In Search Of Excellence - Giada DeLaurentiis: The Dark Times Made Me Strong | E21

Episode Date: June 7, 2022

In the historically male-dominated culinary industry, Emmy-award-winning TV personality, celebrity chef, and New York Times best-selling author Giada De Laurentiis has not only helped pave the way for female chefs but has also shined a spotlight on the culinary arts as a whole. Giada has always been a trailblazer: from being the first in her family to graduate from college, to being the only woman in her class at Cordon Bleu in Paris, to being the first female chef to open a restaurant on the Las Vegas Strip at The Cromwell Hotel in Las Vegas.  But along the way, Giada faced a great deal of adversity - getting bullied as a child, experiencing the devastating loss of her brother, and fighting the sexism and discrimination she faced in the culinary industry.  For Giada, these challenges only fueled her fire - with her passion, a love of great food, and tremendous amount of perseverance - she had built an empire. In this episode, Randall and Giada talk about how Giada discovered her passion while working at her grandfather’s restaurant DDL Foodshow, the cultural Italian norms that impacted her life, how she launched her career, how she overcame challenges and practiced resilience, how her time on The Today Show gave her confidence, and everything she’s learned along the way. Topics Include: - Growing up in a traditional Italian family and her experiences in childhood- Getting bullied as a child- Being the first person in her family to attend college- Applying for and attending Cordon Bleu in Paris- Starting GDL foods - Landing Everyday Italian on the Food Network - Does practice make perfect?- Sexism in the culinary industry- Being the first woman to open a restaurant on the Las Vegas Strip- Giada’s Restaurant at The Cromwell- Challenges she had to overcome- How her brother’s passing influenced her life - The three most important ingredients to success- Advice for changing eating habits - Establishing the right work / life balance - Giving back and Stand Up To Cancer- And other topics…Giada De Laurentiis is an Italian-American celebrity chef, writer, and Emmy award-winning television personality.  She was the host of Food Network's Giada at Home and has been the host or co-host of 18 television shows, and she also appears regularly as a contributor and guest co-host on NBC's Today show.  She is the founder of the catering business GDL Foods, and the founder and CEO of Giadzy.com, an e-commerce platform which sells culinary goods and contains recipes, entertaining, and travel tips.  Giada is also the author of nine cookbooks including the #1 New York Times Best-Seller Eat Better, Feel Better.Resources Mentioned: Giada’s WebsiteGiada’s BooksGiada’s RestaurantsSponsors:Sandee | Bliss: BeachesWant to Connect? Reach out to us online!Website | Instagram | LinkedIn

I was lonely, I was so sad and depressed, and I was all alone, and I didn't know anybody, and I didn't speak French, and the school was all in French. I wanted to come home every single day, and thank God I didn't. It made me so much more resilient, and I don't think I could have done

all that I've done so far in my life had I not had that experience and gone through that darkness to get to the other side of it. Welcome to In Search of Excellence, which is about our quest for greatness and our desire to be the very best we can be, to learn, educate, and motivate ourselves to live up to our highest potential. It's about planning for excellence and how we achieve excellence through incredibly hard work, dedication, and perseverance. It's about believing in ourselves and the ability to

overcome the many obstacles we all face on our way there. Achieving excellence is our goal, and it's never easy to do. We all have different backgrounds, personalities, and surroundings, and we all have different routes on how we hope and want to get there. My guest today is Giada De Laurentiis. Giada is an award-winning celebrity chef and culinary icon. She has been a television star on the Food Network for 19 years, where she has been the host or co-host of 16 different shows, including Giada at Home, Giada in Italy, and Food Network Star. She has won two Daytime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Lifestyle Host and Outstanding Culinary Series, and has also won the Gracie Award for Best Television

Host. She is the founder of the successful catering business GDL Foods, and is also won the Gracie Award for Best Television Host. She is the founder of the successful catering business, GDL Foods, and is also the founder of Giazzi.com, which for five years has sold cooking products that feature recipes found on our website. Giada is a regular contributor and guest co-host on NBC's Today Show, and is the best-selling author of nine cookbooks, including the New York Times' number one bestseller, Eat Better, Feel Better. Giada, it's an incredible pleasure to have you on my show. Welcome to In Search of Excellence. Thank you, Randy. Wow, I'm exhausted.

You've done a lot. We're going to get through it all. I always start my podcast with our family because from the moment we're born, our family helps shape our personality, our values, and the preparation for our future. You were born and roamed into a high-profile family in the entertainment business. Your mom, Veronica, was an actress, and your dad, Alex, was an actor and producer. Your parents got divorced when you were eight years old, and you moved with your mom to Beverly Hills and grew up there. We're going to talk about your grandfather in a minute, but I want to start with your parents. What kind of values do they instill in you? And what kind of influence did they have both growing up and as an adult? My dad was not an actor. I know there's a lot of misinformation that people find. He was a producer. My mom was a, she acted, I think,

in one or two things when she was young, and they met very young. So their values were sort of their parents' values. I think for my mother, I think she struggled. She was 19 at the time when she met my dad. She had just done a movie. Her mother was a very big actress at the time all over Europe. And her father was very famous as well. And she was the eldest of four kids at the time. And she had been moved around a lot as a kid.

So she wanted some grounding. And so we come from a big Italian family. And I think she loved being with her family. She loved just traveling with her mother and spending time with her dad and watching them work. And I think she was super inspired by that. And I think she also craved going out on her own. You know, my family really kept, especially in those days, because there was such turmoil with famous families all over Europe, but really in Italy. We know many stories about kidnappings and all sorts of stuff. And so my family was a very tight knit. And my grandparents were very strict in the sense that my mom, even as an older teenager, wasn't really allowed to

do much without them. And she wasn't much of a rebel. She kind of followed the rules. And I think family was probably the biggest and most important thing in her life. And my dad's life was a little different. He went to boarding school most of his life. He didn't know his parents that well, but he did come from a pretty well-to-do family. And my parents getting together was not something that my grandparents were fans of. So I think for my mom, it was the rebel in her at that point that came out,

even though she loved her family so much. So we stayed close to the family, to my mom's family forever, really, and even moved to the States with them. So I would say family is number one on that list of values. Let's talk about your early childhood and the difficult start you had after moving here when you were eight years old. You didn't speak a word of English and the kids at school bullied you. They tormented you, made fun of you, and called you

names. And to make matters worse, your teachers really didn't stop what they were doing. Bullying wasn't a topic that people talked about back then. And even though it is now, it remains a serious problem. Here are some depressing stats about bullying. One out of every five students in the United States is a victim of bullying, over 3.2 million students. Of these, approximately 160,000 teenagers skip school every day because of bullying. Similar to your experience, only one in four teachers sees nothing wrong with it. And when they do see it, they will intervene only 4% of the time. Students who experience bullying are at increased risk for depression, anxiety, sleep difficulties, lower academic achievement, dropping out of school, violence, and suicide.

