The Liz Moody Podcast - Giada De Laurentiis Spills Italian Secrets For Healthy Living

Episode Date: March 5, 2025

It’s never too late to change your life for the better. Long into her successful career on Food Network, Giada De Laurentiis decided to move from TV to social media and prioritize her cookbooks. She gives tips on coping with all kinds of change, from making a major change in your career to childbirth to aging.  From managing fame to staying sane with a busy schedule, Giada offers insights on how she lives her best life every day. She also gives her favorite health tips, drawing from her experiences with her own diet and exercise and her Italian roots.  1:30 Giada’s Path To Wellness 9:06 Balancing Career & Being A Mother 11:29 Perimenopause 17:29 Mental Health & Anxiety 23:32 Aging Gracefully 27:06 The Best Diet Changes 32:03 Italian Healthy Living Secrets 36:40 Productivity Tips 43:36 The Anti Nepo Baby 47:52 Italy Travel Guide - Hidden Gems For more from Giada, find her on Instagram at @giadadelaurentiis or online at www.giadadelaurentiis.com. Grab a copy of her latest book, Super-Italian: More Than 110 Indulgent Recipes Using Italy's Healthiest Foods, or check out Giadzy for her high-quality pastas, oils, seasonings, and more. Find an EmFace provider, Giada’s preferred collagen stimulation treatment, here. Ready to uplevel every part of your life? Order Liz’s book 100 Ways to Change Your Life: The Science of Leveling Up Health, Happiness, Relationships & Success now!  To join The Liz Moody Podcast Club Facebook group, go to www.facebook.com/groups/thelizmoodypodcast. Connect with Liz on Instagram @lizmoody or online at www.lizmoody.com. Subscribe to the substack by visiting https://lizmoody.substack.com/welcome. If you liked this episode, check out This Celeb-Beloved Therapy Offers A Radical New Way To Heal With Dr. Richard Schwartz. This episode is sponsored by: Seed: go to seed.com/lizmoody and use code LIZMOODY for 25% off your first month. Olive and June: visit oliveandjune.com/LIZMOODY for 20% off your first Mani System. Pique: go to piquelife.com/LIZMOODY for up to 20% off plus a special gift. Osea: get 10% off your first order at oseamalibu.com with code LIZMOODY10. Shopify: sign up for a one-dollar-per-month trial period at shopify.com/lizm. LMNT: go to DrinkLMNT.com/LizMoody to get a free LMNT sample pack with any order. The Liz Moody Podcast cover art by Zack. The Liz Moody Podcast music by Alex Ruimy. Formerly the Healthier Together Podcast.  This podcast and website represents the opinions of Liz Moody and her guests to the show. The content here should not be taken as medical advice. The content here is for information purposes only, and because each person is so unique, please consult your healthcare professional for any medical questions. The Liz Moody Podcast Episode 309. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Giatta, it's such an honor to have you on the show. I'm such a fan. I listen to your show often, so this is a real treat for me. Did it impact your career negatively, would you say, to have a kid? It actually enhanced my career. Having a baby at 38 threw me into perimenopause. I'm not going to age, and I think we can't keep telling the younger generation that we're not going to age, because there is no way around this. We are aging, and we should be able to embrace it. You know, there's something to be said with the people that you surround yourself with and who you eat with, and who you share your time with.

I want her to see that at any age a woman can take a leap of faith. I'm in somewhat control of my own story in a way I never was before. Hello, friends, and welcome to the Liz Moody podcast, where every week we're sharing real science, real stories, and realistic tools that actually level up every part of your life. I am your host, Liz Moody, and I'm a best-selling author and longtime journalist. I don't think that today's guest really needs an introduction because she is an absolute icon. I am so thrilled to welcome Giata de Laurentis to the podcast. Giata is a food world legend, an Emmy Award-winning Food Network host, a best-selling

