Summary: Wednesday, January 29 2013, 3 pm ET, The Halli Casser-Jayne Show, Talk Radio for Fine Minds welcomes Celebrity Chef and author of a delicious, joyride of a memoir No Experience Necessary: The Culinary Odyssey of Chef Norman Van Aken. Norman Van Aken is known as the founding father of New World Cuisine, a celebration of Latin, Caribbean, Asian, African, and American flavors. He is also known internationally for introducing the concept of “Fusion” to the culinary world. The only Floridian inducted into the prestigious James Beard list of “Who’s Who in American Food and Beverage,” his restaurant, Norman’s, was nominated as a finalist for the James Beard Foundation’s “Best Restaurant in America.” He has also been a James Beard Foundation semi-finalist for “Best Chef in America.” Van Aken has published five cookbooks: Feast of Sunlight, The Exotic Fruit Book, Norman’s New World Cuisine, New World Kitchen, and My Key West Kitchen. No Experience Necessary spans twenty-plus years of the culinary renegade and pioneering restaurateur’s career, offering a uniquely personal, highly-entertaining under-the-tablecloth view of the high stakes world of American cuisine, told with wit, insight, and great affection by a natural storyteller. With an abundance of marquee names, incuding Emerill Lagasse, Tennessee Williams, Jimmy Buffet and Julia Child, Van Aken's memoir is as byzantine as a Russian novel but lots more fun.
