Alex Guarnaschelli

Alex Guarnaschelli's early inspiration in cooking came from her parents

Alexandra Guarnaschelli was born on 20th June 1972 in New York City. Her father, John Guarnaschelli was an enthusiastic restaurateur known for his Italian and Chinese cuisine while her mom is an esteemed cookbook editor.

Little Guarnaschelli, who used to watch her mom testing different recipes while editing cookbooks at home, first cooked something by herself, when she headed to the kitchen early morning as a starving 11-year-old and tried to get something to eat but couldn’t.

While not knowing to cook anything, she searched on her mom’s bookshelf and took out one: The Fannie Farmer, that ultimately proved to be right as she could found there a pretty easy way of baking a simple cake, to be precise, “the quick coffee cake”.

My love affair with food was just beginning and I wasn't even in a place to understand that I could spend my life cooking.

- Alex Guarnaschelli

Her mom, who was worried thinking that if she would spend her whole life behind the cooker, even praised her for her first try and motivated her too. She went to Horace Mann School in The Bronx, New York and later joined Barnard College, from where she graduated in 1991.

Alex's journey through famous restaurants and TV shows appearances

Earlier, she worked under the highly acclaimed American restaurateur and chef, Larry Forgione, who encouraged her to travel and develop her cooking skill. Afterward, she worked at numerous restaurants in France, Los Angeles and New York including La Butte Chaillot, Daniel Boulud's eponymous restaurant & Joachim Splichal's Patina.

She worked as an executive chef at an award-winning The Darby restaurant before it was closed. She has been serving the position at the Butter restaurant in New York City since 2003.

Alex is the 2nd female ever to being crowned America’s Next Iron Chef on Iron Chef America. Also, currently, she is the only woman to hold that distinction. She won the ultimate challenge against Amanda Freitag in the 5th season while she had ended up was a third runner-up in the 4th season.

She has been seen showcasing her flairs for culinary arts through various TV cooking shows, like The Best Thing I Ever Ate, All Star Family Cook-off, Alex’s Day Off on the Food Network and The Cooking Loft on the Cooking Channel. She has frequently been appearing as a judge on the show Chopped.

Chronicling her experiences and recipes along with her and autobiography, she launched her first cookbook entitled Old-School Comfort Food: The Way in Learned to Cook in 2013.

Alex Guarnaschelli and husband Brandon Clark share a daughter

Alex has been married to Brandon Clark since 2007. They were together for about a year before tying the knot. The duo together shares a daughter named Ava Clark. Alex was pregnant with Ava during their wedding and welcomed her in October the same year.