Vegetarian Star

The UK Hell’s Kitchen is back, full of celebrity cooking adventures.

One contestant on the show is Ms. Dynamite, born Niomi McLean Daley, an award winning hip hop singer and rapper.

Depending on the challenges given, Ms. Dynamite might have some performance problems on the show, given the fact that she recently turned vegetarian.

“Once I started to cut down on the meat and dairy products, it started to improve – it was all down to vanity, to be honest,” she told the UK Daily Mail.

“I don’t want to get on my high horse about it but I do feel a lot healthier in my diet. I don’t think I would struggle to cook meat during the show but gutting and skinning an animal would be a different story.”

Vegetarian hatin’ Gordon Ramsay started the UK Hell’s Kitchen, then left to run the famous U.S version. What’s fun about the UK version is that celebrities are the contestants.

The new series of Hell’s Kitchen starts next week in the UK on ITV1.

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Gordon Ramsay, the celebrity chef notorious for his not so kind remarks about vegetarians and vegetarian food has become a vegetarian.

If you recall us telling you, Gordon’s hatred of vegetarians was so passionate, he once said he’d put his children on a fence and electrocute them if they adopted the diet.

That has changed.

When Gordon’s wife Tana, announced she was becoming vegetarian and that should would force the diet on the children, Gordon was less than pleased.

“I couldn’t believe after so many years of marriage, she would betray me like this,” Ramsay said, according to Chef Gossip Daily. “So, I decided to put her on the electric fence and electrocute her to prevent anything like this from happening to my seeds.”

While trying to put his wife on the electric fence, Gordon managed to shock himself. The great pain he experienced brought him to an epiphany-like state where he suddenly had more compassion for animals and wanted a healthier diet for himself and his family.

“I’m just glad it wasn’t anal electrocution like those poor animals on fur farms receive,” Gordon said, rubbing his bum to emphasize how painful that would have been.

Now every evening, Gordon likes to cook vegetarian food with his wife Tana. The children are found of tofu, but Gordon prefers they eat seitan, because it “sounds more devilish” and he hates for anyone to think he’s softened in any other area than his diet.

Note: This story is a bunch of vegan hogwash. But it’s April 1st, so what were you expecting?

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It’s always nice to see veg food show up on TV cooking shows, even if Gordon Ramsay doesn’t like it.

NBC’s new reality TV chef competition, Chopping Block,  has one contestant, Kelsey Henderson (right) who’s had her hand in some veg cooking before.

Although she herself isn’t vegetarian, she told the LA Times blog she enjoys “eating and cooking that kind of food.”

Does that mean we’ll see some veggie creations on her “Chopping Block” menu this season?

Henderson is also a former macrobiotic chef for Madonna.

The show involves teams of contestants bending over backwards for various scenarios that go into opening a new restaurant, from planning the menu to publicity to the most important-making the food! All this must be done while pleasing various food critics who are watching every move they make to determine which team should be sent home next.

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Charles Haynes on Flickr

Chef Michael Ginor of Hudson Valley Foie Gras in New York and author of Foie Gras: A Passion is weighing in on PETA’s The Fine Faux Gras Challenge appears to have a Gordon Ramsay split personality when it comes to creating a vegetarian version of foie gras and the challenge presented by PETA for chefs to do so.

He thinks it’s a great idea. But no serious chef would do it. It provides another option. But chefs aren’t supposed to make substitutions. An excerpt from The National Post:

I think it’s great. People should always have alternatives. I also think it’s ridiculous in a sense, because you can find substitutes for steak. It’s another vegetarian thing. It’s not going to be foie gras, it’s obviously another PR campaign to try and get people to not eat foie gras. They’re not going to find an alternative to foie gras because there just isn’t one.

Ginor then went on to say that he hasn’t been asked to enter the competition and “no serious high end chef would want to do this.”

No, a faux foie gras chef isn’t a hardcore chef. And chefs have better things to do.

Before you know it, there will be a substitution for quail, a substitution for squab and a substitution for steak. That’s not the point of a restaurant.

We already have substitutes for steak, chicken, pork, and the like. And what’s even more ridiculous is that these are served in restaurants. And prepared by chefs! Not only in vegetarian restaurants, but other dining establishments who recognize the growing number of vegetarians (an estimated 5.7 million U.S. adults in 2000-FindArticles – How many vegetarians are there? A 2003 national Harris Interactive survey question sponsored by The Vegetarian Resource Group
Vegetarian Journal, May-June, 2003) and growing.

Looking forward to hearing his response when he tries the winner’s faux foie gras. We’re sure it will probably be something along the lines of “It tastes the same, but no serious chef should ever admit it.”

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If Newton’s 3rd Law applies to news, then if we bring you the Best Of Veggie 2008, ultimately, we have to discuss the worst. And they’re really bad. But in order of fairness, here goes…

#5: Andre 3000 Is Cheap-After bending over backwards to get him a vegan meal prepared, Andre’s waiter didn’t even get tipped! The carnis already say we’re weird and demanding. Now they’re gonna call us cheap. Thanks Andre.

