Bobby Flay and Steve Ells Celebrity Chef Wine FAQs

Bobby Flay, courtesy NBC

Celebrity chef Bobby Flay and Chipotle founder Steve Ells have joined forces for a new NBC show airing on Sunday, Mar. 6, at 8 p.m. called America’s Next Great Restaurant.

Think of it as a Shark Tank for the restaurant biz. Flay, Ells and fellow restauranteurs Lorena Garcia and Curtis Stone will watch ten people with dreams of owning the next fast/casual restaurant chain compete to develop their great concept. The big prize? Flay, et. al. will invest in that great concept with their own money.

So, when Anne caught up with Flay and Ells at last January’s TV Critics Press Tour, she had to ask for their Wine FAQs. Well, adapted, because you gotta figure, with Flay and Ells being in the food biz, they’re pretty up on the whole wine thing.  So Anne asked what question do people ask them?

Flay’s was simple: “They always ask me what to cook with. What wine to cook with.”

And his answer was pretty straightforward, too: “I always tell people, rule of thumb, don’t spend more than ten dollars, but under ten dollars you can still get a good bottle of white or red wine. Just taste it before you cook with it. If you like it, you can cook with it.”

We agree, although we’re not above using a $5 bottle of wine to cook with, as long as we like it.

Ells said that folks don’t really ask him about wine. “Usually, they just give me the wine list,” he said.

Steve Ells, courtesy NBC

But he did have a great tip for when you’re ordering for the whole table.

“Generally, if you see people ordering the same sort of thing, you go that way,” he said, adding that it can be tough to order for a group. “But it’s not unacceptable to order a couple of different kinds of wine and just put them right down on the middle of the table and let people pour it themselves. So even at more formal places, I like to do that.”

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