send a lot of snail mail I bought a bunch of these stamps because I can use them… well FOREVER. Regardless of rate changes for postage these stamps will be good, locked in at 49¢. But hurry they are a limited edition.

Everyone knows the names of James Beard and Julia Chid even people who can’t boil water. Edna Lewis, Felipe Rojas-Lombardi and Joyce Chen are not house hold names so a little information is about their culinary contributions are below.

Edna Lewis considered the The Grande Dame of Southern Cooking inspired a generation of young chefs and ensured that the traditional folkways of the South would not be forgotten. She was cooking up Southern cuisine in the heart of Manhattan in 1949. Her cookbook, The Taste of Country Cooking is considered a classic study of Southern cooking. In 1979, Craig Claiborne of The New York Times said the book “may well be the most entertaining regional cookbook in America”.

Felipe Rojas-Lombardi, the Peruvian-born chef helped bring a Spanish and Caribbean influence into America’s haute cuisine repertory. He moved to New York City in 1967 and worked as the assistant to James Beard in his Greenwich Village cooking school. He was the founding chef of Dean & Deluca gourmet food store and was named America’s Bicentennial chef in 1976, the same year he became an American citizen. He was credited with introducing Tapas to America. He was only 46 when he passed away of heart failure.

Joyce Chen was credited with popularizing northern-style Chinese cuisine in the United States, coining the name “Peking Raviolis” for potstickers, inventing and holding the patent to the flat bottom wok with handle (also known as a stir fry pan), and developing the first line of bottled Chinese stir fry sauces for the US market. Joyce Chen Foods.

Julia Child is perhaps the most well known American Chef. She introduced French cooking for everyday Americans, with her groundbreaking cookbook Mastering the Art of French Cooking and was the quintessential TV cook. Starting in 1962, “The French Chef” ran 10 seasons on PBS.  Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, Julia made regular appearances on the ABC morning show Good Morning, America. She won a Peabody award in 1964 and an Emmy Award in 1966. When I was cooking in a French restaurant in Manhattan and there was any question about how something was prepared, it was WWJD.  What would Julia do? You can watch 10 seasons of the French Chef on Amazon Instant Video and if you’re a Prime Member the firs 5 seasons are FREE.

James  Beard  was a champion of American cuisine who taught and mentored generations of professional chefs and food enthusiasts. His legacy lives on in twenty books, other writings and his foundation’s annual James Beard awards in a number of culinary genres. Check out the James Bead Foundation website, it’s amazing and next time you’re in New York, skip the Broadway show and attend one of the Dinners held at the James Beard House in the West Village. To give you a taste of what one of these dinners is like read my post, “Food is the Star of This New York City Show.”

 I just might have to start sending people letters, or mail in checks in stead of paying online. Here’s a good reason to send a letter.