We're going to talk about your grandfather and your introduction to cooking in a minute. But before we do, can you tell us about Jabba the Hutt and Star Wars and the effect that being bullied when you were eight years old had on your path to excellence and on your future? Yeah, it was rough coming here. I will admit it was rough. I think partly we just lived in a different day. I mean, I moved here in the late 70s. It was a different time in this country than it is today. Thank goodness. I also think that, you know, my family, they really truly believed that the family stuck together and they didn't do the greatest job at assimilating. They really wanted us to speak Italian at all times. They wanted us to eat Italian food at all times. There was no like,

well, let's try going to McDonald's and seeing what a hamburger's like, or let's try to give Jada something other than a Nutella sandwich or pasta for lunch, which no kid did that when I was a kid. And it seems strange talking about it now because things have changed so dramatically, but I guess the stats are still there. So maybe they have, maybe they haven't. They get bullied for different reasons. My mother also insisted on cutting my hair short. So I always had really short hair. I know you smile, but as a girl, it was really hard. It was really hard. My mom truly believed in old wives tale, which was if I cut her hair short, she'll grow up and have these beautiful locks. Well, we all know that's not true. So she was slightly naive, I think, at that point too. And I think that made it very

difficult for me because kids would tease me about whether I was a boy or a girl. I had obviously a very different name, which by the way, I really disdained most of my life. And only in my later years have I accepted my name and can actually hear people calling me that. So I think it was a factor of all those things that made me stick out. And I ate lunch alone. I got teased for my food. And yes, teachers didn't really say anything, but I don't blame them. I think they just didn't know any better. And maybe they didn't even know how to talk to me or communicate with me. And I think that's really what it was all about. But I will say this, it definitely gave me the drive to succeed and to show them all that I

wasn't all those things. And they called me Jabba the Hutt because Jabba the Hutt was a very popular character in Star Wars in those days and just happened to work very closely to my name. And so they just figured, well, I can't say her name, so I'm just going to describe her as this unattractive, very large animal thing in Star Wars, which was very popular at the time. And I think that for me, I didn't know where I belonged. It was very difficult for me to figure out who I was and what my identity was. So I think that's why I threw myself into food and cooking. Two things there. Your name means Jade, which is my fourth daughter's middle name, Carter Jade. And I stuttered as a kid and was badly bullied from the time I could speak through high school.

It was brutal. I'd come home crying every day to my mom. I sat alone many days, many years. Kids made fun of me. Teachers did do something to stop it, but it wasn't a lot. But similar to you, it gave me a tremendous amount of drive to succeed. And working hard to overcome my stutter was one of the best things that has happened to me. So I sympathize with what you went through. It does make you stronger and it does create drive. Let's talk about your grandfather, the biggest part of your childhood. And I want to give everyone a little bit of family history here. Your maternal grandfather was named Dino De Laurentiis. He was a very famous, incredibly successful Academy Award

nominated movie producer who produced more than 600 films in 60 years, including Serpico, which was released in 1973 and starred Al Pacino, and Conan the Barbarian, which was released in 1982 and starred Arnold Schwarzenegger. Your grandfather's father, your great-grandfather, owned a pasta factory outside of Naples where they made pasta and sauces. Your grandfather and his seven siblings would go to door-to-door selling them when he was a young child. It wasn't the kind of factory that makes cars in Detroit. As you have said, it was a building where they lived in part of it and made pasta in the other part. And when they finished making the pasta, they hung it on the roof to dry on clotheslines. His experience in making the pasta and selling it stuck with your grandfather. And after he became a successful

movie producer, he opened up a gourmet grocery store called DDL Food Show. You were 12 years old when it opened, and you'd go there after school and spent a ton of time there. Can you give us the details about what you did there, how often you went, and how important this learning experience was to your future, and is having a passion for something at such a young age important on our path to excellence. Yes. So I was 12 years old when my grandfather opened DDL Food Show, one in Los Angeles and one in New York. It was definitely his passion. He loved making movies, but he loved food even more. And I guess it kind of ties back to family. And that's what ties us all together. I went pretty much almost every day after school. And I think the thing that I was so drawn to was just actually the customers coming in and seeing this massive space with all different sort of stands, very similar to what Italy has today, where you get bread at one section and you get pasta at another, and then you'd have a butcher and that's how it would work. And also the fact that my grandfather brought all of his friends

from Italy that he grew up with, pizzaiolos and butchers and everybody you can imagine. He actually imported them and moved them to Los Angeles and to New York. And I think it was just the energy of these Neapolitans there, the fact that they spoke broken English, but it was just so sensual and it was so romantic. And I think customers would walk in and feel like they were transported to Italy somehow. And there was such a light in people's eyes and their mouths would just drop with amazement. And I think, and the food and the aromas that were coming out of that place. And I think it was a combination of all those things

that I realized, whatever I do, I wanna be around this. A combination of everything, not just the food, but even the people and the excitement that they had and the shock and awe and wonder that was coming out of them. And I think that I was attracted to all of that somehow. And so I would just do whatever it took, but take out the trash, hand people things, ring them up,

whatever I could do because I was a kid, I would do so I could hang out there. And it was pretty impressive. And I watched my grandfather when he would be there, when he was there just kind of talking to everybody and shaking hands and being very personable. I was not very personable at that age. I was very, very shy, but I loved watching it. I think it's one of those moments in your life where I realized somehow this is the world I want to be in and I'm going to make that happen. But I don't know that I knew anything more than that. Let's move on to education, which I think is one of the most important

