The Daily - Thanksgiving With Ina Garten

Episode Date: November 28, 2024

Leading up to Thanksgiving, we took a trip to the home of Ina Garten, the legendary cookbook author and TV star. For one glorious afternoon, the Barefoot Contessa gave us a master class on the art of hosting. She answered our questions big and small — seating arrangements, whether to have bread at the table, what to do with that difficult relative, how to zest correctly. Plus, she walked us through two of her signature recipes, which you can enjoy this holiday.For photos and recipes from our visit with Ina Garten, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday.  Unlock full access to New York Times podcasts and explore everything from politics to pop culture. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

Two hours, 32 minutes. Plenty of time to do whatever. A few weeks ago, in the wee hours of the morning, I started out on a very long drive with my colleagues Paige Cowitt, Wendy Doar, and Tina Antolini. But I feel like I probably should have gone left. We should probably go to the BQE. Yeah. And our destination was the home of a person who has very much been having a moment. Okay, so, so far, not much traffic. And that is the cook, television host,

and creator of her own media empire, Ina Garten, aka the Barefoot Contessa. This is Billy Joel singing about the island rock. And if you know anything about Ina, you know that she's written over a dozen best-selling cookbooks. I have almost all of them. And that she's been married to her beloved husband, Jeffrey, for more than 50 years. So now it's about 740 a.m. and we have hit our first big patch of traffic.

And as she lives in the Hamptons, oh, we're in East Hampton. In a stately home that if you've ever seen her TV show is instantly recognizable. And I just missed her house. Except if you're the one driving. I'm so busy talking to you that I just missed her house. Now back to that moment that Ina Garten is having. She just wrote a memoir about her childhood and her marriage and her improbable journey

from working as an analyst in the Ford White House to purchasing a small specialty food store in the Hamptons that becomes wildly popular under her ownership. Okay, and we have just arrived at Ina Gern's house. All of which put her on a path to becoming a kind of guru for a relaxed, real, not too prim or glamorous way of entertaining at home. Wow. Hi.

Hello. Nice to see you. May I hug you? I hear you all the time. May I hug you? I insist. Oh, I'm so happy to see you, Michael. Thank you so much for coming.

And so after a few emails, Ina, to our delight, agreed to meet with us in her home studio. Welcome to the barn. Which she calls the barn. And to talk to us about the thing that so many of us are going to be doing today, hosting or being hosted. I live next door and I do my commutus on the grass. It's 90 feet. It's 90 feet.

Through the beautiful hedges and shrubs. I'm Michael Barbaro. This is a special Thanksgiving episode of The Daily. Today, someone is in the kitchen with Ina and that someone is me. It's Thursday, November 28th. Well, I wanna give you something. Oh, you didn't have to bring me anything.

Now, of course, I wouldn't dream of coming to Ina Garten's house empty-handed. This is a tote and a bottle of what I understand, according to Google, is your favorite kind of wine from Burgundy. I love Burgundy. Oh, this is gorgeous. Thank you so much. And eventually, the two of us sit down So will you help yourself to a little sugar? at a table inside the barn for a conversation over coffee and a basket of pastries.

I feel like you're literally modeling the behavior that we're going to be talking about. The hosting begins early here. Ina, thank you. So happy to see you. So I just want to set the table for this conversation, as it were. To me, there's nothing as special as being invited into somebody's home as you have invited us for a meal,

whether it's a dead simple backyard barbecue or an elaborate multi-course sit-down dinner. And it's always felt to me that good hosting is a kind of magic. And you are such a master of this particular art form, this magic of convening people and making the togetherness feel so special. Well, it's what I love to do because my whole goal in life is to connect with people I love. And it doesn't happen easily. When you have that connection, you feel like you're taking care of people and they're taking care of you. And God knows we need that.

Well, where do you think that comes from? That desire to comfort people, to make them feel cared for? Well, you know, in my memoir, I tell the story that my mother was very cold. I think she just wasn't capable of being warm. So I think I never felt connected to her at all. At all?

At all, at all. That's a pretty stark thing to have to say. Yeah, I think I was really hungry for that in my life. And so that's what I try and do with my friends. I think entertaining for me is really bringing people together and being, making them part of my life. And so that's what I try and do with my friends. I think entertaining for me is really about bringing people together and being, making them part of my family. Well, do you remember the first time that you really hosted on your own? I do. And it was a total disaster. Jeffrey and I just got married. He was in the military. And I decided to have a party for 20 people.

