Last Saturday morning I was invited to a press event, the launch of Braun's Multiquick kitchen appliance. The event was a ladies brunch on a Nile cruise, part of the new trend in PR gimmicks - rather creative, I thought. But the good news was yet to come. The highlight of the day was neither the great river breeze nor the view, but celebrity chef Osama El Sayed, who was there to answer the questions of avid cooking connoisseurs, offering a plethora of personal cooking tips and trade secrets. The charismatic Chef Osama, famous for his daily show on Dubai TV, spent the day effortlessly chatting away, charming all the excited women as they confessed their daily kitchen challenges. His charm aside, Chef Osama has prepared banquets for the likes of Bill Clinton and Al Gore. "I did a lot of banquets during my stay in the United States, he said, "nowadays I do the TV show and am also a culinary consultant. After graduating from the Hotel Technical Institute in Cairo, Chef Osama began his training at the Nile Hilton. Later on living in Washington, DC he worked at acclaimed restaurants where he became familiar with various cuisines like French, Russian and Serbian. As corporate executive chef for one of America's largest social caterers, Martin's Incorporated in suburban Maryland, he produced an innovative Hazard Analysis Critical Control Points (HACCP) recipe guide and developed a Technical Specifications, Nutritional Labelling, and Standard Sanitation Operating Procedures manual (SSOP's) which he submitted to the USDA, where it was implemented. Today his style of cooking is known as Nouvelle Mediterranean. During brunch the chef tried hard to steer away from overly promoting the Multiquick, stressing on the fact he is not a salesman though he is the face of this Proctor and Gamble brand in the Middle East. "You don't have to be a 'master' in the kitchen to make delightful and impressive meals for the family, says Chef Osama. "All you need is your kitchen, your apron, some good music and a nice recipe. And as for preparing the ingredients, using Braun Multiquick will do almost everything, effortlessly, and in no time. "It's not what we eat, but how we eat it, he kept saying. He later explained to me that his show teaches viewers "how to make the right choice no matter where they are; whether they're at the market picking out ingredients or in a restaurant choosing a meal. The chef also autographed each of our copies of his cook "Maa Osama Atyab (More Delicious with Osama), which is the title of his daily show. This is the second book he has published, following the success of his first "Bil Hana Wil Shifa (With Joy and Good Health). In Arabic, the book carries 400 rich recipes, all detailed and illustrated, including starters, main dishes and dessert. Besides the recipes, Osama adds his kitchen's words of wisdom, illustrated icons to help out (like whether it is an economic dish, or a vegetarian dish... and so on) and a comprehensive appendix with a synonyms index, giving the names of cooking ingredients in the different Arabic dialects. With plans to open a school for young chefs, Chef Osama's legacy will likely spice up our kitchens for decades. And the secret of a successful cook? "Learn about ingredients and use fresh ones, he says.
