A ‘Dancing With the Stars’ Pro is Becoming a Chef

Professional dancer Artem Chigvintsev is swapping his dancing shoes for an apron and a chef’s knife when he heads off to culinary school, his fiancee Nikki Bella revealed in a recent episode of “The Bellas Podcast.” Does that mean he’s leaving Dancing With the Stars? Probably not.

Here is what Bella had to say.

Bella Said He Wanted to Pursue Something He’s Passionate About

Bella told her sister Brie that the pandemic has really opened up their eyes to figuring out what they want to do with their lives.

“I feel like we’ve all talked about during this pandemic sometimes doors close, they open, we have job loss or we just are figuring out what do we want to do in life? What are our next steps? ‘Maybe what I was doing I’m not passionate about and this is what COVID and the pandemic has taught me,’” said Bella, recounting conversations she has had with Chigvintsev.

She then revealed that he’s been doing a lot of research on his computer and he finally told her it’s because he wants to enroll in culinary school.

“He’s going to be going to CIA, which is the cooking school in St. Helena. They have a downtown Napa location, I believe, but the gorgeous historic gorgeous one is in St. Helena,” said Bella.

CIA stands for the Culinary Institute of America. It has a New York campus, a San Antonio location, and two locations in the Napa area, as Bella mentioned — one at Copia in downtown Napa and one at Greystone in St. Helena, a nearby town.

Bella Always Encourages Him to Post Cooking Content to Instagram Because People Love It

The former professional wrestler went on to say that she is “always pressuring him” to have more cooking content on social media because when he posts cooking videos or photos on Instagram, “it’s mind-blowing” to her what kind of a response he gets.

“He will get minimum a thousand DMs about ‘How did you cook it? It looks amazing,” she said, adding, “Everyone loves seeing him do it, he makes amazing dishes. He wants to get back to everyone [who DMs him] but that’s a lot, right? I told him, Artem, the universe is showing you our niche. People want more cooking from you.”

His response was to say that professional chefs look at him and think he doesn’t have a clue what he’s doing, so he said to Bella, “I’m going to go to school and I’m going to get the degree.”

“I was just so proud of him. It was crazy, the turn-on, and how proud I was of him … just taking these steps in his life to do something that he doesn’t know where it will take him, but it’s something he wants to do and he’s passionate about it,” she said.

What Does This Mean For ‘Dancing With the Stars?

We don’t think Dancing With the Stars fans have to worry about Chigvintsev leaving to be a chef just yet. The shortest program at the CIA is 30 weeks and that’s for a certificate. If Chigvintsev wants a degree, he would be enrolled for years.

With Dancing With the Stars having moved to only airing in the falls, he has plenty of down time to pursue his culinary passion and still be a professional dancer on the show. But maybe when his time on Dancing With the Stars does come to an end, he could open up his own Napa restaurant or something!

Total Bellas wrapped its sixth season at the end of January and has not yet been renewed for a seventh season on E!. Dancing With the Stars will hopefully return with season 30 in 2021. ABC has not yet officially announced a renewal and premiere date.

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