We can't even defrost an Ellio's pizza, never mind get the foie gras right, which is why we respect cooks so much. Here are the best chefs show business has to offer.

Jack Tripper (training to be a chef), <em>Three's Company</em>- Back in the '70s, if you were a man and you liked to cook, you were gay. Which is why it was a perfect choice of profession for Jack Tripper, even though he was only PRETENDING to be gay. These days, television chefs are all hairy-knuckled oafs telling us to "kick it up a notch," or irritating Englishmen who won't shut up. But hey guys, you're not fooling anyone—we know you're wearing silk panties under those aprons.

Al, <em>Happy Days</em>- If Happy Days was anywhere close to accurate, the '50s were lame and the Fonz (tied with Dylan McKay of 90210 for the world's oldest teenager) was kinda creepy. But man, the burgers and fries that came out Arnold's Diner looked fantastic. The original owner was Pat Morita (before he left the show to become Mr. Miyagi), but when we think of Arnold's, we always think of Al, that fat greasy sad sack who reminds us of how depressing our lives could be.

Soup Nazi, <em>Seinfeld</em>- The same way that you have to be black to say the N-word, you have to be Jewish to make jokes about Nazis. It's as simple as that. Luckily for us, Seinfeld is Jewish, and thus we were given the Soup Nazi. If there has ever been a funnier "bad guy" in a comedy before, we'd haven't seen him. Ah, it seems like yesterday we were shouting at the top of our voices, "No soup for you!" to our mother when she asked us if we had any dirty clothes for the wash.

Bill Murray, Cheeseburger guy from <em>SNL</em>- You know when you say the same word over and over until you go into a walking trance and suddenly something like "Hubba Bubba" becomes the center of the known universe? Bill Murray might not have invented that, but he turned a childhood mind game into one of the funniest sketches of all time.

Jack Black, <em>Nacho Libre</em>- Either you like JB or you don't. We like Jack, because even when he's playing a tenderhearted love interest in a gag-inducing chick flick like The Holiday, he somehow makes it seem like it's all a big joke on somebody else. And considering he's a chubby dude who turned an album of crass songs about "ass fucking" into a full-blown career, maybe it is.

Steven Seagal, <em>Under Siege</em>- Jordan Tate: So who are you, like some Special Forces guy or something?
Steven Seagal: [Whispering] Just a lowly, lowly cook.
Five minutes later Seagal has kickboxed an entire crew of terrorists (seriously there was like 50 of them) into complete submission, saved the world from a nuclear attack, and made eggs Benedict with his family's secret hollandaise sauce for the captain. Now that's a fucking cook.

Jerome "Chef" McElroy, <em>South Park</em>- When you're a kid, it seems like every adult you know is some loser trying to teach you things you didn't care about. But Chef was different. Chef didn't sugarcoat the facts of life; he said things like, "You can't teach a gay dog straight tricks." And children need to know that sort of thing.

Swedish chef from <em>The Muppet Show</em>- We've always thought of the Swedish chef as a kind of folk hero that no one really understood. He was the first to play air guitar with a soup ladle, he reasoned with talking cakes, he got attacked by bandito lobsters, he blew holes in English muffins with shotguns and called them donuts. There's really only two words to describe such a man—"Bort Bort."

Matt "Guitar" Murphy, <em>The Blues Brothers</em>- When Jake and Elwood wanted to reunite the band, they knew the first guy they had to get was Matt Murphy, 'cause without him none of the other black guys would hang with their cracker asses. Matt had a major cool thing going on that white folk just don't have; his strut, his clothes, the way he said, "I once knew a hooker named Minnie Mazola." Not to mention the fact that the guy's married to Aretha Franklin. That's a whole lotta lovin'.

Artie, <em>The Sopranos</em>- They say life imitates art, but when actor John Ventimiglia got busted for DUI and cocaine possession, it was more like Artie imitating art. Outside the comforts of planet Hollywood, REAL cops, with REAL guns, WILL pull you over if you're playing "Straddle the Sidewalk" in your 2004 Jetta. But all is forgiven, Artie, because you inspired our girlfriends to make us unpronounceable but delicious shit like escarole with garlic, braciole, and pasta fazool.

Paul Sorvino, <em>Goodfellas</em>- Right after seeing Goodfellas, we tried using a razor to slice garlic so thin that it liquified in the pan. That didn't work for shit, but Paulie's advice on the culinary world, "Don't put too many onions in the sauce," and "Ah, red wine, now we can eat," are words to live by.

Luis Guzm&aacute;n, <em>Waiting</em>- Guzmán is an amazing actor who can do the straight-up cop, the bad guy, the funny guy, all without breaking a sweat. His deadbeat cook in Waiting is the best part of the movie, and you get to see Guzmán's sack in this film. Which, for many people, was worth the price of admission.

Luigi, <em>The Simpsons</em>- Luigi is the only cartoon character we know of who made the leap from a video game into an animated television series that had nothing to do with that video game. One second he's Super Mario's green-capped pal, the next he's running a snooty Italian restaurant on The Simpsons. Badda Bing! Like most restaurant owners, Luigi has come to despise the patrons who pay his bills, but that's why we love him. "Hey, Salvatore! Break out the cheap hooch for Mr. No-Tip and the dried-up-ah zombie he's-ah captured!"