cookbook author, a restaurant owner and entrepreneur with her line of pasta, sauces and oils, Giazzi. I could keep going with all of her accomplishments. She just released her newest cookbook, Super Italian, and it's everything that I love in a cookbook. It basically takes all of the ingredients and recipes that make real Italian cooking so good for you and it delivers them right to your home so you don't need to go to the Mediterranean to reap the benefits. However, if you would like to go to the Mediterranean, I do make sure

to ask Giata where you should go in Italy right now that's absolutely stunning but not overrun by tourists or ruined by viral TikToks and she gave me very good advice. So stay tuned for that. There's a lot of information in this episode. So if you want some key takeaways when you're done listening, head over to lizmoody.substack.com and sign up for our brand new newsletter, which has action steps for each episode as well as meal plans, workout plans, and bonus interviews. Giata, it's such an honor to have you on the show. I'm such a fan. Aw, thank you for having me. I listen to your show often, so this is a real treat for me. You know, I think we have a friend in coming, too. One of my friends from my editorial days was

Catherine Beudig, and she was one of your yoga teachers, right? Yes, she was my very first yoga teacher. That's so crazy. I never done yoga before that. How did you get into yoga in the first place? How were you like, oh, I want to try it? I was a gym rat most of my life. And then I got pregnant. And when I was six months pregnant, my doctor was like, you have two choices. You either stop working, stop traveling, stop doing everything, or you stop working out. It's one or the other. Because my daughter's little body was not growing properly because I was clearly too stressed and worked. And working out to get rid of the stress because that was my release for many, many years. And they said it was just too much on my body.

So my body was absorbing the minerals and all the stuff from the baby. So they were like, you have two options. Figure it out. I thought, well, I work out to handle my stress. That's how I get it out. That was my form of therapy at the time. I saw it acupunctrous at the time. And she was like, try yoga instead.

I'm like, yoga, that's not a workout. I'm never going to sweat. I'm never going to work out in the sense of what I believed working out was, right? And she's like, well, you don't seem to have a choice unless you stop working. And so I started yoga. One of my friends saw Catherine and they said, why don't you try her? And she also knew how to work with people who were pregnant. You can't go from zero to 100 in yoga and having never done it when you're pregnant.

They really tell you not to do that. So she was really good with pregnant people. And so she was calm and she was very painful. patient. And we did pregnancy yoga for a long time, which I thought was lame because there was nothing happening. But I will tell you that in the months that I did that part of the yoga, I realized she was able to release my back. She was able to do things that a lot of us, when you're pregnant, you're really uncomfortable. And she really helped me through that. And that sort of clicked. And I ended up doing yoga. I've done yoga ever since. My daughter's

almost 17. Yoga changed my body. It changed my life. It changed the way I breathe, the way I move in the world. the way I feel about my own self in the world. Catherine was a big part of that. So yes. Was that the beginning of your health journey? Because I'd say maybe was it like 2020? It's your last three, two or three books.

Your tone has changed to be more in this health vibe, wellness vibe. What was the catalyst for that? Once I had my daughter, I had my daughter a little later at 38 years old. And even 17 years ago, 38 years old was considered old for having a child. Having children was never my goal. So it wasn't like I worked at it for a year. I got pregnant and I thought. Accidentally?

Accidentally. Oh, wow. Yeah. By 38, I am 38 now. Okay. It is on my mind every single day. Like, should I have a kid? Should I not have a kid?

Oh, I never thought about it. You literally, like, genuinely, you were 30 years. You were like brushing your teeth and like, my time is running out because that's me right now. No, I do not. I never thought that. I didn't. Honestly, my daughter knows this. I did not care.

It's not that I didn't want them. It wasn't a priority for me. Interesting. Or at the time for my ex-husband. I'm the eldest of four children. So three of us are born very close together within a year or two of each other. So my mother had me at 19. So 13 years later, she decided to have another child, my little brother.

And so because I was the eldest and I was already 13 when he was born, I was changing diapers at like 16, 17. When I got a car, I was told, okay, now you're going to drive your brother to school as well. And so I felt like I knew what it was like to have a child and I didn't want them. that experience just didn't make me want to have children. It actually made it the exact opposite impression. I really wanted a career. Most of the women in my family didn't have careers except for my aunt. My mother didn't have a career.

