New Brunswick Nurse Appears on Emeril Lagasse Cooking Show

A local woman recently had a brush with culinary greatness when she was a featured guest on "Emeril's Table," a new television cooking show starring the famed New Orleans chef Emeril Lagasse.

Bola Fadipe, 24, of New Brunswick, is a nurse with Chestnut Hill Convalescent Center in Passaic and a field nurse for a Pediatric Home Care Agency.

She also works as an undergraduate teaching assistant with the Rutgers College of Nursing, where she earned a bachelor of science degree in nursing and public health.

Fadipe, along with four other nurses from Elizabeth, Denville, Scotch Plains and Livingston were featured guests on Lagasse's program, which aired Oct. 17.

The premise of the program was that five nurses from New Jersey were invited on to cook comfort foods with Lagasse - chicken pot pie and meatloaf, to be exact.

Fadipe, who said her favorite comfort foods are fried chicken and macaroni and cheese, said the filming of the show at Chelsea Studios, located in New York City's Chelsea Market, was a lot of fun.

" I enjoyed every minute I spent at Chelsea Studios from the set-up to the shooting of the film," Fadipe said, in an email interview with New Brunswick Patch. "It was all new to me and the best feeling was that it wasn’t a dream – when I was a child I always imagined myself being on the cooking show and tasting all of the dishes."

Fadipe said that Emeril was genuinely interested in cooking, and his love for it translated into the dishes. He was the "exact person" she had watched on TV, and made sure all the nurses had a good time, she said.

"Let’s just say I did not leave a food particle behind," she said.

Fadipe said that cooking is one of her hobbies, and a good way to de-stress, dating back to her days as a Rutgers student, cooking in the kitchen of her on-campus apartment.

"I cooked many tasteful dishes in less than hour because when you’re full-time student you have to cook quickly and eat quickly. Right now, I cook on my off-work days," she said.

She even put her cooking skills to work during Hurricane Irene's visit to New Brunswick, making Lagasse's meatloaf.

"I took the recipe from his website and it was easy to follow. I already had some of the ingredients because I knew I was going to cook that meatloaf one day. I added a little more spice just so I could say BAM! The meatloaf was amazing- my family loved it."

Fadipe said the chicken pot pie will also appear on her table in the near future - she plans on making it for Christmas.

"Emeril's Table" is shown at 11 a.m. weekdays on the Hallmark Channel.

For more information on the series, and for the recipes for Lagasse's chicken pot pie and meatloaf, click here.