Mario Batali

• 1. Introduction

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  Mario Batali was roommates at Rutgers University with the actor James Gandolfini, years before either man was famous. Batali, born in 1960, became an American chef, writer and restaurateur whose name was once close to shorthand for Italian food on American television. He co-owned restaurants in New York City, Las Vegas and Los Angeles. One of them, Babbo, held a Michelin star for several years. In 2017, a restaurant news website published accusations that unraveled his restaurant and television careers. How does a cook from Seattle build an empire on that scale? What made his screen presence so powerful? And what did the reckoning that followed involve, in boardrooms, kitchens and courtrooms?

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• 2. Family And Roots

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  Mario Francesco Batali was born in Seattle on the 19th of September 1960. His mother, Marilyn, was born a LaFramboise, and part of her ancestry was French-Canadian. His father, Armandino Batali, would go on to found Seattle's Salumi restaurant in 2006. The Italian side of the family ran through two towns. His paternal grandmother came from Chieti, and his paternal grandfather came from Lucca.

  At Rutgers University in New Brunswick, New Jersey, Batali worked as a cook at a pub and restaurant called Stuff Yer Face. He graduated in 1982.

  In 1994 he married Susi Cahn, and the couple have two sons. Her parents, Miles and Lillian Cahn, founded Coach New York. Batali's brother Dana took a very different path into technology. He served as Director of Pixar RenderMan development from 2001 to 2015.

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• 3. Learning The Line

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  At 29, Batali was working as a sous chef at the Four Seasons Biltmore in Santa Barbara. Before that he had held the same job at the Four Seasons Clift Hotel in San Francisco. Since 1995 that hotel has been known simply as The Clift, under different ownership.

  In San Francisco he worked with chef Jeremiah Tower at Tower's restaurant Stars. Stars was open from 1984 until 1999, and it is considered one of the birthplaces of the celebrity chef.

  Batali's own philosophy was shaped by Italy. In a 2012 interview he said good Italian cooking is defined by simplicity. He credited that insight to his time at a restaurant in the village of Borgo Capanne.

  His apprenticeship years became the subject of a 2007 book by Bill Buford. Its full title is Heat: An Amateur's Adventures as Kitchen Slave, Line Cook, Pasta-Maker, and Apprentice to a Dante-Quoting Butcher in Tuscany.

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• 4. Television Years

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  Molto Mario ran on the Food Network from 1996 to 2004. It focused on Italian cooking, and it made Batali a household name. The show also helped popularize the Food Network itself.

  Other series followed a similar pattern of travel. In 1998 came Mediterranean Mario, a culinary tour of Morocco, Spain, France and Greece. Mario Eats Italy aired in 2001 and 2002 and explored the Italian countryside. Ciao America with Chef Mario Batali followed in 2003 and looked at Italian food in the United States, though it lasted only three episodes.

  Batali also became one of the featured Iron Chefs on Iron Chef America. In 2007, a one-hour special called Mario, Full Boil followed Batali and Joe Bastianich as they opened the Italian restaurant Del Posto in New York City.

  He moved easily between food and general entertainment. In 2008 he co-hosted the PBS series Spain... on the Road Again. In 2009 he played the role of Rabbit in Wes Anderson's stop-motion film Fantastic Mr. Fox, based on the book by Roald Dahl. He also made guest appearances on The Daily Show and The Simpsons.

  In 2011 he became a co-host of the ABC daytime talk show The Chew. He remained on the program until 2017.

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• 5. Restaurant Empire

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  In 1998, Batali, Joe Bastianich and Lidia Bastianich formed the B&B Hospitality Group, also called Batali & Bastianich Hospitality Group. Its flagship was Babbo in New York City. Other notable names included Del Posto and Lupa, and Batali was an investor in The Spotted Pig.

  Babbo collected honors quickly. The James Beard Foundation named it Best New Restaurant of 1998. In 1999, GQ named Batali its Man of the Year in the chef category. Ruth Reichl awarded Babbo three stars in The New York Times in 2004. The Michelin Guide gave it one star in 2008, and the James Beard Foundation named Bastianich and Batali Best Restaurateur that same year.

