Since the beginning of his celebrated career, Master Chef and hospitality entrepreneur Charlie Palmer has received critical acclaim for his signature Progressive American Cooking, a style built on rambunctious flavors and unexpected combinations with a deep and lasting infusion of classical French cuisine. Influenced by his childhood experiences working in his family's vegetable garden, Palmer was an early advocate of farm over factory food. In 1988, he made a landmark commitment to creating dishes featuring regional American ingredients at his sublime three-star Aureole, situated in a historic townhouse off Manhattan's Madison Avenue.

Over the years, Palmer combined his creative cooking spirit and flair for business to open twelve notable restaurants across the country, a growing chain of food-forward wine shops and award-winning boutique hotels. But even today, the chef still steps in the kitchen with reinvention on his mind. "Without a doubt, people eat with their eye long before they put fork to food, so I continue to look for a playful yet respectful way to create excitement on the plate."

A frequent guest on NBC's Today Show, Charlie Palmer is also the author of four cookbooks, Great American Food (Random House/1996), Charlie Palmer's Casual Cooking (Harper Collins/2001), The Art of Aureole, (Ten Speed Press/2002), and Charlie Palmer's Practical Guide to the New American Kitchen (Melcher Media/2006).