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London native lands star role in national TV cooking show
(by Kristy Zurbrick, Madison Editor - February 17, 2010)
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 About The Racing Chef
Nicky Morse, 44, was born and raised in London. He attended St. Patrick School and graduated from London High School in 1984.
He completed a chef’s apprenticeship at Ziggy’s Continental, the only four-star restaurant in Columbus at the time. He went on to cook at private clubs and hotels and freelance for Country Music Television.
For the last eight years, he was the traveling chef for the Team JEGS drag racing outfit. Starting March 1, he will star in “The Racing Chef,” a national television show on the SPEED channel.
Morse lives in Marysville with his wife, Mitzi.
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For the last six years, London native Nicky Morse has chased the dream of starring in a television show about food and race cars.
During that time, Morse also has regularly visited fifth-graders at London Elementary to talk about being a chef, as well as the importance of never giving up, no matter what bumps in the road they encounter.
The next time he visits, Morse can tell students his dream has finally come true. On March 1, the first episode of “The Racing Chef” will air on SPEED, a Fox-owned cable network available in 79 million homes in the U.S. and Canada. The star: Nicky Morse.
“This came at the right time,” said Morse, who spent the last eight years as a traveling chef on the NHRA drag race circuit for Team JEGS out of Delaware, Ohio. In November, the team told Morse they weren’t taking a chef with them this season.
While he was sad to see his time with JEGS come to an end, Morse didn’t have long to wait for the next chapter of his life to begin. SPEED called, an audition was taped in North Carolina, and Morse was literally off to the races.
For “The Racing Chef,” which will air on Mondays at 10 p.m., Morse’s new home-away-from-home is the NASCAR circuit.
“NASCAR is a priority for our network,” said SPEED spokesman Erik Arneson. “Over the last few years, we’ve been looking for ways to bring in fans with support programming. Cooking shows have been a successful genre for decades. We just needed to find the right person.”
They found it in Morse.
“Nicky is colorful and brings real cooking credentials and a background in racing,” Arneson said. “He was the right fit for us.”
For the show, Morse travels the country, cooking with drivers and fans. The “kitchens” vary from drivers’ motor homes to fans’ campsites to the show’s own mobile kitchen. Morse even does shows from restaurants close to race sites, like the Cruisin’ Café in Florida, which he visited while filming at the Daytona 500 earlier this month.
“We did a shoot with driver Max Papis in his motorhome. He showed me how his mom cooks back in Italy,” Morse said. “I’ve been out with fans showing me their crazy rendition of a hamburger they make in a 30-year-old skillet at the races. Some fans are eating four-star cuisine and drinking wine and champagne... The show’s about anything NASCAR- and food-related.”
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 Photos courtesy of SPEED
Morse shoots a segment on grilling Atlantic salmon with NASCAR driver Marcos Ambrose.
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 Morse enjoys a spicy ham sandwich with NASCAR driver Kenny Wallace (left).
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 Morse makes meatball sandwiches with Miss Sprint Cup Monica Palumbo.
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 Morse hangs with his SPEED channel media crew.
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Morse said he’s having fun and working harder than he’s ever worked before. A charismatic guy, he has no problem performing in front of the camera. He did so several times in one-take spots for television news on the drag race circuit. Filming a television show, however, is a whole other beast.
It requires choreography of movement, prioritization of information to be shared, choosing the right lighting, prepping food to look good at all angles, and multiple takes. The days are long and sometimes unpredictable, he said, but never boring.
“I did a segment with driver Marcos Ambrose, who had overnighted Atlantic salmon from Tazmania and wanted to cook it on the grill,” Morse said. “I was up at 5:45 a.m. to clean the fish. The drivers are busy, and sometimes you only get a half-hour with them. So, you have to be ready. It’s a blast!”
Morse said he couldn’t launch a national television show without, of course, the crew at SPEED but also his family back home. Everyone is pitching in, starting with his wife, Mitzi.
“She’s 100 percent on board with this,” said Morse. “She’s developing the Web site, helping with PR, talking to attorneys about contractual stuff.”
Then there’s his parents, Clint and Rose Morse of London, who have done everything from blow snow out of his driveway to iron his chef’s coats so he can get out the door to travel to the next shoot.
He constantly calls his sister, Roberta Nichols, for advice. Roberta lives in Nashville where she produced a show on Country Music Television for 15 years. Her husband is vice president of creative at CMT.
Morse’s brother, Mat, who owns Spank Music & Sound Design in Chicago and writes music for TV, composed “The Racing Chef” theme song. Morse’s niece, Annie Shelton, daughter of his brother, Vincent Morse, created the show’s logo. Annie is a product developer in Cincinnati.
Morse’s other siblings, Rachel Sirca and Andy Morse, both of whom live in Marysville, are in on the project, too. Morse relies on Rachel’s Type A personality to cover technical details on everything from grammar to Web site design. Andy is the person he calls at all hours to pull off feats like designing and printing business cards in a day. The list of relatives and their support goes on.
“I couldn’t walk out the door without my family. We are tight,” he said.
Come March 1, Morse knows he can count on his family to be glued to their television sets for “The Racing Chef” debut. He hopes hometown fans, NASCAR fans and foodies are watching, too.
Stay tuned for more developments by becoming a fan of “the Racing Chef” on Facebook or visiting www.speedtv.com. Additionally, Morse will launch a Web site on March 1 at www.theracingchef.com.
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 Morse puts together a veggie plate while shooting a segment at SPEED's headquarters in North Carolina.
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