Bad idea. Your first party, 20 people. 20 people. And they didn't know each other. And for some reason, I decided I was going to make an omelet for everybody. Now, I barely know how to make an omelet now. I mean, I kind of do.

But I certainly didn't know how to make an omelet then. And what I know now is you have to make them one at a time. So I spent the entire time in the kitchen making omelets. So Jeffrey Port-Jeffrey was in the living room with 20 people trying to keep the conversation going. Well, how did it play out? So you're in the kitchen, you're making omelets, you're recognizing this isn't going super well.

This isn't going well. It was like I was on a cruise ship. I was the chef. And we didn't have a table for 20 people. So there were chairs in the living room that were just in a big circle, and everybody had a plate and an omelet on their lap, but not at the same time. So it was bad. It was bad. It was really bad. Could you feel it? Like, was it tangible? I think I was so busy making omelets, I didn't even think about it until afterwards and I knew it was it was a quiet party and

with 20 people you can't connect with them. But you keep at it quite obviously. So what does it look like for you to grow into a more confident less omelet-centric host? I think by the time Jeffrey and I got to Washington, I had been to France, and I was really interested in the food. And I started working my way through Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking. And so my first parties were very elaborate affairs. It was fancy food. And so I picked the most complicated things,

which is how I taught myself how to cook I'm glad I did and then one day we were invited to somebody's house for dinner It was a guy and I said to Jeffrey. Oh, it's gonna be a disaster because no men cooked in the 70s I mean they just didn't and we went there and he served a simple filet of beef that was roasted Simple vegetables. It was a absolutely simple, elegant meal. And I remember thinking to myself, this is it. Everybody had a wonderful time. His hair wasn't on fire.

He was relaxed. He wasn't cooking from Julia Child. He wasn't making some elaborate thing. And at that moment, I decided to change how I cook. And so the thing that I expected to be a disastrous dinner turned out to be a lesson I'll never forget. The lesson being that cooking is part of hosting, but it is not the totality.

And the simpler the meal is, the more fun everybody has. The irony is, it's not about impressing your guests with a great dinner, it's about making a dinner that's perfectly delicious, that allows everybody to have a good time together. Right. Well, so let's get kind of clinical here and talk about how all of this works. Because it's not every day we get to pick the brain of the barefoot Contessa. And it's really only once a year that I think so many of us are really focused on the act

of really hosting, which is Thanksgiving. So just talk us through the elements of a good meal, a good dinner party. What's essential, what's not? Let's allow ourselves to go rather deep on this subject in a way we normally might not otherwise. So I was interviewing Frank Bruni, who I just adore, and I said to him, what's the key to a great restaurant? And he said, the most important detail is how you greeted at the door. And I thought, that's exactly true of parties.

Because once you feel like you're welcome, you're always going to feel good. How much do you think about, how much should we be thinking about the group of people that you're bringing together? Thanksgiving is unique, of course. You don't always have a choice of who's in your family and who gets to come, who has to come. But to the extent that you do have a choice of who's in your family and who gets to come, who has to come.

But to the extent that you do have a choice, how do you think about combining the right mix of people? Well, first I think about who I want to see, but I also think about who would like to see each other. So people who know each other that don't see each other or who would enjoy each other's company. Jeffrey and I pretty much choreograph each dinner party. And- You sit there and you talk about it. You think about it ahead of time. We totally think about it.

And we think about how the party is seated, which is really important. So inevitably in a group of six people around a round table is my ideal dinner party. And inevitably some people are extroverts and some people are introverts. and some people are introverts. So some people are more talkative than others. So if you think about six people around a dinner table, I always put the most talkative people opposite each other and the least talkative

people opposite each other in the other quadrant. So that if you put the talkative people next to each other, that's where the party's gonna be. And then people can listen that wanna listen, and people can talk that wanna talk. So, and you'd be shocked how too big a table or two people on the same side of the table that are talking can just wreck a perfectly good dinner party. dinner party.

Okay, the food. How do you decide what to serve or not to serve? And I'm not just talking about dietary restrictions, which by the way always come up, but just the whole question of what is going to be possible within the time that you have, what's going to feel the right level of simple? Or, if you wanted to, fussy and formal and meeting the occasion. So this is like a New York Times puzzle. There are a lot of layers to it.

