YOUNTVILLE – Michael Chiarello's voice is gone, ground to a whisper by three days of events, TV spots and a cold. It makes no difference.

He's still in full host mode – friendly, funny, energetic and hospitable. It comes easily, instinctively for him. Hosting is almost his natural state. Almost. Something else runs even deeper in his soul.

It's Sunday afternoon, and this is Chiarello Family Vineyards' harvest party. Right now, Chiarello and two dozen guests are walking through the construction zone that by December will become the arched, bright rooms of Bottega, his newest and most personal restaurant.

"Careful, don't anyone fall," he says warmly. "We don't have insurance yet."

He talks about the idea of Bottega, how he wants it comfortable and intimate, and how being part of the V Marketplace in Yountville is ideal because it was the location of Groezinger Estate, one of Napa Valley's first wineries, and later the site of a diner that drew everyone in the valley.

"I'm a romantic for stories and connections," he says, his voice croaking and sputtering. "I get so excited we'll be in a place where hospitality started in the valley. Then the first question I have to ask is, 'Do we have the parking entitlements?' "

Laughs all around. More laughs when he says, "I've been out of the restaurant business so long, I've already completed the 12-step program for cooks."

As you would expect from a TV celebrity chef, Chiarello enjoys an audience. More on point, he likes people, likes having friends, family, even strangers around to tell stories, to share food and wine, to embrace life.

His "Easy Entertaining With Michael Chiarello" on the Food Network (weekdays at 11:30 a.m.) has won three daytime Emmys. His "NapaStyle" is a solid performer for the Fine Living Network (Tuesdays at 5 a.m.).

It works in the restaurant business, too. Among other eateries, he founded Tra Vigne, one of the Napa Valley's cornerstone restaurants – and in running his six NapaStyle stores (including his newest across from the Bottega site).

You feel welcome straight away with Chiarello. He's charismatic and charming, yet he listens to people. His cheerful tales often involve an Old World accent. He laughs easily. Chiarello really is a terrific host.

But what's even more his natural state, what drives him for reasons even he doesn't entirely understand, is cooking.

That's why this immensely successful guy, this TV star, restaurateur, winery owner, entrepreneur, this family man with a beautiful Napa Valley home and a life that's the postcard for going into the food and wine business, is diving back into the hardest, riskiest part of it.

He's coming out of retirement – pulling a Brett Farve, people tell him – and putting his reputation, his money, maybe even his lifestyle on the line to open Bottega.

Put simply, Chiarello wants to cook. Not the way regular people cook, not even like the cooking on his shows. "The difference between what I do on TV and cooking in a restaurant," he said, "is the difference between T-ball and the World Series."

He's not dissing T-ball. But if you're a major-leaguer, you need to play in the majors.

Still, something else more complicated and much richer calls to him. For that, we need some back story.

In a hurry at a young age

Chiarello, 46, grew up in Turlock, the son of a farming town and a farming family. The land, the approach, the work are home to him. He started in restaurants at age 14, went to the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, N.Y., at 20, quickly opened two restaurants in Florida and at 23 was named Food & Wine Magazine's chef of the year.

At 24, he came home to California, to Napa Valley, and founded Tra Vigne. It was 1986, and the lure of wine and of Napa had not yet gripped America, but Tra Vigne resonated outside wine country.

By 2000, Tra Vigne was a Napa landmark, Chiarello had been named chef of the year by the Culinary Institute of America; he had created a baking company and an olive oil company, and opened restaurants in Aspen, Colo.; Scottsdale, Ariz.; St. Helena and San Francisco. He started Chiarello Family Vineyards on 20 acres around his valley home and was building a TV career. It was time to leave the kitchen. He sold his share of Tra Vigne.

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Call The Bee's Rick Kushman, (916) 321-1187.