ingredients to our future success. You went to high school at Marymount High in Los Angeles, and then you went to UCLA where you got a BA in social anthropology. You were the first person in your family to go to college, which was a little rough for you because back then when you came from an Italian family, the tradition was that they liked the men to be the ones to go to college, which was a little rough for you, because back then when you came from an Italian family, the tradition was that they liked the men to be the ones to go to college. Your grandfather used to say to you, why don't you just get married and have kids? Those were the cultural norms at the time, and they've changed a lot, obviously, in the last 30 years. And even though you came from a wealthy family, you paid for college yourself. When you graduated, no one made a big deal out of your accomplishment, despite how

monumental it was. We're going to talk about what you did after you graduated UCLA in a minute. But before we do, can you tell us how important education is, as well as what we study in college, to our future success? And is what we learn outside the classroom as important or more important than what we learn inside the classroom? Yeah, it's a good question. I come from a family who didn't really value education. My grandfather only finished, I think, eighth grade. He really didn't even go to high school. He joined the army for World War II, so he never really went. And he became a giant international success. My grandmother didn't really, I think she went to high school. Yeah, she did, but no college. And she became a giant international success. And so didn't really, I think she went to high school. Yeah, she did, but no college.

And she became a giant international success. And so I think for them, they didn't really see the value in it. It was just the cultural norm of where my grandfather came from and the world he came from. Europe just didn't push kids to go to college. All over Europe. It wasn't just Italy. I think they just didn't see it that way. But I felt like I was the eldest of the four kids of my siblings. And I felt that without an education, I wasn't sure there was much more for me to do. And honestly, Randall, I admired my Aunt Raffi so much. And she did go to a little bit of architecture school and she worked hard. She didn't have any kids. But I realized I want to be something. I want to do something. And I don't want to rely on my family for money. I want to make something of myself and I want to be dependent

on myself. And I think that drove me to fight to go to college. And it wasn't that they were against it. They didn't see the value in it. And so for them, I didn't even want to ask them to pay for it because I already knew that I had a younger brother, two years younger. And I knew that for them, they would think, well, no, your brother go to college, but you don't need to go to college. So I didn't even want to approach the subject. I never did. I just took a loan out. I filled out the paperwork because I was a little older because moving here loan out. I filled out the paperwork because I was a little older because moving here, I missed a couple of years. So I was always the eldest in my class and I was able to get a loan on my own. And so I never even explained it to them. And it was only years

later that they asked me, how'd you pay for that? So I explained it. But even that to them was, they didn't understand. How do you get the government to pay for it? It just doesn't exist in Europe. It does now, but not at the time. And so I would say that I loved going to college. I really did. I felt like I gained a lot of independence going there and I had time to figure out, did I really want to pursue cooking or was there something else I was interested in? I also got to meet a lot of people and I had so many opportunities that just helped me sort of grow as a person. And for me, especially being so close to my family, I felt like I needed somehow to be able to detach from them. And college gave me the opportunity to really do that.

I do think that the experiences outside of college are just as important as what you experience when you're studying. It really helps a lot of people focus on maybe what they'd like to do, meet people that really influence the rest of their lives, and just learn so much about yourself. You really grow and learn about yourself for the first time in your life. And that is an experience I think everybody should have. It should be their right to have it. I agree. I learned probably more outside the classroom. I was an entrepreneur. I sold t-shirts. I did well academically. I grew up not wealthy, was raised by a single mom, and really wanted to make money. So for me, education was the path out, and it gives you

a stepping stone for whatever else you do. Speaking of what you did next, when you graduated, your family tried very hard to get you to work in the entertainment business. Your grandfather and Aunt Raffi were producing a movie at the time, and they had you work on the set of various roles, from costume design to set design. And then you were given a small role in one of your aunt's films, but you didn't like that either. In fact, you hated being in front of the camera, and you hated everything about being on a movie set other than the catering truck, which you thought was interesting and wondered how they did so much from such a little truck. Despite their efforts, you were determined to set your own path. You decided to go to the prestigious and world famous 125-year-old Cordon Bleu cooking school in Paris. We had aspirations of becoming a pastry chef.

You're also the only woman in your class, and similar to college, you put yourself through and paid for cooking school. Can you tell us about throwing pots and rolling pins and the burns all over your arms and how important it is not to quit when the going gets rough. And can you tell us how important it is to pursue your own path in life despite family or other outside pressures who want you to do something else? Yes, my family thought I was nuts when I said I was going to move to Paris and go to cooking school. Again, cultural norms. My grandfather felt that I was too little and I was a female and that it just wasn't the place for me. And why would I ever want to be in a kitchen? He was like, that's not a

place for a woman and it's not a place for you. And you can't lift heavy pots. That was in his mind all the time. You cannot lift heavy pots. What in the heck are you doing there? Then when he wrapped his mind around the fact that I wanted to cook, he then switched and said, well, then forget Paris. That's old news. And you go to China and you learn to make Chinese food. China is the future. And I was like, and I kept saying to him, I don't want to go to China and I don't want to learn to cook Chinese food. And do I even look like someone who could possibly have anything to do with Chinese food? No one would even believe it. So I think that they were just confused by the whole thing. I think they also, I was the first grandchild. So I think for them, it's like the

first child who kind of grows up in America and starts to open their mind to what the possibilities are here and what people value here. And they just had a really hard time accepting that I wouldn't follow the traditional norms. At the same time, interestingly, I wasn't a boy. So it was okay if I was going to go off the rails. They were like, oh, let's just see what she does. It doesn't matter. Whatever she does, she does, and it won't really matter. So expectations were low being a female. So that helped me out. And I was able to do a lot of these things. But yes, I had to do a lot of them on my own terms and figure it out on my own. I will say Paris was rough. I thought it would be easier because I spoke Italian and French and Italian are so close. It was not easy. I was lonely. I was so sad and depressed. I realized the weather in France is just horrible during the winter. And I didn't realize how much I love the sunny California sunshine that I somehow was getting a lot of energy from that. And I was all alone and I didn't know anybody and I didn't speak French and the school was all in French. So it was very rough for, I'd say, nine months of it. I wanted to come home every

single day. And thank God I didn't, because I think it made me so much more resilient. And I don't think I could have done all that I've done so far in my life had I not had that experience and gone through that darkness to get to the other side of it. But it was rough. It was really, really rough. Until nine months in, I started getting friends and I realized how to get through the classes and I learned to speak French. And I got over the loneliness because I got a group of friends, but that was a giant leap. People were throwing pots and rolling pins at you? Well, in France. You had burns over your arms? You lost 10 pounds?