And the first one is I just remember these are my friends and I want them to be happy. So when I'm doing the menu, the first thing I do is find out, or if I know, figure out what everybody doesn't like or doesn't eat. And I want to make one menu that everybody can eat. Because you never want to be, I'm having the roast veal dinner and this person over there alone by themselves is having pasta.

I want everybody to share the same meal. So that's the first thing. Then I'll write down a menu of what I'd like to make. And then I just start crossing things off. And just go, well do we really need four vegetables when two would be fine? Cross two off. Can I make that, do I have to make that peach tart?

Or can I get it from a bakery? Cross that off. Is it hard to make a first course or can I get it from a bakery? Cross that off. Is it hard to make a first course while the meat is in the oven? Don't make a first course. Then I figure out how am I going to make this meal? Are there four things that need to go in one oven? Or is there one thing that's room temperature, one thing that I can cook on top of the stove, and one thing in the oven so that I'm not trying to juggle things

while it's happening. And then the last thing I do is make a timeline. How is this meal gonna happen? I feel like I'm at NASA command center. It is like that. And I think people are shocked that when I have six people for dinner, I do this. Because otherwise all day I'm like,

oh my God, should I start the dinner? And then I look at my schedule and I say, five o'clock I have to turn the oven on. It's literally that detailed. 515, put the meat in the oven. 545, take it out. It's really detailed. But then I know that before five o'clock I'm fine.

I can relax. And it's hard. It's a complicated thing to get everything out on the table at the same time when it's perfectly cooked And that's the only way I know how to do it is to make a schedule Okay, so now that we talked about the food the table what's on the table so let's talk about levels of on the table and how much fuss do you put into it?

And why does it even matter? Well, first I would say paper and plastic are nice for a picnic on a boat, but I'm not sure that they belong on a table. I knew it. So that should settle that. I think the table should be lovely, but I really like a modern table that's simple. I think there's nothing more horrifying than sitting down to a really fancy dinner table

where there are like six glasses at each place setting and you know you're going to be there forever because there are six courses, each with a different wine. Right, or a different fork or a different knife. Oh my God, it's just horrible. So modern simply means as simple as possible. As simple as possible, but it can still be beautiful. And I use the same things over and over again.

I like really good napkins, good linen napkins. I have a wine glass, a water glass, a dinner plate, tableware, and that's the table setting. And then what I like to do is have like garden flowers from the flower shop or from my garden. If you do little vases filled with flowers in the same color palette as the napkin, then it all feels coordinated,

and you can move those vases around until they look great. I think things that are fancy are actually meant to impress rather than make people feel comfortable. And I feel that way about food And I feel that way about food. I feel that way about table settings. If for the holidays you don't have enough chairs of one kind of chair. Who cares?

Who cares? It's fun. Just put chairs around the table. If you only have six white dishes in one pattern and you have six white dishes in another pattern, just mix them all up. And I think that makes something feel simple and elegant and fun, which is at the end of the day, you just want your friends to be there.

Right. Everything we're talking about here is really just a tool to bring people together. It doesn't really matter which tool we use. Exactly. Okay. Once the dinner's underway, the food is out, the conversation's going, I have to imagine once in a while in this line of business you're in, you run into the problem of a guest, a relative, a problem person. And how do you deal with that? I'm thinking of my family.

I'm thinking about an uncle of mine. We must have the same uncle, the disruptor. The dominator. Oh, the dominator. Yeah. What do you do? You don't do anything? It's pretty hard to think of what to do except to invite them to come join you in the kitchen

and say, this isn't okay. But how do you do that? It's very hard to do. And probably everybody would like to do it. I mean, I try and change the subject. I try to change the subject. Yeah, I think that's the only thing you can do. And I think everybody's so grateful that you do.

At this point, I think some of our listeners might be thinking to themselves, serve the food already, Michael, be done with it, Ina. This is like, this is not how I think about dinner. You guys are overthinking the whole thing. Are we overthinking these details, you and I? I don't think so. I think it's really important.

Right. And I think it's a skill. You just, you get better and better at hosting people. And I think, I mean, you and I obviously find it's really worth doing because it's the glue between people. And I think, I mean, you and I obviously find it's really worth doing. Because it's the glue between people. I think with that, it might be time for us to think about cooking.

