Ming Tsai
Ming Tsai | |
|---|---|
| File:MingTsai.jpg | |
| Born | March 29, 1964 |
| Education | Cordon Bleu |
| Culinary career | |
| Cooking style | Chinese |
Current restaurant(s) | |
Television show(s) | |
Ming Tsai (Chinese written language): Cài Mínghào) (born March 29, 1964) is an Chinese American celebrity chef and restaurateur who currently hosts two cooking shows – Ming’s Quest on the Fine Living Network and Simply Ming on American Public Television – and formerly hosted East Meets West on the Food Network. He has also appeared as a challenger chef on the Food Network's Iron Chef America beating Iron Chef Bobby Flay and was a judge for Cooking Under Fire on the PBS network. In 1998, Tsai, a Dayton, Ohio, native along with his wife Polly, opened his first restaurant, Blue Ginger, in Wellesley, Massachusetts and he is the author of three cookbooks, Blue Ginger, Simply Ming, and Ming's Master Recipes.
Ming Tsai started cooking at his family's Chinese restaurant as a teenager in Dayton, Ohio. He graduated from The Miami Valley School, an independent school in Dayton, Ohio. A mechanical engineering degree from Yale proved to be merely a brief detour in a career that would lead him to Paris, where he studied at Cordon Bleu and worked at Fauchon and Natacha. It was at Natacha that he encountered east-west cuisine for the first time. Back in the U.S., Ming returned to school and earned a Master's Degree in Hotel Administration and Hospitality Marketing from Cornell University before working for several years in the hotel industry as food and beverage director at Hotel-Intercontinental Chicago.
In 1992, the kitchen lured Ming back and he arrived at Silks, an east-west restaurant at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel in San Francisco. There he assumed responsibilities as sous chef, working with Ken Hom. Subsequently Ming served as executive chef for Ginger Club, a Southeast Asian restaurant in Palo Alto, California. He then moved on to Santa Fe, New Mexico, as executive chef of Santacafe, where he was honored as best chef in Santa Fe and a 27 out of 30 rating in the Zagat Guide 1996.
Ming decided to move back east and establish his own three-star restaurant, Blue Ginger, in the Boston area. He chose Boston because "the restaurant scene is alive and healthy. In addition," he says, "there is a Chinatown, which not only means the availability of products, but also the opportunity to get a good bowl of noodles and dim sum." As well as being chef/owner of Blue Ginger, Ming oversaw all aspects of the design and construction of the restaurant. His minimalist design showcases an open kitchen with 40-foot, blue pearl granite counter, Italian granite floors and a water sculpture. A feng shui master consulted on the design.
Ming also has appeared in USA Today, The New York Times, Saveur, Food Arts and Food & Wine. Esquire magazine hailed him as Chef of the Year 1998, and the James Beard Foundation has nominated Blue Ginger as Best New Restaurant in the country.
Ming has hosted several TV series, including Emmy Award-winning East Meets West with Ming Tsai and Ming's Quest. Ming's first cookbook, Blue Ginger: East Meets West Cooking with Ming Tsai (Clarkson Potter, 1999) and was named one of 1999's 25 best cookbooks by Food & Wine. In 2006 He appeared in an episode of Arthur entitled "What's Cooking?".