I lost 10 pounds because I was so depressed. Crazy though. The second year, I gained 10 pounds and then some with all the croissants I was eating. But cooking school in Europe at that time, I'm not saying it's like that anymore. But at that time, you have to think that the chefs that cook there basically dealt with a lot of abuse growing up. And they all worked in restaurant kitchens, and restaurant kitchens were horrible places. They just were. And they usually employed, if they even employed them, young children from families that didn't have a lot of money. So it was sort of a white-collar job, and a lot of people just sent their kids there. So they dealt with a lot of abuse. So they turned around and went to these cooking schools to teach,

and were very unhappy people and just thought, oh, these people are paying for this. Okay, we're going to show them what it's about. And you know, they were rough around the women. There were other women in my classes, but they were definitely tough on us, really tough. And yes, they would throw things at us, sauce, whatever. I had burns. But I think honestly, Randall, that having dealt with all the bullying that I dealt with when I was young, I just kind of got through it. I was, yeah, I cried a lot and I was upset, but I kind of just felt like that's just the way things are. When you go through it as a young child, you sort of just expect that those are the bumps in the road that you're going to have to deal with as you grow up. So I dealt with it. I wasn't proud of it, but I just dealt with it. And I got through it. And I think that experience definitely made me more resilient

than I could have ever been in this life. You graduated. You've moved back to LA where you worked for a few different French chefs in mostly menial positions. But you also worked at two prestigious restaurants, the Ritz-Carlton Fine Dining Room and Spago, which was owned by the world-famous chef Wolfgang Puck. Spago was the

big one. It launched your career because having it on your resume helped you get jobs as a private chef. We're going to talk about your private chef experiences in a minute, but before we do, can you tell us how you got those jobs, how hard it was to land them, how much preparation you did for them, and what the interviews were like? Yeah, they were all tough jobs to land. I think the Ritz-Carlton was a little bit easier than landing Spago because it was a union job. So they have to hire a certain amount of people. It was just a little easier. And I got paid more, which was nice.

And I got to work for a French chef. So I could continue to speak French, which was really important to me, to continue sort of that whole rhythm of cooking and that whole cultural sort of feel. I still cooked French food. It felt like it was just an extension of what I was doing in France, which I really wanted to do. Because in my mind, I was going to be an executive chef at a French restaurant too at the time. So I really liked that. And I loved the camaraderie. I loved working in the different departments. When you work in a hotel like that, there's so many different departments

you can move around in, which in a restaurant, you're a little more limited to certain areas. And there were a lot of different people there. I had a lot of fun bouncing ideas off of people, cooking with people. It was just fun. Getting a job at Spago was very difficult.

It was very competitive. Everybody wanted to work there. And so that made it really hard. So I became friendly with the pastry chef. I really wanted to do pastries. Originally, I went to Paris because I wanted to be a pastry chef. I love desserts. I love sugar. But I realized, you know, you should do savory and you should do pastries. And so at Ritz-Carlton, I worked in the fine dining room on the line, on the savory line. I didn't do any desserts. There was never a position there for desserts or for pastries.

So I became friends with Sherry Yard, who was Wolfgang's right hand when it came to pastries. And over time, I fostered that relationship. And little by little by little, she called me one day and she's like, we have a position. It's very entry level. You will make, I think I made $4.80 an hour, which is nothing, especially when you're trying to make your own living. And she said, but you could work your way up. So I left the Ritz and I just ran over there because to me, that was

a career changer. I felt like if I had that on my resume, I could really, really start to build a business for myself. And so I worked there for a long while, a couple of years actually, but it seemed like it was like probably 10. It was a rough schedule. You work 16, 17 hour days. You basically get home at like one in the morning after closing because pastries, you're always the last one out, right? Because desserts close out the dinner. And I'd go back to work at around 11. So I had a really strange schedule that was rough for me. And you work all the weekends, you work all the holidays. It's a difficult job. But I learned so much. And I worked my way up in the pastry department. And I just loved the energy.

Wolfgang brought a wonderful energy to the room anytime he entered it. And I watched him taste food on the line. I watched him mingle with the guests. I learned a lot about how to become a persona in a way. I think I learned a lot of that there from my grandfather, but also from watching Wolfgang in the dining room. So that was rough, but it did help me to start my own catering business after that, where I felt like it was a good time to transition. You worked as a private chef for a few people, including Ron Howard. Your family knew him. He produced a lot of movies.

Many people know Apollo 13 and A Beautiful Mind, which in 2002 earned him Oscars for Best Director and Best Picture. He had moved to LA with his four kids and his wife. He needed a chef for a year. You loved that job. While you were doing that, you started your catering company, GDL Foods. It was a lot more lucrative than being a private chef.

You developed a really thriving business doing that. Then once you had a successful catering business, you were a little bit bored because you had gone to this amazing and prestigious culinary school in Paris. You were making fried chicken every night and you wanted to do something more creative. You had a friend who was a food stylist in LA who said to you, it doesn't pay very much, but if you feel like it on the weekends, you can do these photo shoots with me. Your friend would do photo shoots for Martha Stewart Living and Food & Wine and some other magazines. And you started helping your friend as an assistant just for fun. 9-11 happened. The world changed. Before then, people were going out to dinner, which was the social way of enjoying food and family and friends. But after 9-11, people wanted to eat at home.