Oh, you're going to come cook with me? Would you do the honors of throwing us to the break? We'll be right back. Bravo! So Anna, tell us what you have picked for us to cook for the holidays and why and how it fits into this conversation we've been having about bringing people together in ways that are simple, efficient, and without the host's hair on fire. So the first thing is baked Virginia ham. So what I do is I buy a fully cooked smoked ham, really good quality ham, that's pre-sliced.

So you don't have to slice it at the party. And all I do is make a glaze with like five ingredients in it. It goes in a food processor, put it on the ham, goes in the oven, and it bakes for an hour. So all we're going to have to do is make the glaze. Exactly. Okay. Okay, you ready?

I am ready. One thing you need to know about me is I follow a recipe exactly. So six cloves of garlic. You in charge of garlic? I would like to. Choose your weapon. I'll get the garlic. I'm ordering Michael Bubba around.

I'm not going to feel judged as I do this because there is really no wrong way to. There's no wrong way to do it. Period. Okay. There's really no wrong way to do it. There's no wrong way to do it. Period. Okay, so we need eight and a half ounces of mango chutney, which is exactly what I have. Can you describe this chutney? Well, it's mango, but it's got raisins in it, and it's chutney, so it's both sweet and sour. Half a cup of Dijon mustard.

I can do that. I'll just dump it in. One cup of light brown sugar. Now we need the zest of one orange. I've always had a zest of question. Is the zest of an orange or a lemon or a lime simply when you've covered all the surface area with one or two gos, like how deep do you go into the skin? It's called the pith, which is the lighter part, and you don't want any of it because it's bitter.

So you just go absolutely, just the absolute surface where it's really dark orange or dark lemon. And then we need a quarter of a cup of freshly squeezed orange juice. I love a juicer. That was a tool I didn't know I needed. Okay, we're ready to go. So, got a food processor, garlic in.

Garlic in. Okay, so just turn the food processor on. Okay. Until it's all pureed. This is the best glaze. It's so good. Okay, and just describe this. You're bringing this over to this enormous, amazing, pre-cooked, pre-sliced ham, threaded with string. Just to hold it all together. Because it's pre-sliced. Because it's pre-sliced. And then we're going to pour the glaze over it.

Yeah, this glaze is just like that. Did I miss any places? This glaze is caressing the ham. That's exactly what it's doing. And now this whole thing goes in the oven. Okay, let's get it in the oven. Put that big baby in. Alright.

Okay, so this is what I love about roasting. You put it in the oven, set a timer, and forget about it. Mm-hmm. So this is one hour, and in one hour we're going to have a delicious ham. That was stunningly simple. And it's going to eat 20 people. I mean, it's really quite extraordinary. Yeah. No, it's feeds more than that, like 20 to 30.

Okay, ham is now in the oven. So we need something to drink while the ham bakes, don't we? Do we ever. Okay, how about a cranberry martini? So you want to make it with me? I would love to make it. Okay. I feel like everyone listening to this wants to know if the giant pandemic martini cup actually exists. It absolutely does. Would you like your martini in that glass? No. I have it right in your... It's here? It's here. Can I just see it? Oh my word. This is like a... it's glass? It's like a bird bath. It was given to me as a joke, but I mean I had to use it. And there's two of them.

And there are two of them. They're like bosses. Well, you don't want to drink that by yourself. So let's make that cranberry martini. You're going to love this. So first thing we need is three quarters of a cup of cranberry juice, and it's actually cranberry juice cocktail, so it's got a little sugar in it. Into the measuring cup goes the cranberry. Three it's actually cranberry juice cocktail so it's got a little sugar in it. Into the measuring cup goes the three quarters of a cup.

Half a cup of good vodka. This is from the freezer. It's from the freezer, yeah. Quarter of a cup of triple sec. Which is a sweet little orange liquor. Exactly. That perfectly measured. And now we need a cup of ice. Is that perfectly measured? And now we need a cup of ice. And this is the key to cocktails with ice, is you have to shake it for 30 seconds. And what it does is dilute the cocktail enough so that it's not like that, like really harsh, so it's absolutely delicious.

So how about you do 30 seconds and I'll tell you that. Okay. Go. It's longer than you think. That's only five seconds. I would give it probably at most 12 seconds. That's 15 seconds. Oh, it's a little light.

