Emeril Lagasse
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40 free Emeril Lagasse trivia questions with answers — trivia quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
Emeril Lagasse turned a chef's jacket and a one-word shout into one of the most recognizable acts on American television. Before the cameras arrived he had already run one of the most admired kitchens in New Orleans and opened a restaurant of his own. This quiz gathers the fun facts behind the fame: the talent he nearly followed instead of cooking, the mentors and kitchens that shaped him, the shows he hosted, the restaurants he opened, and the odd places his food and his voice have turned up. It is written for Food Network fans, trivia hosts and anyone who grew up watching him cook for a cheering studio audience. Every answer comes with a short explanation.
30 of 40 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01In 2006, Emeril Lagasse's jambalaya and rice pudding were delivered to a team of three living where?
International Space Station
The International Space Station received five Emeril dishes, flown up on the shuttle Discovery, and its residents then talked to the chef on live TV. NASA wanted tastier food to lift morale on long missions.
Q 02Which musical skill won Emeril Lagasse a conservatory scholarship that he turned down to become a chef?
Percussion
Percussion was the teenage Lagasse's other talent: he led his high school drum squad, playing dances, banquets and local religious festivals. The offer came from the New England Conservatory of Music.
Q 03Which Disney animated film features Emeril Lagasse as the voice of Marlon, a hot-tempered alligator?
The Princess and the Frog
The Princess and the Frog cast Lagasse as Marlon, one of the gators who try to eat Tiana and Naveen while the pair are stuck in amphibian form. The 2009 film is set in his adopted city.
Q 04Which animated sci-fi series parodies Emeril Lagasse with Elzar, a four-armed alien celebrity chef?
Futurama
Futurama's Elzar, voiced by John DiMaggio, is a Neptunian with his own restaurant in New New York and a very high opinion of himself.
Q 05Which lifestyle mogul's company paid $50 million in 2008 for Emeril Lagasse's shows, cookbooks and product lines?
Martha Stewart
Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia bought the Emeril brand for $45 million in cash and $5 million in stock. Lagasse kept his restaurants and his foundation out of the deal.
Q 06Emeril Lagasse's one-word signature exclamation began on long Food Network taping days as a way to do what?
Keep his crew awake
Keep his crew awake was the entire point: on marathon taping days his staff grew sleepy after lunch, so he shouted to jolt them. Viewers liked the shout so much that it stayed.
Q 07Which actress plays the cookware saleswoman who idolizes Emeril Lagasse in the 2006 comedy Last Holiday?
Queen Latifah
Queen Latifah plays Georgia Byrd, who copies Lagasse's recipes at home, and he appears as himself when she finally opens her own restaurant.
Q 08Which annual event made Emeril Lagasse its 2008 Grand Marshal, a job that includes a football coin toss?
Rose Parade
The Rose Parade's Grand Marshal traditionally joins the coin toss at the Rose Bowl Game, which USC won over Illinois that New Year's Day.
Q 09Which ingredient did Emeril Lagasse champion on air, urging viewers to use it for frying and sausage?
Pork fat
Pork fat was one of Lagasse's loudest causes: he told viewers to reach for genuine lard and gave the ingredient a catchphrase of its own.
Q 10Emeril Lagasse's New Orleans restaurant Meril, opened in 2016, takes its name from which person in his life?
His daughter
His daughter Meril gave the restaurant its name. Lagasse planned the casual menu around his travels and the food he likes to cook at home.
Q 11In which Massachusetts mill city did Emeril Lagasse grow up, spending time in the kitchen with his mother, Hilda?
Fall River
Fall River, an old textile city also known for the Lizzie Borden case, is where Lagasse was born in 1959. He studied culinary arts at Diman, its vocational high school.
Q 12Emeril Lagasse's mother, Hilda, gave him roots in which European country, whose flavors run through his cooking?
Portugal
Portugal runs through his mother's side of the family, and Lagasse names its cooking among the influences on his style, along with Asian and Southwestern flavors.
Q 13What kind of business gave the teenage Emeril Lagasse the job where he discovered his talent for cooking?
A bakery
Q 21Which cooking show, among Food Network's first programs, made Emeril Lagasse its original host in 1993?
How to Boil Water
How to Boil Water was the young network's trademark show, aimed at viewers with little cooking skill. Lagasse moved on to his own series as his popularity grew.
