Rocco DiSpirito

Rocco DiSpirito (born November 19, 1966) is an American celebrity chef, reality television personality, and cookbook author based in New York City. He is known for his involvement in Union Pacific, a restaurant he opened in 1997 in the Gramercy Park section of Manhattan. He departed Union Pacific in 2004. From 2003 to 2004, he starred in the NBC reality television show The Restaurant, which followed the launch and operation of a new Manhattan restaurant called Rocco's on 22nd. The show was canceled, and DiSpirito was successfully sued by the restaurant's financier Jeffrey Chodorow to have the restaurant shut down, and DiSpirito banned from entering the premises. He succeeded Arthur Schwartz as host of Food Talk, an hour-long morning talk show on New York Radio WOR (AM), from October 2004 through December 2005, and then hosted 12 episodes of the TV show Rocco Gets Real on A&E (October 4 through December 27, 2008). He was featured in a Lincoln MKX commercial and the ABC sitcom The Knights of Prosperity, and was a guest judge on Bravo's Top Chef. He was a contestant on season seven of Dancing with the Stars and was paired with professional ballroom dancer Karina Smirnoff. On June 15, 2011, he debuted as host of a weekly reality TV cooking competition, titled Rocco's Dinner Party, on Bravo TV. He hosted the syndicated television program Now Eat This! with Rocco Dispirito, which debuted on September 15, 2012. In 2013, he hosted the Food Network reality show Restaurant Divided, where he went to struggling restaurants where the owners had two differing visions and then picked which concept would save the restaurant. On August 20, 2017, he appeared on celebrity chef Guy Fieri's Guy's Grocery Games - Superstar Tournament Part 1, competing against other celebrity chefs. He has also appeared on other episodes of Guy's Grocery Games as well as Tournament of Champions and Guy's Ranch Kitchen.