It just wasn't part of our culture, really. I looked up to my aunt and my aunt had no children and she made movies all around the world. And I thought, that woman has the best life. How exciting is that life? So to me, children meant I can't have an exciting life. Did you think about it when you got pregnant? When I got pregnant, I was terrified, terrified of being pregnant.

And I remember having conversation with my daughter's father, and he was like, I mean, I don't really care if we have one or not either, but we're married now, so should we just see how this goes? Because I don't know that you want to go get an abortion at this point. You're just like, we can send it back if we don't like it. Well, well, he was like, in the beginning he's like, but a lot of women miscarriage. Okay. And you're traveling a lot. So who knows? And then they were like, okay, but now you have to have the amniotic fluid tested in New York because it was in New York at the time. I said, I will do anything, but I'm not changing my schedule. Yes. Like you will have it, not have it like do anything, do testing? I will keep the baby, but I am not changing my life for the baby. So if you tell me that all of a sudden now, I cannot travel and I cannot do this and I cannot do all the work I've done up to now to be an independent woman. When I come from a family where the women aren't really independent, there is no chance. That is not what I want to do.

So my doctor's like, Jada, you can do anything you want. We'll find you a doctor in New York for the time you're in New York. You'll go get these tests done. You still need to stand on top of it. So I did all those things. And the pregnancy actually went fabulous. I had no issues. It was great.

Did you like being pregnant? Did I like it? I didn't dislike it, but I didn't love it. I like the fact that I could get out of a lot of things when I wasn't feeling well, but I didn't really not feel well that often. And what I didn't like is how big my chest got. And my belly didn't get that big, but my chest got really big. And my back hurt all the time and I couldn't digest foods and I had acid reflux and all that.

But I craved things like meat that I'd never craved in my life. I used to crave only sugar. So it kind of balanced me out a little bit. Once she came, all bets were off. It's always like this. Right. So once I met my daughter, then it was over and I was in love. Right away?

Right away. Okay. I have a girlfriend right now who... That doesn't always happen, though. It took a few months and the few months really messed with her. She was like, did I make the biggest mistake of my entire life? And now she's in love with her baby. Like, she loves...

But isn't it like other relationships? Like, sometimes we meet a partner and we just fall madly in love. And other times they're friends for a really long time. Then the love grows. And I think that we need to see being a parent more like that than this like instantaneous thing. But no, I did. The only thing I would say is I had an emergency C-section. So I was in a lot of pain for the first, like, couple of months. That was rough. Enough for me never to do it again. Did it impact your career negatively, would you say, to have a kid? So that was my worry, which I'm sure is a worry for anybody thinking. Big, big worry for me.

Correct. It actually enhanced my career. Because all of a sudden, people that were watching me on Food Network saw me more as on their same level instead of this cute girl without a child, even though I was married. I think they saw me on a different level. Like, a lot of the comments I got at the beginning of my Food Network career were, why did you get this cute little model girl to pretend like she knows how to cook? So I think they started to see me as a human being.

And women, who were the majority of the viewers on Food Network, started to connect with me at a different level. And I think because they saw me from not being pregnant to being pregnant, to having a child, to watching my daughter grow on the shows, there was a bond that happened that I don't think I would have been able to forge if I didn't have it. Interesting. So no.

And I think that the things that you will talk about will change. They just will. And that will be for the better because it will enhance your career. I just didn't see it at the time. It's very hard to see it. I understand it was really hard for me to see that. I just want to fast forward to having like a 15-year-old where they can talk and we can converse. It's the baby part that I'm just like that feels like a lot of work and they can't even communicate their needs, you know?

It's a lot of work. But isn't your job a lot of work? Is your relationship a lot of work? Yeah. Are your friendships a lot of work? Yeah. They're all a lot of work. But guess what?

When this is all over, Liz, what do you have? This doesn't last forever. None of this lasts forever. That one most probably will. So that was the start of your wellness journey. So after I had Jade, my hormones went bananas. I was okay for a couple years. I hit my 40s.

