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Also included are profiles of people first featured on Taste the Nation: among them, a Gullah Geechee chef in South Carolina, a Peruvian dance teacher in New Jersey, and an Iranian restaurant owner in Los Angeles. What drew you to their stories? I wanted to give a good cross section of the people that I met on the road. When you travel this country by road and you embed yourself—which is not always easy to do; I had the privilege of doing that with a TV show—you learn so much more. Not only about that community, but about our country. You have a new cooking competition show, America’s Culinary Cup, premiering next year.What are you excited for viewers to see? I’m really excited for people to find out about the challenges, and also see what world-class chefs we have [competing]. Giving away a million dollars brings a lot of people out of the woodwork.
