Talking Food, Fame and $4,000 Tips With Food Network Star Alex Guarnaschelli

How has the transition been for you, juggling both your restaurant duties at Butter while also becoming a major part of Food Network?
I'd call it an addition more than a transition, because I think a very important part of the brand I'm trying to build is both being a professional chef and a mother. That means what I'm doing caters to people who don't have a lot of free time and to people that may be either at home with their children cooking or in a workplace where they're not, and they want to make something when they get home. My feeling is that if you're going to go shopping and cook, whether it's 20 minutes or 45 minutes or 8 ingredients or 80, it better be worth it.

How do you recommend people reach that balance between work, food and time?
Let completely go of everything you've ever tried to control, and the day goes much better. One of the major good fortunes of my job is that I work in a restaurant that doesn't serve lunch, so I spend the mornings with my daughter. We'll go food shopping, we'll go to the farmer's market. We cook, we eat together, and then I come to the restaurant and I cook and eat with my other family. TV is just a really good attachment to a home sound system.

Your daughter is 2-1/2 years old. What are some of her favorite foods?
I find my child and children in her class are very curious in nature. That means you can sell them anything if you do it right. Her palate is always changing. One week, it'll be nothing but kiwis and bananas, and then the next all of a sudden the next week she never wants to see a banana. Shopping and cooking, I find it interesting to feed her curious nature. Now we really love apples -- red, not granny smith -- and she's really into steak, but she suddenly discovered that steak is one of the cornerstones of American food. Like mother, like daughter.

Are you used to being on camera yet?
Nothing is ever comfortable on camera. You have 30 precious minutes, and it's very important to me that the show be worth it every time people watch it. Sometimes I don't win that battle with myself, but I'm trying to teach as much as I can without preaching or overloading. That's been very difficult. I don't think there will ever be a day where I will take that aspect of it for granted.

Is it weird when you get noticed on the street or in public?
The worst thing they did to professional chefs was put them on TV. We're hiding in the kitchen because that's what we chose to do. To want us to come out of our cages and holes is very funny to me. I get recognized the most when I'm doing my dirty laundry and getting a coffee at the Dunkin' Donuts -- moments where I wish I could have a 'Bewitched' moment and just disappear. That connectiveness with people makes the whole process that much easier, though, because what I want to share is what some people want to have as a part of their lives.

Butter is a big-time celebrity hang-out. What are some of the more memorable ones for you?
We've had a bunch of people come in the past couple of weeks... Susan Sarandon will come in and always have the soup. There's something about that -- that she always comes and eats soup -- it's such a basic thing. People think Lindsay Lohan is running through here going crazy with 18 paparazzi, when really you might just find Susan Sarandon or Olympia Dukakis tucked in having a piece of fish. Tiger Woods has been here many times -- he always has the steak.

Jim Carrey left a $4,000 tip when he last ate here a few years back. That took a long time to get over. We made the busboys buy us drinks.

Some of the most gracious people -- we had U2. Bono and the Edge stroll in for dinner on a Friday at 8PM... 'Oh, of course we have a table!' They could not have been more human or gracious to our fellow diners and the staff. What's been really refreshing for me about working in a celebrity-oriented place is how human we all are when it comes to food. It's how we define ourselves as Americans and as a culture. I'm only going to vote for the next president if he or she can cook!

So when you're home, what's on your TV?
I watch food television obsessively. Paul Prudhomme, 'Jacques and Julia,' ... I watch Ina Garten and Bobby Flay. Before you're on the Food Network, you almost can't bear to watch because you wish it was you. Like when you're a kid and you see that really expensive toy in the window and you press your face up to it and breathe and steam up the glass. And now that I'm on it, I can't believe what a diverse universe food television has.

I also watch other stuff, of course. I'm obsessed with 'House.' I find it comforting and calming to watch someone solve something so grave in 57 minutes. I watch Formula One car racing for the same reason. I can doze off watching that very easily. I also love 'Sunrise Earth,' where you watch the sun rise or a llama eating a blade of grass for 30 minutes. I put on my little blinders, and I'm right at the pond with the moose just nuzzling that little bit of early morning water somewhere in Maine.

Are you a music in the kitchen chef?
Never. I have too much respect for music to combine it with the cacophonous sound of pots and pans, chopping, aggravated chefs and high temperatures.

But personally, I love Eric Clapton. I just bought the instrumental version of Pink Floyd's lullabies for kids. I love Prince. He comes here whenever he's in town. He's a vegetarian, eats very late at night and we go back a few years with my 3AM vegetarian meals for him. Just bringing him plates and plates of local vegetables is one of my favorite celebrity interactions I've had. Watching this firecracker of a person eat my food is incredible.

What's the best food scene or movie?
'Big Night,' but not because of the food, but because of the waiting. It is so how it truly is, waiting for someone not knowing when they're going to come. When Daniel Boulud came here, I knew he was coming so I was looking out for him. When I saw him at the coat check, that's when I put fresh biscuits in the oven. I knew they took 9 minutes to cook. When he sat at his table, I figured it took a minute and a half, so I came over and talked to him for seven and a half minutes. Then I got the fresh biscuits -- so fresh they were still breathing -- and I gave them to him piping hot and watched from the kitchen. I saw him close his eyes and smell them and I watched him bite it and I thought, "Sucker." That was probably one of my most memorable moments here -- he thought I was making idle chatter, but it was all about timing.

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