Things to do before you die might include meeting the President of the United States and traveling the world--but how about pulling a prank on some local television stations?
Over the holiday season, Chef Keith Guerke, author of "Leftovers Right: Making A Winner Of Last Night's Dinner," appeared on five network morning shows in Wisconsin and Illinois to promote his new cookbook on how to turn leftovers into something amazing.
During his appearances, the chef described himself as self-taught and unorthodox and would say things like, "There's a statistic that around the holidays, especially between Thanksgiving and Christmas, it's one of the highest suicide rates and I think part of that is the stress of what are you going to do with these leftovers?"
Chef Guerke's cookbook included the weirdest combinations--from mashed potato ice cream cones to smoothies that included ingredients such as gravy, ham and pieces of turkey, cranberry, and pumpkin pie
But there is one major problem with this situation: Chef Guerke is not a real chef and his recipes are just as false as his name.
According to New York Daily News, the prankster's real name is Nick Prueher, a comedian from Long Island City, Queens. The fake chef character was created by Prueher and his partner, Joe Pickett. The pair are co-founders of the Found Footage Festival, a tour that showcases strange and outrageous old home video recordings purchased at rummage sales.
Prueher said the idea to create a fake character was invented while he and his partner where appearing on shows to promote their tour. Over the holidays, they decided to try something a little different after growing bored of doing morning talk shows in every city they were touring in.
"We hated doing those TV interviews," he said. "We would get up at 6 in the morning and we would always wonder what's the point is anyone even watching this?"
Prueher said no one working at the station had any idea they were being tricked. The pair created a fake press release and a image to their fake cookbook; both were sent out to 10 television stations. Prueher said he received a response from seven stations. No website or proof was provided.
"I said he was a frequent guest on 'The Queen Latifah Show' and he owned the Milk House Café in Manhattan," he said. "No one checked any of this."
In his segments, he informed viewers the average person consumes about a pound and a half of human feces a year. Some host played along in a post-Thanksgiving segment. One station tried to promote an upcoming fake book signing.
"Some were apologetic the segment didn't go better, which was the point," Prueher said, adding that he would purposely make a mess on the set.
The comedian duo told the Daily News that they are currently working on a new character and hopes to pull off another trick next year.
"With Kenny Strasser we thought we would never do this again," he said. "But the Internet has a short memory. We have ideas for next year. There is no end in sight."
