Local show garnishes cooking lessons with comedy

Friday, Sept. 8, 2000 | 8:49 a.m.

What: Jerry Lee's Comedy Cafe.

When: 7 p.m. Wednesdays through Saturdays, beginning Sept. 20.

Where: Alexis Park Resort, 375 E. Harmon Ave.

Ticket: $32, $65

Information: Call 798-5606.

A pinch of humor, a dash of cookery and an audience with an appetite for fun and fine dining is the recipe two Las Vegas entertainers have created for an act they hope will put food on their table.

Their formula for success has one secret ingredient -- surprises.

It's a secret even to its stars, Jerry Lee and Steve Yates, because they never know what might go wrong when they step behind a portable counter and begin preparing a meal on an outside grill for a growing number of fans hungry for their kind of wry wit.

Lee created "Jerry Lee's Comedy Cafe," which debuted recently on the terrace of the 19th Hole Bar and Restaurant in Henderson, where it played for three consecutive weeks on Thursday night.

The unusual act moves to Alexis Park hotel later this month for an extended run. Beginning Sept. 20 Comedy Cafe will be performed there Wednesdays through Saturdays.

The performance is primarily a cooking show laced with humor.

Just before the start of one recent show, Lee and Yates learned that the pork they had ordered for the main course had been replaced with beef. Dessert that was supposed to have been frozen resembled soup.

"The only thing we're sure of is the audience is going to have a good time and a great meal," said Lee, a chef who graduated from the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, N.Y., in the mid-70s. He has also spiced up his life with other jobs including working as a stand-up comic and radio disc jockey.

In an ideal world, Lee and his co-star would prepare a meal in a dining room full of people while cracking jokes, bantering with the audience and explaining the finer points of cuisine arts.

The food cooked on the spot would be eaten by guests closest to the makeshift kitchen and the rest of the audience would eat the same selection of food that had been prepared earlier and, on cue, brought out from the wings and served.

That's an ideal world. But ...

"Anything live and spontaneous, you never know what's going to happen," Lee said prior to the start of a recent show at the 19th Hole, for which the duo held an "Arctic Luau" to celebrate the 41st anniversary of the statehood of Hawaii and Alaska.

Lee was more prophetic than he would have liked. Five minutes before show time, he discovered his first surprise ingredient of the evening -- the portable grill on which he was to have cooked kalua pork and other delicacies was out of propane.

Even Julia Child can't cook without heat.

Sweating profusely, either from the heat (or the lack thereof) or from being in a pressure cooker created by the limelight, Lee did what all true showmen do in spite of all obstacles -- he put on a smile and put on a show.

"Someone asked, about a week ago, how we are going to do an Arctic Luau," Lee said, launching into the act as a moderately strong wind challenged the outdoor event (a week earlier it had rained, forcing the show inside). "I said I had no damn idea. After I did a little research into Alaskan cuisine, I learned you don't find an awful lot of caribou around here ... even moose is extremely hard to get in Las Vegas."

He and Yates prepared a salmon appetizer, explaining what they did as they progressed through the ingredients. When preparation of the first course of the evening was completed, Lee announced to the audience, "The wait staff will now bring out your appetizers."

Another surprise ingredient popped up: The waiters missed their cue. Ten minutes later -- time used by Lee and Yates to make a few jokes and discuss cooking with the audience -- the appetizers arrived and the 40 or so guests applauded.

"Part of the fun is that the first time they taste the food, it may be the first time for us, too," Yates said before he show.

"You can't script a show like this," Lee added. "You can't script an audience's reactions."

Yates, who also has been a disc jockey and a stand-up comic, gained an appreciation for epicurean meals while growing up in St. Louis, next door to a man who owned a restaurant. The man's wife taught Yates to cook.

"At 15, I had a job in a restaurant as a saucier (chef's assistant in charge of sauces)," he said.

The two men met while doing their stand-up comedy routines and discovered they had a mutual interest in cooking. Their goal is to one day perform their particular flavor of comedy at a Strip hotel -- and to have their own show on the Food Network (locally on Cox cable channel 42).

"The demographics and ratings show it is the fastest growing cable network," Lee said. The channel features such well-known chefs as Child, Graham Kerr and Emeril Lagasse.

"Some cooking shows are too simplistic and boring or too technical, and people don't understand what's going on," Lee said. "I want to take the mystique away and work my comedy in with it. I want to make them smile."

He said almost anybody can cook like a five-star chef.

"I don't do anything people can't do themselves when they leave our show," he said. "Five-star chefs keep their recipes secret because they are so simple and anyone can do it.

"We demonstrate in each show how to use products found on the shelves of most supermarkets across the country. With you, we will create new tastes, new flavors and new ideas about the meals we prepare."

The types of audiences for "Jerry Lee's Comedy Cafe" vary from week to week. Some are more interested in the humor, others in the food.

"One week we had a lot of 'foodies' in the crowd," Yates said. "They wanted to know some pretty technical stuff. 'Foodies' are everywhere these days."

"Foodies" have more than a passing interest in cooking.

"This is a show," Yates said, "and people are there to learn, but we don't want it to be like watching (a show on) PBS."

"Everybody is part of the act. It's like it's just a big kitchen with everyone hanging around," Lee said.

They compare their act to dinner theater, similar to murder mysteries in which audiences are part of the show.

Lee said he is not intimidated by large audiences. At the Henderson venue, they cooked for as many as 40 people. He said they will be able seat more than people at Alexis Park.

"It's easier to cook for 70 than it is for one," Lee said.

Perhaps the best part about their act is, if they don't get rich at least they won't go hungry.

archive