It was terrible. I would do fittings for shows. Two days later, couldn't fit into the outfits. My breasts became huge or tiny and huge and tiny. And we're talking in a span of days. I felt sick all the time. I didn't digest anything. I couldn't sleep.

I would break out hives from right at the base of my neck by chest all the way. My entire torso, basically. Not my legs, not my arms, just my torso. So I realized, okay, something is just not right. Having a baby at 38 threw me into pariamanipause. But I think a lot of it also had to do with all the stress accumulated from before that, right? Like, this doesn't just happen. It's many years of chronic stress that I think perpetuated this particular situation.

Having the baby just threw my body over the cliff. It's a lot on the body. I don't think we realize. Oh, I realize that that's one of the reasons I'm like, should I do it? Should I not do it? It's a lot. It's a lot. It's a lot on the body. You're growing another body. Correct. Correct. And everything is about that body. Not you. You're a vessel that's just a carrier. It does not care about you. You get really depleted and I don't think I knew enough about the fact that my body would be incredibly depleted and tired from that entire experience. By the way, I went back to work on camera six weeks after having her after having a C-section because I was told I had to because I had a contract and I did not discuss having a child. Yeah. So this is 20 years ago, but yes, they don't do that anymore. Yeah. Yeah. So you guys are lucky. But when I was, that's exactly what I got from corporate is like, we didn't discuss this. It was not in the plan. You owe us X, Y, and Z per the contract. You need to go back to work. And I did. And I tell you, it was very difficult. And I think that's what threw me over. And so anyway, I started a soul searching, you know, and I started to talk to a lot of doctors and try to read as much as I could and figure out my body. So that's where all the books came from and that

is the health journey that I've been on. And it is evolved. This is the third version of that journey and it's evolved over time. I needed different things at different times. I always say to people, each book is like a chapter in my life, right? Anybody who writes a book like you wrote a book, that's your first chapter. But the next book you write is probably, going to have a little bit of a different spin because Liz, you won't be in the same spot that you are today. I mean, my first book was Glow Pop, so that was a, okay. I had the healthy popsicle chapter.

This is my third. Third. Oh, wow. I have two cookbooks, but this is my first sort of like me book, I would say. Exactly. Because you're evolving as a human being. A hundred percent. Yeah.

And if you have a child, it'll be totally different the next one. And so books are really, they should be. They should be. Basically, a chapter and a snapshot of you. at that moment. I love that. So you've tried all these different things. You've talked to all these different doctors. What key things would you say have made the biggest difference in your health? HARTs have made a big difference in my health. And I know that it's very controversial how people feel about it. But for me, personally, they have worked, diet and exercise. And when I say that

is I eat four meals a day, smallish meals. I eat between 80 and 100 grams of protein a day. So divide that up. It's quite a bit of protein. I'm in each meal. I've even worn a glucose monitor to figure out what foods irritate me at what times a day, because believe it or not, I can have carbs until like two. And then all of a sudden, if I have carbs, certain types of carbs, all of a sudden, my blood sugar spikes. I have to eat enough. I used to not eat very much because I used to eat sugar.

Like, I used to shoot shows. So on my sets in the freezer section, I would have a whole plethora of different chocolates, dark chocolates. chocolate chips, chocolate bars, blah, blah. And when I needed to pick me up, because I worked 16 to 18 hour days, really long days, I would just go for handfuls. I mean, I would go as far as doing close-ups of different dishes I was making and stick, just stick my finger in my mouth, stick it in the sugar container and put it back in my mouth. That's how much how addicted I was.

And I would skip a meal because I felt like, oh, if I eat a meal and make me tired. Were you thinking about your weight or how your appearance in any of these? decisions? No. I did not think about my weight. I did not think about my appearance. All I thought about was I need to get through the day. That is all I need to do. I need to take it one day at a time and get through the day. It was just a lot. I didn't think about that. I did later when I didn't fit into my clothes. Yes. Then I started to think about it. You know, weight as a whole has never been a real big issue. For me, it's more about inflammation. So it's how you feel in your body. Yes, exactly. I'm really petite. So if I'm inflamed, I can feel it.

