Chef Wolfgang Puck is a world-renowned chef and restaurateur who has crafted a vast culinary empire since the early 1980s. His establishments include over 20 fine dining restaurants and 80 plus fast-casual dining spots, along with a host of cookbooks and products.
Puck started cooking at his mother’s side as a child and began his formal training at fourteen years of age. As a young chef he worked in some of France’s greatest restaurants. Wolfgang came to Los Angeles in 1975 and very quickly caught the attention of the Hollywood elite at Ma Maison with his dynamic personality. In 1982, chef Wolfgang Puck opened restaurant Spago in West Hollywood, the flagship of chef Puck’s fine-dining restaurants. The restaurant relocated to Beverly Hills in 1997 and now has three sibling restaurants in Las Vegas, Maui, at the Four Seasons Resort, and one in Beaver Creek. He also owns fine-dining restaurants Chinois on Main in Santa Monica, a restaurant inspired by the Asian flavors and products of multi‐cultural Los Angeles, CUT in Beverly Hills, Las Vegas, London and Singapore and restaurant Wolfgang Puck at Hotel Bel-Air in LA, as well as several more.
Chef Puck also has six cookbooks and has made national/local television appearances including ABC’sGood Morning Americasince 1986. For 19 consecutive years, chef Puck has created the menu for the Annual Oscars Governors Ball and hosts his own syndicated weekly column which appears in over 30 newspapers. He has also earned many accolades, one of which is the prestigious James Beard Foundation “Outstanding Chef of the Year” which he won twice, in both 1991 and 1998. This year, he will be recognized for his dedication, expertise and passion for the culinary industry with the Lifetime Achievement Award from The James Beard Foundation, and by the Culinary Institute of America as a “Pioneer of American Cuisine”
- 2012 Lifetime Achievement Award, James Beard Foundation
- 2012 Pioneer of American Cuisine, Culinary Institute of America
- 2011, 2010 AAA Four Diamond rating, CUT Las Vegas
- 2009 Inductee into Nation’s Restaurant News MenuMasters Hall of Fame
- 2008 Outstanding Restaurateur nomination, James Beard Foundation
- 2008 “Chef of the Year” award, Culinary Institute of America
- 2008 Michelin Guide’s Two Star rating, Spago Beverly Hills
- 2008 Michelin Guide’s One Star rating, CUT Beverly Hills
- 2007 Vanguard Award, Spago Beverly Hills, Angeleno magazine
- 2007 Fine Dining Legend Award, Nation’s Restaurant News
- 2006 “Restaurant of the Year,” CUT, Esquire
- 2005 Outstanding Service Award, Spago Beverly Hills, James Beard Foundation
- 2004 “Keep Memory Alive” Tribute to Wolfgang Puck, Alzheimer’s Foundation
- 2003 “Wolfgang Puck” Food Network television program receives Emmy for Best Direction – Service Show
- 2002 “Wolfgang Puck” Food Network television program receives Emmy for Outstanding Service Show
- 2002 Visionary Award, Beverly Hills Chamber of Commerce
- 2000 Best Restaurant, Spago Beverly Hills, Food & Wine magazine
- 1998 Honorary Doctor of Culinary Arts, Johnson & Wales University, Providence, RI
- 1998 Outstanding Chef of the Year, James Beard Foundation
- 1995 Salute to Excellence Award, National Restaurant Association Educational Foundation
- 1994 Outstanding Restaurant of the Year, Spago Hollywood, James Beard Foundation
- 1991 Outstanding Chef of the Year, James Beard Foundation
Pictures © Amanda Marsalis