Can you tell us about the food and wine family-themed issue after 9-11, lunch with your family, your grandfather getting the Lifetime Achievement Award at the Oscars, and then the call you received from an executive named Bob Tushman, who worked at the Food Network, which was then a fledgling cable network at the time? Yeah, that was a giant turning point. So yes, I loved working for Ron and I loved working for many of the clients that I had. I think for me, it's just that, like you said, I'd gone to a prestigious school and I'd honed my craft and I felt like I could create such beautiful food and with intricate sort of style. And I just felt like all I was doing was making just pot pies, fried chicken, or healthy food that didn't have a lot of fat and blah, blah, blah, which makes sense for people who are eating every day. I mean,

I was cooking for the entire Howard family and they all ate a little bit differently. A lot of them were constantly watching what they ate, which makes sense, but kind of becomes boring for someone like myself. I'm more artistic than that. I felt like I was losing all of my techniques and all my ability to create art, in other words. When this friend of mine called me, who was a pretty big food stylist at the time, I just thought, well, I could learn something and I could be more creative and I could be more artistic. So yeah, I started for very little money doing it on the weekends. I had a lot of fun. I felt like I was being creative again and I felt like, oh, my soul was getting fed. And so I did that for a hot second. And then I got to meet a lot of creative directors of these magazines. And so when 9-11 hit, these magazines, one of the creative directors who I was friendly with reached out to me and she said, you know, we were thinking of doing a whole spread in the upcoming magazine about family and food. We really feel like this is changing the dynamics of how people entertain and spend

time with their family. I thought, okay, I can do that. That's exciting. Maybe this will launch my career into food styling, which I really liked. I really, really liked it. So I created a menu that was very simple. And because I was the only chef they asked that had more of a Hollywood background, they asked me about my grandfather. And so I told them, yeah, he's getting a Lifetime Achievement Award. So we thought, oh, wouldn't it be nice to do a whole luncheon, a De Laurentiis luncheon, so family style. And that's pretty much how it happened. And I created these recipes and I got my favorite photographer who I'd worked with for a while and to come help me style a little bit. And we all put it together. And my family, it was really awesome. And that magazine, after being on, I think it stands for a day,

I immediately got a phone call from Bob Tishman. And I honestly didn't even believe, I didn't even know what Food Network was at the time. The only cooking shows I'd watched were on PBS. Those are the only cooking shows I knew. So I didn't even understand what this phone call was about. I was like, is this a scam? Is someone trying to scam me?

So it took Bob Tushman a few phone calls to sort of get my attention and for me to do a little due diligence and figure out he was legit. And his whole idea was that they were looking for people who could inspire home cooks. And Italian was a very big market for them. And although they had at the time Mario Batali,

Mario was very chefy and he spoke that language and they wanted someone that was a little more family oriented and they could do more simple recipes. And he liked the recipes and he liked the family angles. So he asked me to put myself on tape and do a little demo, which took me about six months to do because I was busy with my catering business. And honestly, I did the acting thing for my family years prior and I did get that. And I was like, I'm not going to like it business. And honestly, I did the acting thing for my family years prior, and I did get that. And I was like, I'm not going to like it now. So why would I want to do that? And there wasn't really, I made way more money catering and private chefing than I did doing

television. So I was like, this is a waste of my time. Anyhow, my brother who has since passed convinced me because he was doing movies with my aunt and he convinced me, hey, how about I just follow you around with a camera and we'll go to the grocery store, we'll do all the mundane things and see if we can get you comfortable enough to put something together. And he did, bless his heart, he did. And it made me comfortable being with him.

And so I put this demo reel together, we put music on it and I went to the farmer's market and I tried to make it very cinematic. That was my whole thought. I was like, if I'm gonna do this, it's gonna be cinematic, which nobody else does. And we did it. And I went to the farmer's market and I tried to make it very cinematic. That was my whole thought. I was like, if I'm going to do this, it's going to be cinematic, which nobody else does. And we did it. And I landed Everyday Italian. And it took me a couple seasons to get comfortable. Definitely it was a difficult and rocky road, but the rest, I guess, is history, as they would say. Let's talk about the rough beginning for a minute. When the program first aired, the network received mail that accused them of hiring a model or actress who was pretending to

be a chef instead of being a real chef. You were naturally shy, which is shocking. It took some time for you to get comfortable in front of the cameras, but you did. You became a fan favorite. You were also very insecure about what you were doing, and you got over that too. It was 19 years ago, and since then, you've been the host or co-host of 16 different shows and are also a co-host of the nation's number one morning show. Does practice make perfect? And what's your advice to the millions of people who are shy and think that being shy is hurting their careers? And what's your advice on how they should get over it? And for those working who are insecure about what they're doing, how should they get over their insecurity? I mean, practice for sure made me

10 times bigger and better than I ever could have been. I think you got to stick to it. I would also say that doing the Today Show live was a game changer. It scared the living bejesus out of me. I would have the worst stomach aches in the mornings going there, and I felt like I would vomit, honestly. I was so incredibly nervous doing that show. But live television changed my life. It just did because I learned to be comfortable and secure, and I sort of controlled my domain. And I was able to really learn how to manage that camera and how to manage that time and be quick, like really quick on my feet, quick thinking, all of it. Because when you're in live television, it's difficult to stick to a script. And if you make a mistake, oh, well, that's just the way it goes. There is no

redos. I have to say that that experience on the Today Show just changed my entire trajectory. I became so confident in what I did. And I would also say that the people around me really helped as well. And yes, was I insecure about what I could do or what my potential was? Sure. I've always said there's millions of chefs that are probably way more talented than I am, but it's almost that mix you need to have where you're talented, but you're also accessible, and you can teach. Because that's really, at the end of the day, my job is to teach people, right? And you have to be passionate. And I'm certainly passionate about my family and my culture and where I come from. And I think it's the mix of all of that that creates a force. And I think that along the way,

I had some great teachers and places that really helped foster that in me. And I'd say for anybody who is shy or feels that they haven't mastered it, you just got to keep going. You got to keep doing it. And the more you do it, the more comfortable you get. And talking in the mirror really helped me as well. I know that sounds really cheesy and corny, but talking in the mirror and watching the way that you react, because how do I know that? When I'm looking at a black circle on a camera, I don't know the way I look and I don't know how I speak. And I think that really helps to practice in the mirror. It might seem weird, but it really helps. At least it helped me. I do a ton of coaching. We have an internship program. We have 36 students every summer.