I'm really super sensitive to how my body feels. I'm super sensitive to everything, but intensely sensitive to my body in a weird way that most people aren't. And it can be good. It can also be really, really bad. So you do the formulas a day. You do HRT and I do about 8 to 10,000 steps a day. In fact, I have my pedometer with me.

I put it in my bag. I usually wear it on my pants or whatever I'm wearing, but I took it off and I put it in my bag. I count every step, 8 to 10,000 a day. And I find that just that change has made a huge improvement in my blood sugar levels and my cholesterol in all of it. I was pre-diabetes just six months ago. Wow. Yeah.

Those things have really, really changed my life. I would say that yoga has been a constant, really helped me sort of center. I love acupuncture. I believe in it. It's helped me through my hormonal situations up and down. It also helps with chronic pain. and a lot of bodywork to kind of the back. Like massages?

Yeah. So I see he's not, he's sort of a masseuse, but he also adjusts and he also does cupping. A lot of cupping on my back and my stomach. I do a lot of cupping on my stomach, which I know sounds weird. I keep a lot of tension right in my diaphragm and in my stomach. So the cupping relaxes everything. It's about relaxing me, I guess. Yeah, I was going to ask if you do anything for stress relief specifically.

Yeah, and that I would say baths at night with magnesium salt, absent salt, baking soda, and a little lavender oil because it makes everything smell good. And that really just chills me out, gets me ready for bed. Because sometimes we don't sleep well when we're super stressed and we're just ruminating on everything during the day. The bath really helps. The warm water is sort of, or you could do a jacuzzi, I guess I do that sometimes. How has your mental health been over the years? I think that overall it's okay. but I get a lot of anxiety, I think, too, and I think a lot of it is driven by hormones.

The fluctuation of our hormones when they're not at a key level has really created more anxiety about little things. You know, and I catch it, my daughter's a good one saying, like, mom, is today a bad day? I won't ask you if today's a bad day. What do you do if today is a bad day? I tell her. Today is not a good day. I'm trying to figure it out.

and let's try it a little later because it can get to be a lot. So she knows and we have like a little conversation about things that, days that are not great days. She has them too because she's being 17. She's also having all sorts of hormonal fluctuations, right? So we're both doing these, it's weird, but we're both in the same but different hormonal fluctuations. So we have to have patience and we have to be kind to each other. I'm always like, when she gets mad at me for nothing, I'm like, okay, let's just say,

that you're not at your best today. We're not always at our best. We just aren't, and that's okay. But let's take a deep breath and let's try not take it out on each other. And I think just talking through it, because I don't know what else to do about it. If you have a good life hack for that, you let me know that because I would love that. I don't. I'm curious.

Do you ever have panic attacks? I don't actually have panic attacks. Okay. No, but I'd say high anxiety. High anxiety. Yeah. When it comes to wellness, you're going to get the best results by focusing. on the big needle movers.

A lot of us spend a lot of time trying to optimize that last 1%, which creates a ton of stress and it actually doesn't help our health that much. At the top of the needle mover list, sleep. And one of the best ways to optimize your sleep is to optimize your mattress, which is why I love avocado green mattress so much. First of all, this mattress is so comfortable. I have the one with the pillow top, which is medium firm, and it's just a dream. I miss it when I travel.

It's better than even the fanciest hotel beds. Having a mattress that supports your joints and your body and feels good is going to help you get more sleep and better quality sleep. But then, on top of that, avocado mattresses are made with certified organic cotton, wool, and latex, and they are made safe and Greenguard Gold certified. They're also Okotech certified, which is the gold standard. I look for it in any mattresses, sheets, or towels that I buy, which means the materials have been rigorously tested for harmful substances. You can actually look for the Okotech standard 100 label right on the product, and I love this. part, it includes a traceable certificate number and the name of the testing lab so you know exactly what you're getting. There are no toxic chemicals. There's no harmful off gassing.

