Undercover Boss cooks up an amazing makeover this week — of celebrity chef Marcus Samuelsson.
The cooking maestro and restaurateur gets the make-up and new wardrobe treatment on tonight’s episode as he heads out to try and find new culinary stars.
His transformation sees him gain a new head of hair, a moustache and a lot more wrinkles as he becomes “Veejay”.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OuUJ1Fvt5oI
Cameras then follow him as he seeks to uncover gifted new talent among aspiring chefs in a soup kitchen, high-end food truck, public cooking class and a culinary institute.
But the chefs have no idea who they are filming with after the Undercover Boss team make him unrecognizable.
Samuelsson, who was born in Ethiopia and raised in Sweden, became the youngest ever chef to receive a three-star review from The New York Times when he was just 24.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kCmiBIG2GQk
In 2009 he was a guest chef at Barack Obama’s first state dinner, when the then president hosted Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on the White House’s South Lawn.
Samuelsson owns a string of top restaurants and eateries, including Red Rooster Harlem, Ginny’s Supper Club, the American Table Cafe and Bar, and the Streetbird Rotisserie in New York — as well as the Uptown Brasserie at JFK airport.
He also runs Marc Burger in Chicago, Marcus’ Bermuda on the Caribbean isle, and a string of restaurants in Sweden — Eatery Social Taqueria in Malmo, Norda in Gothenburg, the American Table Brasserie and Bar in Stockholm and the Kitchen and Table chain, which has several branches both in Sweden and Norway.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pHWm5RWWuNA
Samuelsson is already well-known to television viewers, after making appearances on everything from Top Chef, Iron Chef USA, and Iron Chef America to Chopped.
He’s also appeared on Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown, in an episode focusing on Ethiopia, and is a regular face on CNN, MSNBC and Today.
Samuelsson is the author of several cookbooks, New American Table, The Soul of a New Cuisine and Marcus Off Duty — as well as Yes, Chef, a book about his life and journey to becoming a chef, and Make it Messy: My Perfectly Imperfect Life.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G5MiThAJcRw
Undercover Boss airs Fridays at 8/7c on CBS.