Who

Flay doesn't spend much time in the kitchen any more, but chances are one of his half-dozen television shows is probably on the Food Network right now.

Backstory

Flay dropped out of Chelsea's Xavier High School and took his first job in the restaurant industry at the theater district spot Joe Allen. Per his official bio, Flay showed such extraordinary promise that Joe Allen's owners decided to cultivate his talent by sending him off to the French Culinary Institute. (What Flay leaves out of the story is that his father was a part-owner of the restaurant.) By the late 1980s, Flay was working the kitchen at the East Village's Miracle Grill and his Southwestern fare caught the attention of Jerome "Jerry" Kretchmer, the restaurant impresario behind Gotham Bar and Grill. With financing from Kretchmer, Flay opened Mesa Grill in 1991; a year later, New York's Gael Greene had proclaimed it restaurant of the year and the Times had awarded Flay two stars. In 1993, Flay and the Kretchmer family opened a second spot, the Gramercy Spanish eatery Bolo. He turned into a dining star shortly thereafter thanks to a dozen books and a bazillion hours on the Food Network.

Of note

Flay's culinary talents are rarely on display these days: His numerous restaurants all have seasoned chefs behind the stoves, which leaves the cocky red-haired chef plenty of time to build Bobby Flay, the brand. Over the past decade, he's created six TV shows (Hot off the Grill, Boy Meets Grill, Grillin' & Chillin', BBQ with Bobby Flay, Foodnation, and Throwdown!) and made countless appearances on other food TV programs (like Iron Chef). And he has so many books with his name stamped on the cover, it's hard to keep count. Since the publication of his first book, 1994's Bobby Flay's Bold American Food, he's authored From My Kitchen to Your Table, Boy Meets Grill, Bobby Flay Cooks American, Boy Gets Grill, and Bobby Flay's Grilling for Life, among others.

Flay's ubiquity on the TV dial has earned him the usual detractors, many of whom find his on-camera persona arrogant and obnoxious. (Although with millions of middle-aged moms in the Midwest swooning over him, you can be sure that he'll be demonstrating mango-heavy dishes on TV for many years to come.) And like any chef with an oversized ego, Flay has used his celebrity status to pursue global culinary domination. He opened the Mesa Grill Las Vegas in Caesar's Palace in 2004, and debuted the David Rockwell-designed Bar Americain in Times Square a year later. In 2006, Flay opened a steakhouse in the Borgata Hotel in Atlantic City and then followed up with a Bahamas branch of Mesa Grill in 2007. He lost a venue that same year when his Bolo was shuttered. (The building is being torn down.) But he's got other projects in the works. Next up he's opening a burger joint named Bobby's Burger Palace.

Personal

Flay is on his third marriage. His first marriage in the early 1990s was to Debra Ponzek, the former chef of Drew Nieporent's Montrachet. His second wife, whom he married in 1995, was a single mother named Kate Connelly who co-hosted the show Robin Leach Talking Food. (Mario Batali and Tom Valenti stood by his side during the ceremony.) In 2005, he tied the knot with Stephanie March, formerly a cast member of Law & Order: SVU. He has one daughter with Kate named Sophie; she was a bridesmaid at Flay's wedding to March.

Habitat

Flay lives with March in a loft in the Chelsea Mercantile building and in 2005, he purchased the apartment below his for $1.5 million to create a duplex. Their neighbors in the building include Christopher Wheeldon, Kyle MacLachlan and Desiree Gruber. In 2005, Flay sold his home in East Hampton for $995,000.