It is a surprising fact that even chefs make big money. There have been surveys conducted to learn how much is the net worth of several top and well known chefs across the globe.This list was released by Forbes, with the top ten celebrity chefs in terms of money.

As expected Rachael Ray, turned out to be the richest amongst all, with her day time TV shows, four shows on Food Network, magazine, and of course the Dunkin’ Donuts deal, all comprising to a huge total of $18 million. Next in the line is, the Oscar famous and a well known caterer named Wolfgang Puck who earns around $16 million preceding Gordon Ramsay who earns around $7.5 million.

However, owning a restaurant is definitely not the criteria of this list as, Ray doesn’t own one. This clearly states that having countless exposure and numerous endeavors one can pile up huge amount of money.

For example, Wolfgang Puck’s empire constitutes of 15 restaurants, a soup line available at grocery stores, an assortment of knives that are sold on Home Shopping, many restaurants and also successful television shows both in UK and in the US.

All of these famous chefs have had a great exposure through television that helped them get the fame they acquired but it is again interesting to note that the next to follow, Nobuyuki Matsuhisa (fourth), and Alain Duchess (fifth) had a very little to absolutely no TV exposure, but still both of these great men each own more than 15 restaurants all around the world.

Following is the list of the top ten celebrity chefs of today:

1. Rachael Ray ($18 million)
2. Wolfgang Puck ($16 million)
3. Gordon Ramsay ($7.5 million)
4. Nobuyuki Matsuhisa ($5 million)
5. Alain Ducasse ($5 million)
6. Paula Deen, (4.5 million)
7. Mario Batali ($3 million)
8. Tom Colicchio ($2 million)
9. Bobby Flay ($1.5 million)
10. Anthony Bourdain ($1.5 million)

From this you can easily see how different chefs have charted their careers in such a manner and have become the world’s most famous and rich chefs.

There have been great movies in the past about food and chefs. We have loved them all and enjoyed them, some less some more. Now on the silver screen is a new movie called, ‘Julie & Julia’. The message the movie conveys is that everyone and anyone can become a chef, the only thing you need is the love for food.

When we look at the various movies about chefs we can never forget some of the very few that marked an impression on our minds. One of those is ‘Ratatouille’ where a chef who is a rat named ‘Remy’ overlooks his rat heritage.

To understand what people felt about great movies about chefs, a random poll was conducted. Some of the chef movies that took a front position as one of the best liked chef movies includes ‘No Reservations’, with Catherine Zeta-Jones playing the no nonsense chef Kate Armstrong. Then there was Adam Sandler’s ‘Spanglish’ where he played the part of John Clansky. In the movie ‘Babette’s Feast’, Stephane Audran played the role of Babette. One other movie, a romantic comedy called ‘Women on Top’, presented Penelope Cruz as Isabella Oliveira, who was struggling with motion sickness and turns to cooking.

Movies area a great way to play with human emotions and senses, and the greatness or so to say the success of the movie depends on how deeply you touch those emotions and senses. Mostly the senses that play part are hearing and sight but, movies like ‘Julie & Julia’ take an extra leap and inspire us to create, imagine and even savor the rich flavors of the food we happen to see.

With the world booming with food lovers, people automatically compare them to the great chefs in real-life like Emeril Lagasse, Gordon Ramsey, Paula Deen, Bobby Flay and of course the famous chef of all time, Julia Child. With a number of television cooking shows that air today, the idea of cooking as a passionate art form has now taken hold in the minds of people.

These great chef movies no doubt inspire us to look at cooking as not just something which one does in order to have food, but as something more alive and full of life. These movies present to us an aspect of cooking which has long since been ignored – the passion, the zest for life and the ultimate pandering to one’s senses of touch, smell and taste – all of which come together when one cooks even a simple dish.

Altogether, cooking has thus become transformed into a form of self expression, which was previously very ignored. These great chef movies are also a great source of inspiration for many among us who aspire to work professionally as chefs and cooks.

No matter how much one lives to eat, unless one combines it with the passion for life that food embodies, one cannot completely understand the magic that cooking is all about.

