The Celebrity Chef Comeback Trail

After weaving his way through a maze of living room sets with unpronounceable Swedish names, Curtis Aikens was ready. "Good afternoon, Ikea shoppers," says Aikens, in an avocado green chef's jacket, before a crowd of 10 or so customers listening to muzak and fondling sleek crock pots. Undeterred, Aikens announces with gusto, "Today, we're having fun in the kitchen!" Yet the showroom kitchen in the Emeryville (Calif.) superstore was a humble reminder of glory days past for the former celebrity chef who once commanded $450,000 a year in salary and endorsements. The previous day, Aikens led a demo by an escalator at a Sacramento Ikea. "It's called 'making it work,'" says Richard Gore, the architect behind Aikens's comeback attempt. "We'll make lemonade from lemons."

As one of the forefathers of the celebrity chef movement, Aikens, 52, once enjoyed the trappings of borderline fame. During his mid-'90s heyday, he hosted five shows (including ), met three Presidents, published several cookbooks, toured the world, and was regularly swarmed by culinary groupies. "From a strictly professional standpoint, it was gravy," says Aikens. By the Aughts, however, a new generation of coiffed, camera-ready food personalities—Tyler Florence, Rachael Ray, Guy Fieri—began to revolutionize the industry by swinging it from education to entertainment. The Food Network demanded that Aikens take a drastic salary cut in 2003. Instead, he walked—effectively ending his celebrity chef career.