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Dad ~ Chef ~ Author
Carlo Morelli is an accomplished Dad, Chef, Restaurateur, Author, Designer, and Entrepreneur Extraordinaire.
Although he didn't start out in the kitchen, things got plenty hot for Carlo at a very tender age . At 11 years old, after winning a city wide art festival, Carlo won an art scholarship and set a course that catapulted him out of the Chicago's Little Italy ghetto. At 16, Carlo became the youngest artist on staff in the international headquarters of Sears Roebuck and Company.
At the age of 23, he held a much acclaimed International Debut of Fashion and quickly launched The House of Carlo fashions. Carlo soon was recognized as an accomplished Couturier and promising Costume Designer. His fashion career and led him to Hollywood where he was a wardrobe and costume designer on productions as varied as The Dean Martin Show, The Perry Como Show, Red Skeleton, Bonanza, and Hogan’s Heroes, and feature films, The Son's of Katie Elder, War Lord, and Harlow! Glamorous women such as Barbara Stanwyck, Gypsy Rose Lee, Sally Rand, and Joan Crawford, spun in The House of Carlo gowns, and the rest should have been, as you say . . . history. Not a chance!
While the movie studios fought over union contracts, Carlo snapped up a fun job designing uniforms for the Century Plaza Hotel in Beverly Hills, sparking his interest in the hospitality industry. During the grand opening, the Food and Beverage Manager quit. With his can-do attitude, Carlo stepped in to get the hotel through the crisis. He stayed with that company 9 years and became Director of Food and Beverage. He opened luxurious hotels in cities from coast to coast. fun, food, fashion . . . fabulous! He did it all. Well, . . . not quite yet!
The astounding accomplishments in his background paid off in the early 1970s, when Carlo was appointed The Chief of Protocol for The State of Texas. Over the next 2 years, he was the insurance policy that every visiting dignitary was treated with the style and grace unknown outside the parlance of European royalty. Every major state function came off with flare and panache. He was the site coordinator and responsible the for the United States, Southern Governor's Conference the first ever held in The State of Texas. Enough? hardly!
Entrepreneur Extraordinaire! Over the years, Carlo has owned or managed over 56 restaurants and hotels, many of them having multiple locations. He bought Houston's first Four Star French restaurant Le Pavillon, an offshoot of New York's acclaimed restaurant, and operated it until the 1980s.
It was during this time that Carlo became really serious about his own culinary skills. He knew that he needed a way of evaluating the more than 50 chefs working for him. So he brought in Swiss master chef Josef Boudé as his teacher. For over 2 years, they spent the time each day perfecting Carlo's cooking ability.
Other restaurants and hotels that Carlo has owned or operated include Élan, the award-winning chain of 14 private clubs with nationwide locations; the Cowboy Club, with locations in Houston, Dallas, and Memphis; the Rice Rittenhouse Hotel in Houston; and the Cadillac Bar throughout Texas, California, and New York.
With a growing family, Carlo decided it was time for a change. At age 38, he retired, and soon tackled his most important challenge of all, a stay-at-home dad with his young sons, Michael and Matthew. Now in their teens, the boys have talents far beyond their years, and are truly living up to their potential!
As a popular homeroom dad, he's shown children how to make funny faces on pizzas, and as part of the Houston School District's education-on-film project, Carlo taught students how to make muffins and breads. He knows that getting children involved with their food at an early age is the best way to turn picky eaters into adventurous culinary explorers. “I've never had so much fun as cooking with kids,” says Carlo.
Carlo is in constant demand for cooking demonstrations, motivational speeches, radio and TV appearances, and fashion show judge. Schools, charity organizations, cruise lines, and restaurants call on him when they want an extra special draw for their events. His appearance as the featured Chef on a recent Royal Olympic Cruises, for example, enticed hundreds of people away from a ship’s-worth of other fun activities.
His newest cookbook "Kids, Cooking With Carlo" contains 100 kid friendly, kid tested, kid approved recipes covering everything from pancakes and tortilla roll-ups to homemade macaroni and cheese, chicken nuggets, sugar cookies, Orangeapple Whirladoodiddles, and Carlo's own blueberry muffins.
But his books are more than a collection of recipes. They also provide the shopping, prep, technique, and cleanup know-how kids need to become self-sufficient cooks. It's about mixing good times with good eats. And it's about the bond formed when youngsters and their parents share the process of meal preparation, learning not just the cooking basics but also the supermarket skills they'll need as they mature into adults with kitchens of their own.
Carlo knows that bringing children together with their parents at the table is the surest way to open the lines of communication. At his own house, he proves every day that children are never too young to experience the possibilities of the kitchen. By now, even his grandchildren can see why Carlo is known as the best recipe man in the school's PTA.
Hold on to your hats!!! NOW in development, a new blockbuster TV cooking show,