Q 22The Food Network show Essence of Emeril took its title from which product created by Emeril Lagasse?
A spice blend
A spice blend called Emeril's Essence gave the show its name. He also urged viewers to mix their own versions to suit their personal tastes.
Q 23Which pioneering TV cook visited Emeril Lagasse for the 1993 PBS series Cooking with Master Chefs?
Julia Child
A bakery was his first training ground: he mastered bread and pastry there, then enrolled in his high school's culinary arts program.
Q 14Which culinary school did Emeril Lagasse choose over a music scholarship, later receiving its honorary doctorate?
Johnson & Wales
Johnson & Wales, in Providence, Rhode Island, graduated Lagasse in 1978. He paid his tuition by working at a local restaurant.
Q 15After culinary school, Emeril Lagasse sharpened his classical technique in two cities of which European country?
France
France was the finishing school: Lagasse trained in Paris and Lyon, then cooked in fine dining restaurants in New York, Boston and Philadelphia.
Q 16In 1979, Emeril Lagasse became executive chef of a resort hotel in which Massachusetts vacation area?
Cape Cod
Cape Cod's Dunfey's Hyannis Resort put Lagasse in charge of its kitchen only a year after he finished culinary school.
Q 17Which Cajun chef, famous for blackened redfish, did Emeril Lagasse replace at a New Orleans restaurant?
Paul Prudhomme
Paul Prudhomme left to run K-Paul's Louisiana Kitchen, the place he had opened with his wife, and a job offer from Dick and Ella Brennan brought Lagasse to New Orleans to fill the post.
Q 18Which New Orleans landmark, owned by the Brennan family, had Emeril Lagasse as executive chef for over seven years?
Commander's Palace
Commander's Palace, a Garden District institution dating to 1893, kept Lagasse as executive chef for seven and a half years before he left to open his own place.
Q 19In which then-underdeveloped New Orleans neighborhood did Emeril Lagasse open his flagship, Emeril's, in 1990?
Warehouse District
Warehouse District was an unlikely address in 1990, but patrons and critics took to the restaurant at once. Lagasse later opened Meril a few blocks away.
Q 20Which magazine named Emeril's its Restaurant of the Year in 1990, the year Emeril Lagasse opened it?
Esquire
Esquire's critic John Mariani made the call in the restaurant's first year, and the James Beard Foundation gave Lagasse its Southeast regional chef award in 1991.
Julia Child visited sixteen celebrated American chefs for the series, and the young Lagasse was one of them, three years into running his own restaurant.
Q 24Emeril Green, Emeril Lagasse's series on organic and seasonal cooking, was filmed in which grocery chain?
Whole Foods
Whole Foods stores served as the set, and the daily series aired on Planet Green, Discovery's eco-lifestyle network.
Q 25Which streaming service released Eat the World with Emeril Lagasse, his globe-trotting food series, in 2016?
Amazon
Amazon's series sent Lagasse abroad to eat with chefs such as José Andrés, and it won a Daytime Emmy for Outstanding Culinary Program in 2017.
Q 26Which cooking competition added Emeril Lagasse to its judges' table and later filmed a season in New Orleans?
Top Chef
Top Chef made Emeril's flagship a featured location during its New Orleans season, and the winning dish from that episode went onto the restaurant's menu.
Q 27On a 2010 Iron Chef America special, Emeril Lagasse cooked with produce from the garden of which famous address?
The White House
The White House garden supplied the secret ingredient, and its executive chef Cristeta Comerford teamed with Bobby Flay to beat Lagasse and Mario Batali.
Q 28Which broadcast network aired Emeril, the short-lived 2001 sitcom in which Emeril Lagasse played himself?
NBC
NBC pulled the sitcom within months, though its set had a fully working kitchen where Lagasse cooked for the cast and staff.
Q 29Which chef and author wrote Emeril Lagasse's scene for the HBO drama Treme, showing a sadder side of him?
Anthony Bourdain
Anthony Bourdain, a writer on the series, called the scene a dream to write because it showed a burdened Lagasse that his own television shows rarely did.
Q 30Which network breakfast program made Emeril Lagasse its regular food correspondent, starting in 1998?
Good Morning America
Good Morning America put Lagasse in front of a national audience a year after his nightly Food Network show began.