Bon Appetit!

Today, getting a job that offers long time stability is impossible due to the economic conditions, thus the consumers are putting off buying luxury products. However, one cannot stop from eating , and so a career in food service management is sure to stay for long. Today it is more in demand compared to any other industrial job or service.

The most advantageous position in Food Service Management is that of a Manager. When we talk of Restaurants, sports complexes, prison kitchens or any other establishment which deal in cooking and serving food, a need for a manager who coordinates the business the operations related to the occupation and the human resource is a must. He is the one who communicates with the customers and makes sure that they are attended the best possible way. What appears to be the most challenging job of the manager is to hire, train and then retain good employees for the Food Service Industry.

Today, management careers in food service industry are very profitable and long term once you know the responsibilities of the service manager well and execute them accordingly. These responsibilities include:

1. Maintaining Customer Relations: this means he has to make sure that guests are served in time and with good service.
2. Keeping in check the cleanliness of the kitchen and dining areas to the set government standards.
3. Maintaining safety standards and observing liquor laws.
4. Ordering food, equipments and supplies.
5. Track seating, inventory and the orders via computers.
6. Supervision of assistant managers.
7. Helping the chef to create successful food items.
8. To recruit, hire, train, motivate and dismiss employees.
9. Schedule work hours and to handle last minute changes.
10. Managing any kind of banquet or catering operations.
11. Invoicing and paying of bills.
12. Processing paperwork like payroll, employment records and tax documentation.

And there are many other responsibilities too, as in long work hours and work scheduled on any day of a week, even holidays.

Schools and Degrees

Today, vocational schools, community colleges, universities and all are offering two to four years degrees in hospitality which are preferred by all the restaurants. Any kind of experience in this field can also pave your way to enter the food service career as practical experience is an essential part of such programs.

The curriculum of the degree offered by such colleges includes food preparation and planning, nutrition, accounting, sanitation, business management and law, culinary courses and computer science.

There are some basic requirements that need to be fulfilled by a person to be a food service manger. Firstly, a prior experience in restaurant or any food service joint, a two-year/four-year hospitality degree for national level restaurant chains.

In order to evaluate whether the chosen university is a good for the hospitality degree, remember few points:

1. The reputation of the college or university,
2. The conditions of the labs and the quality of equipments,
3. Practical experience and exposure,
4. Financial aid to the students and the expenses,
5. The earlier graduates success rates.

Indian cuisine has evolved from its remarkable past, acquiring varied tastes and traditions brought by numerous conquerors and traders, all of them adding one thing or the other to enhance the diversity in flavors of rich Indian Cuisine. Indian Culinary Art has a long and interesting history.

Indian Cuisine is basically known for its snacks, appetizers and Mughlai preparations. The huge variety of rich desserts is also worth noticing. All throughout the Indian sub-continent one can notice the diversity in cooking style, use of spices, preparation methodologies and use of sauces and ghee (clarified butter).

The Mughlai Cuisine style emerged as it crossed Indian borders via West Asia, way back in 12th Century with Babar’s reign. The use of rich spices, low flame and good ingredients is a cooking style that is mostly influenced by Central Asia, namely the Turkish and Persian cuisines. Mughlai cuisine is popular in northern India, with its aromatic and rich spices, cream, nuts and curd. A typical earth oven is used to prepare Kababs and Rotis. One of the most popular Mughlai preparations is Biryani, which is prepared from rice.

Rasogulla, a very popular Indian sweetmeat originates in the eastern part of the subcontinent.
The dish is prepared using small portions of casein with sugar syrup, and then cooling it off.
Another dessert that is prevalent in South Indian households is Payasam (also known as Kheer). In some parts of India it is an integral part of a wedding feast. Yet another Indian sweet is Gulab Jamun, which is the fried ball of milk in sweet syrup. Other dishes that constitute Indian sweets are, Halwa (made with sugar and semolina), Mysore Pak (chick pea flour, ghee and sugar), Kulfi (an indian Ice cream made of boiled milk with flavors to requirement), Jalebi (a sweet pretzel shaped batter fried and then soaked in syrup), and Jangiri (a south Indian Jalebi).