It does not smell like it's going to kill you when you unbox it. This is what I mean. I'm not going to swap out all of my clothing, which is that top 1% of optimization. But by making sure that my mattress and my bedding are as good for me as possible, I literally reduce my exposure during a third of my life, which is a huge needle mover for a one-time swap. I will also note, and this is a me thing, but I sleep super hot and avocado's materials are really breathable, and it makes me sweat the least of any mattress that I have slept on. And avocado is a certified B-Corp and a 1% for the planet member because caring for yourself and caring for the planet do not have to be separate things.

You can get up to 20% off organic mattresses and more by shopping Avocados President's Day sale, right now at avocado greenmatress.com. That is avocado greenmatress.com, no code needed. I very rarely get genuinely excited about skincare, but this is one of the most innovative products that I have come across in years, and I am so obsessed with it. I've been telling all of my friends to get it, so now I need to tell you guys. Here's some science first. Your skin isn't just getting older. It's being actively broken down by something called senescent cells. These are cells that have stopped functioning but refused to die. They sit there releasing inflammatory signals, breaking down your collagen, degrading your skin barrier, and accelerating every visible sign of aging.

Scientists call them zombie cells and as they accumulate, they are one of the primary drivers of how old your skin looks and feels. The team at one skin, a group of female longevity researchers and PhDs, spent five years testing over 900 peptides to figure out how to help reduce the accumulation of senescent cells. And they finally landed on it. OSO1, the first peptide scientifically studied to reduce skin's biological age at the molecular level. OSO1 goes in and it clears out the senescent cells so it helps skin function like

healthier, younger looking skin. It is not masking the signs of aging. It's not targeting one thing. It is actually rolling the clock back at a cellular level. I've been using the face moisturizer for almost six months now and I love it. so much. It feels amazing. It goes on really smoothly. It's not tacky at all. And I actually see a difference, which I just feel like is never the case with skincare. You want to always like see a real difference and you're kind of like, do, do I? And this I genuinely do. Because it's clearing the senescent

cells, it doesn't just target one thing. So my skin looks firmer. It looks glowier. The texture feels dramatically smoother. And I feel like you can see that too. I also love the body moisturizer. It dries down really quickly, which is always a pet peeve of mine with moisturizers. I hate that, like, sticky feeling when you go to put your clothes on. This does not do that, but it does moisturize really, really well. And then again, I'm reducing my skin's biological age. I am not making it just look younger. I am making it actually younger. One skin has four peer-reviewed clinical studies and over 10,000 five-star reviews. The data backs everything up for a limited time get 15% off with code Liz at one skin.co slash Liz. Again, that's 15% off at oneskin.com with code

Liz. When you think about strength and resilience, like your ability to feel energized, to recover well, to stay strong as you get older, what do you think that actually comes from? Most people say working out or good nutrition, and yes, of course that matters. But there is a biological foundation underneath all of that that most people are completely overlooking. I have been diving deep into this lately with the team at timeline, and what I've learned has genuinely shifted how I think about my own health. Every single movement that your body makes, every step, every workout, every muscle contraction depends on energy produced at the cellular level. And at the center of that is your mitochondria. Here's the thing that nobody tells you,

certainly nobody told me, starting around age 30, our mitochondria naturally become less efficient, more get damaged, more become sluggish, and over time that impacts your energy, your strength, your recovery, and your resilience. Most of us respond by pushing more. We're like noticing these things and we're adding in more protein. We're trying to fix it with more supplements. We're trying to do harder workouts. And those things do help.

But timelines research suggests that we also need to be supporting the cellular machinery underneath. And that is exactly what their supplement, Mitopure, does. It contains Erolithin A, which helps your body clear out damage mitochondria and support healthier ones so that your cells can produce energy more efficiently. Because this is happening to your cells, it's going to impact your entire body, your immune system, your muscles. One study found that taking mitochondere increased muscle strength by 12% in four months with no change in exercise routine, it's going to impact your energy, your sleep, your skin, your cell health

impacts all of this, and urolithin-A keeps your cells healthy. Timeline has done over 15 years of research and testing on this one product, urolithin A, which, by the way, most of us lack the gut bacteria to synthesize naturally. That's why many of us need to supplement it to get the benefits. This has become a staple supplement for me. It is my top way to support how I want to look and feel as I age. Support yourselves and how you age with mitopure gummies from Timeline. Visit Timeline.com slash Liz and save up to 39% on your mitopure gummies. That is timeline.com slash Liz. I'm curious, your mom had you when she was 19.

