Charles Phoenix (born December 20, 1962) is an American pop culture humorist, historian, author and chef whose work explores 1950s and 1960s kitsch and Americana.

Phoenix has appearanced as a recurring judge on the Food Network series Cake Wars and served as a frequent guest commentator on NPR and KCET.

[3][5] In 1992, Phoenix was shopping for vintage clothing when he came across a shoebox labeled "Trip Across the U.S., 1957" filled Kodachrome color slides of an unidentified family's vacation photos at numerous roadside landmarks.

[2][6] Fascinated by the vivid color depictions of the era, Phoenix began scouring thrift stores, flea markets and estate sales buying boxes of slides taken from the late 1940-1970s, amassing a sizable collection.

His first public event, entitled "God Bless Americana: The Retro Vacation Slide Show of the USA", was held at the California Map and Travel Store in Los Angeles in 1998.

Bolstered by excellent critical reviews in publications such as the Los Angeles Times Magazine, Phoenix's slide shows quickly grew into bigger and more elaborate events which started appearing all throughout Los Angeles, including at such prestigious venues as the REDCAT at the Walt Disney Concert Hall, the Egyptian Theatre, the John Anson Ford Amphitheatre and the Museum of Contemporary Art.

[19][20] His most famous creation is the Cherpumple, in which cherry, apple and pumpkin pies are baked into several different flavors of cake and then stacked together, a concoction which The Wall Street Journal dubbed "the turducken of desserts" and The Huffington Post described as "awesome and absolutely offensive all in one".

[21][22] Among some of Phoenix's other creations include "Bambrosinana", a layered fusion of banana pudding and ambrosia, "Inchezonya", a hybrid of enchilada and lasagna,[20] "Fried Cereal", a sugar-sautéed snack mix of breakfast cereals,[23] "Frosty the Cheeseball Man", a snowman constructed out of Velveeta and cream cheese which is melted into fondue, meatloafs molded into various shapes ranging from tiki heads to giant rats, numerous multi-layered cakes incorporating such ingredients as breakfast cereals, marshmallow Peeps and jelly beans, and a lighted Jell-O Christmas tree which uses an orange traffic cone for a mold and contains working Christmas lights.

[6][27] The tour, which received ample coverage from the likes of LA Weekly and the Los Angeles Times, proved so popular that it expanded from being held every few months to a regular bi-monthly engagement.

With co-author Fred E. Basten, Phoenix also contributed to 1999's Leis, Luaus, and Alohas, a similar coffee table book about Hawaii in the 1950s, and Fabulous Las Vegas in the 50s.