  Batali himself was also honored personally. The James Beard Foundation named him Best Chef in New York City in 2002, and gave him its All-Clad Cookware Outstanding Chef Award in 2005. He was later inducted into a Culinary Hall of Fame.

  The business had a labor dispute behind the success. In 2012, Batali and B&B settled a lawsuit with 117 members of the restaurant staff. They had alleged that the organization skimmed a percentage of the tip pools over a period of years.

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• 6. Cookbooks

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  Mario Batali Simple Italian Food: Recipes from My Two Villages appeared in 1998, the same year as Babbo's James Beard honor. A holiday collection, Mario Batali Holiday Food, followed in 2000. In 2002 came The Babbo Cookbook, and he also contributed to Vino Italiano, a book on the regional wines of Italy.

  Molto Italiano: 327 Simple Italian Recipes to Cook at Home arrived in 2005. A lighter title, Mario Tailgates NASCAR Style, came out in 2006.

  Several books were written with partners. Spain... A Culinary Road Trip, published in 2008, was written with Gwyneth Paltrow and Julia Turshen. Italian Grill, also from 2008, was written with Judith Sutton. Molto Gusto: Easy Italian Cooking, from 2010, was written with Mark Ladner. Molto Batali: Simple Family Meals from My Home to Yours followed in 2011.

  Another title, America: Farm to Table, was written with Jim Webster. Its subtitle promised simple recipes celebrating local farmers.

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• 7. Causes And Convictions

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  In May 2013, Batali and chef Bill Telepan co-wrote an opinion article for the New York Daily News about hydraulic fracturing, commonly called fracking. They wrote that fracking "could do serious damage to New York's agricultural industry and hurt businesses, like ours, that rely on safe, healthy, locally sourced foods." Batali had signed on to Chefs for the Marcellus, a group formed to protect the state's regional foodshed from fracking.

  In 2008, he and his wife Susi Cahn founded the Mario Batali Foundation. It funded children's educational programs and pediatric disease research. He also supports Transcendental Meditation through the David Lynch Foundation.

  Batali served as an ambassador and board member of The Lunchbox Fund. This non-profit provides a daily meal to students at township schools in Soweto, South Africa. In December 2017 he stepped down from that role.

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• 8. The Reckoning

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  On the 11th of December 2017, the restaurant news website Eater reported that four women accused Batali of sexual harassment and sexual assault. By the following day, four more women had come forward. Batali took a leave of absence from Batali & Bastianich Hospitality Group.

  The consequences moved fast. The producers of The Chew fired him on the 14th of December 2017. The Food Network halted plans to release episodes of Molto Mario. Target announced that it would no longer sell his pasta sauces and cookbooks.

  In May 2018, an episode of 60 Minutes aired more accusations of sexual assault. The New York Police Department confirmed it was investigating, including an alleged assault at The Spotted Pig. Batali denied one allegation of sexual assault. He also said, "My past behavior has been deeply inappropriate and I am sincerely remorseful for my actions."

  Days later, B&B Hospitality Group announced it would close its three Las Vegas Strip restaurants. The Las Vegas Sands Corporation had ended its relationship with the company.

  In January 2019, New York City police declined to charge Batali over two alleged sexual assaults at his restaurants, citing insufficient evidence. Two months later, in March 2019, he surrendered his stakes in the hospitality group, and he sold his minority stake in the Italian food marketplace Eataly. The Bastianich family said the group's name would change.

  In May 2019, Batali was charged in Boston with indecent assault and battery. His accuser alleged that he had groped her at a bar in Boston in April 2017. Batali pleaded not guilty and chose a bench trial, which means a judge rather than a jury would decide.

  A separate matter ended in July 2021. Batali, Bastianich and their former restaurant company settled a New York state case that the Attorney General of New York had been investigating. They agreed to pay $600,000 to more than 20 former employees, both men and women, of three restaurants in Manhattan.

  On the 10th of May 2022, a judge in Boston Municipal Court acquitted Batali. The judge ruled that his conduct during the incident was "not befitting of a public person of his stature." The judge also agreed with the defense that the accuser had credibility issues. The acquittal came more than four years after the first Eater report.

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