Doesn't it seem like more than 30 seconds? Yeah. Oh, it's a little light. Doesn't it seem like more than 30 seconds? Yeah. It seems like two days. Especially when you're thirsty. That's 30 seconds. Okay, I'm getting the glasses in the freezer.

These are beautifully chilled Martini glasses to the touch. This is a day to cheer. It's really nice. Isn't that good? Yeah. Because it's, you know what I love? It has no bite. It has no bite, exactly.

But also the flavors are layered perfectly and it doesn't have that hit of like vodka, even though you and I know how much is in there The orange and the cranberry kind of bubble up a little bit. It's not too sweet not too tart I think I'm gonna have to sell my whole family on this one because it it just feels like a perfect Thanksgiving That would be the ham. Ham's ready. Okay, well it smells pretty good doesn't it? That's the first test.

I love the way the ham has kind of opened up and it's kind of fanning out. And then so what I like to do is I like to serve it like a slice of ham with a little bit of the glaze from the pan. If nobody had told you, I would think that you have been working on this for 24 hours. It'll be our little secret. It's just something I whipped up in the few minutes before you got here, and I actually did. And you actually did, because you planned it. I have to say, this looks really good.

It's really punchy. Isn't that delicious? I can taste the orange zest. But it doesn't overpower the smoked ham. You still take, I think it's really important that the intrinsic flavor of the thing that you're cooking shines through and the ingredients just make them taste better. Kind of layers of mustard and orange and chutney. Not bad, is it?

No, it really... it's ham on steroids. It's really, really good. Thank you. Where's my... Cranberry. Excuse me, I need to get mine too. I can't have you drinking alone. What a great day. Cheers. We a great day. Cheers. We made that sauce. We did.

We worked so hard too, didn't we? Look how gorgeous that is. I have learned a lot. Thank you. I'm so glad. We'll be right back. So, normally at the end of an episode, we do the headlines of the show. Today we're going to do something a little bit different. I'm going to throw a bunch of rapid fire questions at you about cooking and entertaining.

But to begin this, I need you to kick us off by saying. Here's what else you need to know today. Okay, here are the questions. Best cold appetizer that's ready when your guests walk in? Roasted shrimp cocktail. Bread or no bread on the table? Depends on the meal. If it's not a sandwich, bread on the table.

Hmm. Your personal preference, pumpkin or apple pie? Apple pie. Stuffing or mashed potatoes? I love stuffing, but I make it as bread pudding. Hmm. A savory bread pudding. Resolve a debate, another debate I've been having with my mother for years.

The blade of the knife must face the interior of the plate, yes or no? 100%. Criminal to have it out the other direction. Response that you give to a guest who says, can I help? Absolutely accept washing the dishes. And if they insist on helping with the dishes? I insist they not. Ha ha ha ha ha ha.

Are you giving your guests leftovers? I actually do one better than that. I actually make another Thanksgiving dinner. I'm sorry, what? When I make Thanksgiving dinner, I make a second one so that I can cut it up and give it to the guests to take home I'm sorry, what? When I make Thanksgiving dinner, I make a second one so that I can cut it up and give it to the guests to take home because everybody wants Thanksgiving dinner

sandwiches the next day. They do. Turkey and cranberry sauce and mashed potatoes and it's really terrible the next day when you've gone to somebody else's dinner and you don't have those things. So I make sure everybody has everything. That is hosting at a level I cannot fathom.

It's a PhD in hosting. Well, on that note, happy Thanksgiving. Happy Thanksgiving to you too. I'm grateful to you. I'm grateful for everything you've taught me as a amateur home chef. And I'm grateful just to have you in our world.

I'm so happy to be here, thank you. Thank you. I think I'd be remiss if I didn't ask, where's Jeffrey? He's at Yale teaching and he's coming home tonight. All right, he's not gonna be joining us. No, I'm sorry. Next time. No day's perfect.

No day's perfect. Today's episode was produced by Tina Antolini and edited by Wendy Doerr. It was Fact Check by Susan Lee, contains original music by Marian Lozano, Rowan Namisto, Corey Schreppel, and Dan Powell, and was engineered by Chris Wood. Special thanks to Paige Coward, Kate Tyler, Sam Harnett,

and my dearest mother, Jean Barbaro. That's it for the Daily. I'm Michael Barbaro. Happy's it for the daily. I'm Michael Barbaro. Happy Thanksgiving and see you tomorrow.