#4:Amazing Race Sheep Butt Eating Incident-Vegetarian Terence Gerchberg was athletic, smart, and a promising part of the duo Terence and Sarah on Amazing Race this past season. So sad that he got taken out by sheep ass.

#3: Paula Deen’s Ham Delivery-25,000 pounds of pork nastiness delivered in the name of charity. At least we got Heather Mills donating veggie burgers to balance off this Karma.

#2: Gordon Ramsay Vegetarian Children Nightmare-The celebrity chef said his worst fear is one of his children coming home and telling him he or she is a vegetarian. In fact, this would cause Ramsay so much distress, he said he would promptly put them on a fence and electrocute them. Nice.

#1: Sarah Palin Thanksgiving Turkey Slaughter-Palin gave the meaning of “know where your food is coming from” a whole different twist as she did an interview with turkeys getting killed just over her shoulder. Wonder how many converted (to vegetarianism) after seeing this, uh, miracle?

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Image: Greg Gayne/FOX

Gordon Ramsay has an on again, off again fondness for vegetarians, and he recently visited a vegan restaurant in Hollywood, Sante La Brea, that was in need of a makeover for an episode of “Kitchen Nightmares” which aired November 20th.

Before we get any further, we’d like point out a serious WTF flaw in the menu. Although they claim to be a vegan restaurant, they serve fish and chicken, something which confused Ramsay, to say the least. Don’t worry Gordon, this confuses us too.

Apparently, the restaurant offers many vegan options on the menu and any entree can be made such by requesting unchicken or tofu. However, there are items with real chicken in tofu sauce, which doesn’t seem to make any sense, but that’s probably one of the reasons why Gordon was there to rescue them.

Here’s the lowdown on what happened:

Gordon is fed a turkey melt, which he is not impressed with and feeds to a dog. Turkey, yuck! Good for him. But he didn’t necessarily have to insult the dog like that.

A plate of tofu with overcooked vegetables and overcooked, lumpy rice does not impress him either. “Shocking. My God!” he exclaimed. Rotten eggplant is just one of the many delightful wonders he finds in the kitchen refrigerator.

Humorous highlights include Ramsay playing a joke on owner Dean Hamoui by having the police handcuff him so he can’t do everyone else’s job, forcing the employees to learn for themselves.

It was a happy ending and Hamoui was quoted in Eater, saying the best thing about working with Ramsay was, “The fact that he fixed things up. There are plenty of problems that I wanted to fix, and when Gordon came he actually put the lid on all those problems—my sons straightened out, Mark [the manager] quit coming with crazy ideas. I needed someone to help me put it back on the map.”

via Reality TV Magazine

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The relationship with the Veg Star and celebrity chefs has been a roller coaster lately. Love, hate, love, hate.

Awhile back, we hated Gordon Ramsay for his less than kind remarks about vegetarians and what he would do if his children became one. Then, we loved Rachael Ray for putting an entire chapter of vegetarian recipes in her new cookbook and featuring hottie vegan rocker Bryan Adam’s Juice Recipe in Everyday With Rachael Ray. Recently, Paul Deen made us steam when we found out she delivered 25,000 pounds of ham to a food bank.

But we’re feeling love again, thanks to Wolfgang Puck.  Puck’s catering company provided the vegetarian meal for the 15th Annual Lint Roller party, which several vegetarian celebs attended, including Lisa Edelstein and Emmylou Harris. The event served to raise money to assist in providing better treatment for animals, including helping getting rescue dogs adopted.

But this isn’t Puck’s first time around the veggie block. Last year, he created an Animal Welfare Program for himself and his 137 restaurants and catering venues, which consisted of various measures to support the humane treatment of animals and offer only all-natural and organic food.

Some highlights of the program were eliminating foie gras from his restaurants. Foie gras is produced when ducks or geese are stuffed to the point of where their livers swell 10 times the normal size. He also increased the number of vegetarian options on the menus and vowed not to use eggs from laying hens confined in battery cages.

He’s catered vegetarian meals for big events in the past, including a party in Beverly Hills that kicked off the 2007 Genesis Awards, which recognizes news and media organizations that produce work which brings awareness to animal issues.

Puck’s not the only one wanting to drink to the occasion. Thanks to the Wolf for bringing back the veg love for celebrity chefs!

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“We have vegetarian menus in all our restaurants, my gripe was never against the vegetarians, I was just trying to move things on a bit and become a little bit more exciting with veg. My frustration years ago was against chefs, how they don’t cook for vegetarians.”

—-Gordon Ramsay, celebrity chef who must be the veg Jekyll/Hyde. He became furious at his chefs on Hell’s Kitchen when they accidentally put chicken broth in a vegetarian risotto. He once joked he’d put his children on a fence and electrocute them if they said they were turning vegetarian. Now this statement. What gives? Is this the veg happy dance he’s doing here?

via Ecorazzi

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