‘The Culinary Adventures of Baron Ambrosia,’ starring a persona of Bronx filmmaker Justin Fornal, above, starts Friday on Food Channel.
Forgive Baron Ambrosia if hes not hungry.
The 33-year-old TV personality alternately known as the quaffer of culinary consciousness, The Ali G of Food and The Culinary Ambassador of the Bronx has eaten nearly six meals a day for the last few months while filming his new Cooking Channel show.
Right now, Im in my cool-down phases, says the Bronx man about the rigors of his star turn in The Culinary Adventures of Baron Ambrosia, premiering Friday at 10 p.m.
My body is built for a lot of food and I have this desire to sink my teeth into everything, but sometimes I have to take a break and say, No more goat this week.
Sporting his trademark pony-tail and clad in a red robe from India, Ambrosia pours himself an Ethiopian coffee while sitting in the herb garden behind Sundial Herbal Products on Boston Road in the Bronx.
This food is almost like medicine, he says. You just dont think that the Bronx would have this beautiful, magic medicine garden, but here we are.
Discovering gems that are hidden in plain sight across America is what Ambrosias show is all about.
I really like to celebrate foreign cuisines served at little mom-and-pop eateries that are so divine and exquisite, yet we dont normally pay any attention to them, he says.
My job is NOT to tell you that Philadelphia has great cheese steaks. You already know that. My job is to show you something new that is accessible and authentic.
Ambrosia might have the stomach of a foodie, but hes got the heart of an explorer and the mind of a romance novel writer.
His show combines a love of food with a fictional cinematic narrative, which is just as likely to feature a haunted carousel or a villainous beaver as it is Portuguese dry soup or deep-fried turkey soul tacos.
According to Ambrosia, who was recently inducted into the Explorers Club: This is not the kind of food show that people are used to. This is a little movie with true elements in it.
Born Justin Fornal in Killingworth, Conn., Ambrosia studied film at the University of Pittsburgh before moving to the Bronx and creating Underbelly, the top-rated food podcast on iTunes.
He parlayed the success of his podcast into the public-access show Bronx Flavor, which documented the uncelebrated food scene in the Bronx and won Ambrosia a New York Emmy. Then the Cooking Channel called.
Along the way, Ambrosia, whose only known food allergy is fire ants, traveled the world eating culinary specialties (like Vietnamese water bug pus) that would make most people squirm.
There are lots of things that I eat that are pleasing but not necessarily delicious, he says. The only thing that I really dont like is kidneys. Oh, and Hakarl, the fermented Greenland shark they eat in Iceland. It tastes like rotten zombie meat.
Audacity not only describes Ambrosias culinary tastes, but his sartorial splendor as well. By his estimate he stores over 100 colorful suits in his closet as well as outfits from every place he has traveled throughout the world.
It is important to bring color and flavor every moment you can, says Ambrosia. Many people have accepted the grayness of their lives, but when I step on the subway in a purple suit, it brings some positivity back to their lives and lets them know that this can be fun.
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