Thus, the cusine in India consists of a number of flavors, and cooking styles – all replete with rich spices and sauces (or curries) which please the palette and have been long savored across the globe.

If cooking is your passion and you love experimenting with food, and if are searching for scrumptious new recipes, or just love trying fancy meals, then here is a solution. Listed below are the top six websites for you to go through and start experimenting. Give your special guests some real fancy meal. Great recipes at your service!

1. Professional Chef Resources

This is the best recipe site ever! You will fall in love with the Guide to the practical cooking provided by the chef. Each section, forum, job board or directory – every section is a cook’s delight. With the new and recent recipes that are added almost daily the featured chef’s board is also a delight to read.

2. Epicurious

All you want to know about roasting, pickling, and prepping meat is right here on this website. If you enjoy all this then you will just love this site. Expert seasoned chefs know all about the trade and offer you with nothing but the most useful information and recipes about then same providing you with useful tips and secrets to prepare fabulous meals.

3. RecipeLink.Com

Influence your important guests, impress your boss, or colleagues, or prepare a scrumptious delight for your friends and family. There are plenty of recipes to keep everyone happy. The website even offers some safety tips for amateur cooks. What more, it also has a calorie counter that will inform you about the nutritional value too. So eat healthy!

4. 101 Cookbooks – Recipes Journal

Thinking of great recipes for appetizers, desserts, drinks and more? Then this website is your solution: Pastries, pies, soups, sandwiches, and every dish that will make your mouth water is in here! Experience the best of the recipes that easy to learn and hassle-free to prepare.

5. About.Com Food & Drink

 Any and every cuisine that you wish to prepare is here on this site. This site will pamper you and spoil you like crazy. With its amazing and tempting catalog of mouth-watering delicious cooking recipes you will never look any further.

6. Food Network

 Not just written text but this website provides you with videos that will guide you all along your preparation of the delicacy. On this website you will never run out of amazing recipes. So now no more boring text reading, lookout for demos and make cooking more exiting!

Use the above websites to prepare your next meal and you will never look back again. Improve your cooking and learn some very useful tips without joining any cooking class!

Spices are the food seasonings that come from the different parts of a plant like the buds, the bark, the fruits, the flowers, the roots, the seeds, and the stems. These spices have played a very important part in the development of the Western civilization. In ancient and medieval times, Spices were rare and precious. To look at the history of spices is to look at the history of civilization as we know it.

Today, spices play a major role in any cooking endeavor – they are used for their fragrance, their flavor and their taste. They also have a number of medicinal properties.

The first recorded documentation of the use of spices as medicines is found amongst the documents of the ancient Sumerians. This was over five thousand years ago. Over four thousand years ago, we have records that the Chinese also used over 300 different herbs and spices for medicinal reasons. Over three thousand years ago, ancient Egyptians used spices for a variety of purposes, including embalming mummies.

The Greeks and the Romans have also used spices for a variety of reasons. The Greeks used laurel leaves in the form of a wreath worn on the head to honor their heroes. The Romans used herbs for magic and sorcery.

From the middle ages onwards, herbs began to be cultivated even in the western parts of the world. But prior to that, trade was the only means of obtaining these spices. Hence these spices were often considered to be very precious and were quite valuable as trade goods.

From around 3000 BC to 200 BC, the Arabs were the prime traders of spices in the western world. The Romans took over the trade and were controlling it till about 1200. From 1200 to 1500, the Europeans explored different routes to the Eastern parts of the globe and began to take over the spice trade. The period between the 15th to the 17th centuries even saw wars break out for the control of the spice trade.

The period between the 16th to the 18th century saw the English explore and control the spice trade. After this period, the Americans also entered into the spice trading community.

Thus, one can see that the history of spice has always been a history of control, of power and of wealth. Spice has proved to be the number one commodity of trade that has made a lot of difference in the lives of many people – especially in the way we eat food – simply because it just tastes better with a little bit of spice!