We teach a lot about the intangible as much as the tangibles. I think that many times the intangibles are more important than the tangibles. And I tell everyone practice in front of the mirror. We're going to talk about preparation in a few minutes, but I want to switch gears and talk about sexism. It's rampant in the American workforce. It's also rampant in the male-dominated food industry. As of December 2021, there were 145,115 chefs currently employed in the United States. Of these, 25.8% are women, while 70.3% are men. In the United Kingdom, only 18.5% of over 250,000 professional chefs are women. And we'll start by talking about your first restaurant named Giada, which opened in July

2014 at the Cromwell, which was the first ever boutique hotel on the Las Vegas Strip. More important than the location was the fact that you were the first woman to have her own restaurant on the Las Vegas Strip. There's a common perception among female chefs about how their likability with their peers and the public impacts their professional lives. On the flip side, the same has not been true of men where bad behavior has been accepted for long periods of time. In the last couple of years, we've seen exposés that reveal cultures of ridiculous harassment, and in some cases, sexual misconduct by famous chefs like John Bash and Mario Batali, who have gotten away with this behavior for decades. People have given a lot of reason for the culture and the sexism in the restaurant business and for female chefs. People who work

in the industry have said that they don't feel like a woman can handle the pressure, and that's why it's a boys' club and why they don't let women in. You've made it as a pioneer. You're incredibly likable. You have a great outgoing personality. You have an incredible smile and you're incredibly beautiful. You're in the 1% of 1% of 1%. What's your advice to women who want to succeed in business or in any business where sexism is rampant? And how does chess, monopoly, and politics play a factor in their success? Yes, this is a very complicated question. I think, unfortunately, yes, it is perceived that women can't handle the stress for some ridiculous reason, as if, because who's having kids in this world

and who's raising these children? And isn't that the biggest job that anybody could have? And most men, if you give them the same chance or opportunity, they wouldn't be able to handle it. So I think it's such a giant misconception. I think it's rampant in probably every single profession in the world, really. I think that we still, as women, are seen

as weaker. I don't know. I think it's gotten better over the years, but it's still something that women fight, that women have to fight on a regular basis. I also think that they make it seem a little bit like if you make it to that top tier as a woman, you're probably going to be the only one up there because there's no room for any others, which isn't true either. And I think we have to believe in ourselves as women and we have to fight. Now, having said that, it is a delicate game. I will say that. And it is, I think what you said about playing a chess game and being very careful about your moves, it's very methodical. The chess game that you have to play in most professions in this country as a female to sort of jockey your way to see

when you can kind of be at the same level as a man is a tricky game. I never had any intentions of any of these things happening. I never planned it because people ask me that all the time. If I had a strategy and if I followed my strategy and And I said, I didn't have a strategy. I kind of just went on an adventure and I went to see where the adventure would lead me, always believing that I wanted to make my family proud and I didn't want to somehow tarnish their name. That is something my grandfather sort of instilled in me quite early on in my careers. Please, I have created a very iconic name. Do not disrespect it in any way in whatever you choose to do. So that has always been in the back of my mind. So I've made decisions mostly based on what would make my grandfather proud. And I try not to make decisions based on money because most of them never turn

out well. And I am a bit of a risk taker. I think opening Jada in Las Vegas and being given that opportunity, I was scared to take that opportunity. I built that restaurant from scratch. You can ask many male chefs on the strip if they've built their spaces from scratch. And I will tell you that they will say no, because that opportunity doesn't come around very often. So I think it was sort of a rare gift from the universe that I was given at that time to do that restaurant. And it was a giant leap of faith, absolutely. And there were definitely people who thought I was nuts,

that they thought for sure I'd never make it. And you know what, Randall, there were times where I didn't think I'd make it. I mean, I got divorced after I built that restaurant. So it was definitely taxing. It definitely took a toll on me and my family, but I think it changed my trajectory again. I think it really threw me into a pool of male chefs that I would never have been considered a part of. And it gave me such respect. I think all of a sudden they really, really respected me. And I'm not sure, Randall, I could have gotten

that in any other way, especially because of the way I look and that I came from TV. I mean, most chefs don't open restaurants after being on TV. It's the reverse. They go on TV after opening restaurants for like 20 years. And so I think that everybody watched to see what was going to happen. And I think there were people who were rooting for me and people who just, they weren't. And my goal was to prove them wrong. And I did something a little bit different than what you find on the strip. And I think that was sort of the magic of why Jada to this day, eight years later, is still super popular.

Congrats on that. I think that's amazing. I want to switch gears again, and I want to talk about the challenges we all have to overcome on our path to excellence. And I want to talk about a few of your challenges. We'll start with one of your first catering jobs out of school. You were cooking Thanksgiving dinner at a client's home and tripped over their dog after you had put the turkey on the platter. The turkey hit the floor and the dog got it before you did. No more turkey for Thanksgiving, only lots of sides. You whipped up some pasta quickly, take place of the turkey. That problem was solved. Then there was some

criticism after you opened your restaurant, a few negative reviews. You spent two days bawling your eyes out after that. On May 10th, 2007, you went on Ellen Show, and you were teaching her and Nicole Kidman how to cook some of your favorite and most popular recipes. And then things got a little catty between you and Nicole while you were making focaccia. When she bit into it, the pre-made focaccia would have been sitting there for a very long time, wasn't fresh. Nicole called it tough and spit it out. Then there was the first time you appeared live on the Today Show when Matt Lauer spit out your food after taking a bite of your seared chicken, which was meant only for appearances and not to be eaten because it wasn't cooked through. These are minor challenges.

But right as your career was taking off as a celebrity chef, your younger brother Dino died after a short battle with melanoma in 2003. You were extremely close to him. The two of you talked three times a day. He was the person you turned to for everything good and bad. Can you tell us how you overcame this personal tragedy and how you've used your brother's death to give advice to others about their health? And on our path to excellence, what's your advice to others how to overcome negativity

and challenges we all face in our careers? I think that for me, all of those moments that you just described, I know they don't seem crazy at this point, but when you're in it, it feels like your career is just over. They were just horrifying at the time. I think that each one of those experiences made me stronger once again. And I think that we get tested in our lives. We just do. It's not always an uphill battle, even if, I mean, an uphill road, even if it looks like it is. I think sometimes we have, we sort of misjudge what we see because especially with social media these days, we only post the, you know, the great things, but there's so many down moments for all of us. And I think sometimes we forget that,

our perspective sort of changes. I think that all of us. And I think sometimes we forget that, our perspective sort of changes. I think that all of those moments you described made me stronger and made me more determined and to who I am. I think my brother's death was probably the hardest by far. I think when you lose a sibling that you're so close to at when he's, I mean, he had just barely turned 30. It shocked my life. It just, I couldn't believe that that would actually or could actually happen. And a piece of me died, I think, with him. But I will say that I promised myself that he didn't have the opportunity to see his goals and his dreams come true, and that I was going to make sure that I would do it for the two of us or for the both of us.

