Johnny Iuzzini spent ten years as the executive pastry chef at four-star Jean Georges in Manhattan. He was known there for his four-part pastry and “studies” of ingredients—not to mention his tattooed arms, pompadour hairstyle (less prominent these days), and appearance in a New York Magazine portrait covered in Marshmallow Fluff.

Iuzzini developed an interest in pastry arts as a teenager when he worked at The River Café in Brooklyn, New York. Although his station was garde-manger, Iuzzini often visited the pastry kitchen. His visits turned into assistance and eventually into a full-time pastry job.

After graduating from The Culinary Institute of America, Iuzzini worked at Daniel and Payard Patisserie under François Payard, and he apprenticed for a year in France. In 2002, Iuzzini became the executive pastry chef at Jean Georges. Iuzzini took an inventive four-in-one approach to his plating there: each dessert is a tasting of four dishes that were each a different play on one ingredient.

Iuzzini was awarded "Outstanding Pastry Chef" by the James Beard Foundation in 2006 and was named one of the 10 Most Influential Pastry Chefs in America by Forbes Magazine. During the ten years that Iuzzini was at Jean Georges, the restaurant has received four stars from The New York Times as well as three Michelin stars. Iuzzini’s first cookbook Dessert Fourplay: Sweet Quartets From a Four-Star Pastry Chef was published in 2008. Additionally, he serves on the StarChefs.com Chef Advisory Board and is the head judge on the Bravo series "Top Chef: Just Desserts." In November 2011 Iuzzini announced his resignation as pastry chef at Jean Georges and desire to step away from restaurant kitchens, possibly to study gelato and chocolate, and to work on his next book.