I would spread the message of what melanoma can actually do to you and what the sun can actually do to you. And also I worked harder than ever. I just did. I was like, I am going to become incredibly successful for my brother's sake. I'm not going to let his death go in vain. I'm going to just sort of somehow propel myself and use that platform also to help others realize that wellness starts from a very young age and that we have to really pay attention, pay close attention to who you are and how your body works. I think that's been my goal and it probably will be my goal till the day I pass. And the one thing I look forward to when I do go is that I get to hang out with him again. That's the best part of all of this. I want to talk about success now and start with one of the highlights of your career.

In 2001, you catered a huge high-profile charity event for Prince William and the Duchess of Cambridge with hundreds of people in royalty there. You had no idea they were coming and you were seen on TV checking every single plate before they left the kitchen. Hundreds of plates. You killed it that day. Everybody loved your food. How important has preparation been to your success?

And going a step further, how important is extreme preparation, going way above and beyond what would normally be considered great preparation? I'm talking about the kind of preparation that you spend 30 or 40 hours on for a single event or meeting. I am incredibly type A.

I prepare for everything. I am over the top. If you ask people who work with me or people who work in my restaurants, I taste everything. I look at every plate. I'm a detail-oriented person in every single thing I do. So I expect perfection from myself. And there's times I expect perfection from others, which I know is not politically correct or is not the way we should be. But I do expect perfection because I expect it from myself. That is part of who I am. And I do it endlessly. I mean, there's times at my restaurant where I go in and if the seats are dirty or the tables are dirty, the floor is dirty, I'll start cleaning it myself. I'm not going to wait for somebody else to do it. I'll just do it. I think that that is important when other people are watching you, that they can see that you're in it with them. We're all in it together. And together, we can

make this unbelievable experience. And I watched that with Wolfgang. I watched it with my grandfather. I think it's ingrained deep in me. Other than preparation, in your view, what are the three to five most important ingredients to our success? Practice, determination, drive, and self-confidence. You really have to believe in your mission and in yourself, whatever it takes. It doesn't matter even if you're bullshitting your way through it, but that's what it takes. People can feel your energy, and they believe in you if you believe in you. I love it. Let's talk about the importance of eating healthy. Most Americans don't have a

healthy diet. And we'll start with some statistics here. 32.5% of American adults are overweight, and another 36.5% of adults are obese, meaning they're grossly overweight. Being overweight and obese are associated with at least 13 different types of cancer. In the United States, the cost to treat obesity ranges from $147 billion to nearly $210 billion per year, and a report by the World Health Organization estimates that at least 2.8 million people die each year as a result of being overweight or obese. The number one cause of obesity is our diet, particularly the amount of fat and sugar in our diets, and not exercising enough to burn off these calories. You're a chef, you're in amazing shape, and the question you're most

frequently asked is, how do you stay in such amazing shape? And your answer is genetics, portion control, fresh ingredients. But it's incredibly rare to have genetics like you, so for the more than 100 million people struggling with eating unhealthy foods and being overweight in the United States, what advice do you have? How do people change their habits from eating unhealthy foods to eating healthy foods?

We have to change the way our relationship with food. I think that's the number one sort of thing that we have to see food differently. For a lot of us, food is comfort. It brings us back to our childhood. It's what we turn to when we're not feeling well. And I think we have to try as best we can to try to change that relationship to food and be a little more knowledgeable. I think a lot of us put things in our mouth without realizing that we're doing it. We go through our eating process just sort of blindly. And I think it's really important we wake up and we really realize what it is that we're eating. And I think that it's not just us, but I think we need

to push our lawmakers to sort of clean up the food that they're putting on our store shelves because our food's polluted. I mean, it just is. We've just destroyed our food source. I'm not saying that it was done meaningfully, but I think that over the time, in an effort to feed all Americans meat and whatever else, we've destroyed our source.

And I think that it's going to take all of us to convince our lawmakers that we have to change the laws of how we move in this country. But for an individual, I think just one baby step at a time. So let's say you drink three sodas a day. A lot of people still drink a lot of soda. I'd say just cut out one of those sodas at a time. Don't go cold turkey because it never works. Most people can't stick to that. But little by little, scale back on the things you already know are not great

for you. And over time, give yourself time and be patient. But I think over time, you can do better. More water, less soda, and I think making better decisions on the foods that we eat. If you eat your three meals a day or two meals a day with fast food, try to swap one out for something a little bit lighter. Even if it's still fast food, make small changes to your diet and over time you will see a difference. All right, let's talk about work-life balance. Many ultra successful people I know are workaholics. They aren't around for their kids because they're always working. You have a daughter, Jade, in short custody with your ex-husband. You're incredibly busy and successful. You have your TV shows, your books, your companies.

Can you tell us what your typical day is like and how you balance your personal life with your professional life? And when coming up with the balance, can you tell us what you want your legacy to be? I have no idea, Randall, what I want my legacy to be yet. I've tried to think that I'm a little younger than I am. I will say this, Randall, that the pandemic changed my perspective. Before the pandemic, my day would start 5.30 in the morning. I'd get up, take a shower, get myself ready, get my daughter up, make her breakfast, and then out the door all day. And a lot of times not home until later at night. I love having dinner with my daughter pre-pandemic, three days a week maybe. And I do share custody. So I tried to do it when I would have her, but that didn't always work out with my schedule. I traveled a lot. And a lot of times I'd bring her with me.

Once the pandemic hit, I started to realize how much I enjoyed being home and what I learned about my daughter. And so I switched my whole schedule. And nowadays I get up a little later. I spend that whole time with my daughter in the morning. I take her to school every day that I have her and I pick her up every day that I have her. I've started to realize that these moments are fleeting. She's going to high school next year. I've got, what, four years left of her, if that, and she's out the door and I only have one. And I feel better. And I realized I was going a million miles a second. And I've sort of, since the pandemic, so now two and a half years maybe, I've really slowed my roll. I don't say yes to everything anymore. I try to take more time for myself

and spend way more time just chilling with my daughter. Those have become the most important things to me. And I've sort of filtered out a lot of the other noise. Let's talk about philanthropy. Can you tell us about your work with Oxfair, America, the kitchen community, and Stand Up to Cancer? And how important is giving back in our search for excellence? I think what happens is we get to a certain age and we start to realize that, well, this happened to me actually when I first had my daughter. I started to realize life isn't just about us anymore. Life is about a complete new generation. And my brother died of cancer, so that's why I do a lot of work for Stand Up To Cancer. And I love anything to do with kids, so I also work for

Alex's Lemonade Stand, kids with cancer, to raise money for them. I have a charity in Venice that I work for that helps homeless kids because there's a ton of homeless kids in our own neighborhoods. I've always believed in, yes, helping people around the world, but really looking in your backyard and seeing what needs to be done there. I do inner city gardens for the Compton School District. I do a lot of things that involves children, food, shelter in my community. I think when you have been given this special gift that you can have a platform and you become successful, it is our duty to help the generation underneath us and

help kind of pull them up and help them see a bright future. It's what feeds at least my soul. And I know it feeds a lot of people like yourself as well. It really feeds your soul to give back. It makes me feel good in a way that other things don't. I think giving back is the most important thing we can all do. And I've been very fortunate, very lucky in my career. I spent 10 to 15% of my day mentoring people, coaching people. But when you can really make a difference in people's lives, people are less fortunate. I'm very passionate about foster care. My grandmother was raised in foster care. I have a scholarship at Michigan where I went to school. It's a full ride for people. It's amazing. You can change the trajectory of one person and their lineage forever,

your family lineage. It's the best thing I've ever done. And I encourage everyone. It doesn't matter if you're wealthy, by the way. You can still give back. Talk about a legacy, Randall. Well. That's the legacy right there. No, but it is. Most people want to be remembered, not everybody, but a lot of people would like to be remembered for who they've helped in their lives and what life they've changed. And you know what, Randall, at the end of the day, when you have kids, as you have five of them, I only have one, I want my daughter to see me do things more than just

working, but actually giving back. That's something that is really important to me. I started an event with my friend John Terzian years ago called the Imagine Ball. It benefits a homeless charity in Los Angeles that keeps family together rather than breaking them up, which is the normal case. And I brought my kids every year because I want them to see what I'm doing.

Before this, I started a function called the Justice Ball. It's in year 26 right now. It's raised $8 million for a nonprofit law firm in Los Angeles. But taking my kids to these things when they're young. Our last event for the Imagine Ball was at Bootsy Bellows. Dave Chappelle was the emcee. My son was the only one there, by the way. He's 14 years old. And it was the Dave Chappelle, Charlie Kacee. My son was the only one there, by the way. He's 14 years old. And it was the Dave Chappelle, Charlie Kaplan show where Dave is very inappropriate. And he was asking my 14-year-old son all kinds of very inappropriate questions about what 14-year-olds do. I'm sure it's Dave Chappelle. And I'm looking at my son thinking... I mean, the room stopped, by the way, and everyone's looking. But it was fun. It was a very good experience. And I bought a package, backstage passes for Post Malone, which is also very cool. So there was a good part. I give a lot of money to charities.

I gave a lot to my own charities. That was cool as well. But I definitely want my kids to see it, and they do see it. I put a foster care student through Michigan. She was living in her car when she was 17 years old in East Lansing, Michigan. Her parents were in prison. She got a full ride to Michigan. She graduated as a social worker, as a mom, homeowner, coach, public speaker, and she's now a member of our family. She comes to all family functions and it's great. I mean, my kids have seen that firsthand and that's just been incredible for them. It's been incredible for us. More importantly, it's been incredible for my grandmother who was raised in foster care. They're super, super tight and it's just a great thing when you can make a difference in people's

lives. So I encourage everybody to go out and give back regardless of how much money you have. It's not about the money. It's about the heart and devoting the time. Yeah, the time more than anything. So before we finish today, I want to go ahead and ask some more open-ended questions. I call this part of my podcast, fill in the blank to excellence. Are you ready to play? Sure. When I started my career, I wish I had known that I'd still be here 19 years later. The biggest lesson I've learned in my life is to stand my ground and believe in myself. My number one professional goal is to build my marketplace, Jadzi. I'm excited for that, by the way. I went online. Good stuff there. My number one personal goal is?

To live into my 80s happily. My biggest regret is? That I didn't have another kid. The one person in the world that I admire the most is? My daughter. My favorite restaurant in the world is? La Campanella in Capri. We were just there, by the way. Were you really? It's

phenomenal. Phenomenal. We were there six months ago for a wedding. It's insane. Amazing. Insane. Lucky you. It was amazing. The one restaurant I haven't been to but want to try is? I don't think there is one right now. Other than you, my favorite chef is? I don't think there is one right now. Other than you, my favorite chef is? My Aunt Raffi. That's too safe. That's the safe answer. I know. I know you're trying to get something out of me. I'm just asking. I'm just asking. All right. Not going to answer that one. You're going to go with your aunt. Yep. I'm going to go with my aunt. Okay. If you could meet one person in the world, who would it be? Dead or alive? Alive.

The Pope. Dead? Marilyn Monroe. The one question you wish I had asked you today but didn't is? I don't have one. You've asked me just about everything. You've been more thorough than anyone ever. So hats off to you. You definitely do your homework and you dig deep, which is really impressive. Most people don't dig that deep. I'm grateful. Thank you. Yeah, you did a great job.

Thank you. Do you have any last advice for those listening and watching today? And is there anything you're working on that you would like to promote to our listeners and viewers today? All I want to promote is Jotzezy, which is a wonderful Italian marketplace with content and recipes and all very special curated Italian products directly from Italy. And as for anything else, I think that people shouldn't, especially young people, don't worry if you don't know what you want to do. It will come to you. Life is an adventure and it's not about getting to the top of the mountain. It's all the steps you take

to get there. That's what makes life interesting. So enjoy the moments you have here, because for a lot of us, it's fleeting. You've been such an incredible role model to millions of people. You've brought incredible happiness to tens of millions of people who watch your shows and love you. I'm very grateful for your time today. Thank you very much for sharing your incredible and inspirational story with us. Thank you, Randall. Thank you for having me. I appreciate it. And thank you for all your patience, getting everything set up. This was really fun. All right. Thank you again. You're awesome. Thank you. Bye-bye. Bye. you