You had your daughter when you were 38. What do you feel like are the pros and cons of being a young mom versus a 38-year-old mom? Well, my mom had me in 1970 and in Italy. So she smoked. Why, she's pregnant? I guess that was just like the thing. This is why I'm prefacing. That's why I'm prefacing with the time, right?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm prefacing with the fact that we're talking about the 70s. We're talking Italy, which is even worse, right? They still smoke. So, okay, she smoked. She also smoked dope. And she also drank alcohol. And she didn't know.

I'm not. And I'm like, look at you, maybe this. But did that make me ultra-sensitive? Did that make me have slow metabolism? Did it make me have all of these things that I now genetically have, right? We don't know because she doesn't have it. So I don't know. But her mother spoke.

And she grew up in a household where everybody. smoked. Do you have any like resentment or anger about that at all or no? You know, I used to, but I realized my mom didn't know any better. And had she known better, she probably would have done better. And also my mom was 19. What 19 year old is thinking about taking care of their body, their own body, much less their baby's body, right? So I think I was in a different place. I was mentally in a different place. You know, my mom always talks about how she just wanted to go out and party. Meanwhile, she had me and then two years later, she had my brother. And then less than a year later she had my sister. So she felt strangled in a way, like she was in a cage and she couldn't get

out of that cage, right? She wanted freedom and she never had it. And so I think there were different issues with her being a young parent. And then for me being an older parent, having already worked and having so much more knowledge, I think there were benefits, but I spent a lot of time on the road too when Jade was a baby. Sometimes I'd drag her with me, but sometimes I had to leave her at home for the first three years. I think there's pros and cons. What about now? I mean, a lot of people have said to me like, oh, I had babies younger because I didn't want to be an older parent. And I'm like, well, too late for me. Like, that's going to be my lot in life no matter what at this point. But do you feel any disadvantages as you get older with parenting her? I would say if you want to

have children, you should have them soon. Because once you get into your 40s, your body and your mind changes. You go through another whole, like, do you know the thing they talk about the hormonal like cleanup in the brain and in the body. I know that we have like these two rapid aging periods in our life and one of them is 44 I believe. Correct. Which is why you're coming up on it and that's why you want to, if you're going to have them, you should just have them soon. Like in the next two years, you should, you should have a child. What is your relationship with aging as somebody who's been on camera for decades and decades of your life? Well, it's interesting because I get asked sometimes to do like different campaigns for different companies, right? And everything is anti-aging

creams and anti-aging this. And I remember being on the phone just a few months. months ago saying, I don't believe in anti-aging. I'm aging. There is nothing I can do about the fact that I'm aging. Now, I can do it gracefully and we can do things to enhance the way we look, but I'm not not going to age. And I think we can't keep telling the younger generation that we're not going to age because there is no way around this. We are aging. And we should be able to embrace it. Is it harder when you're on camera? A hundred percent. Is it harder even when you've been on camera for 20 years and you look back and you're like, oh, gay. Yes, it is hard. It takes a lot of therapy to get through to be honest. But yes, I don't believe in anti-aging. I believe in aging gracefully.

My mother's 70, almost 75. No, she's 75 because I'm going to be 55 and or 20 years apart. No facelift. No Botox, no nothing. And she looks pretty good. So if I do Botox? A little bit. Okay, a little bit. I do. What else? What are your skin? Care secrets? So you know the things they put on your back when you do chiropractic work to relax your muscles and stuff? I do that on my face. Oh, you do it like in office? In office. Yeah, it's not something you can do it home. You got to do it. I think eventually they'll have it, but right now it's not. It's just in office. Also, because they have to check. Like, it's basically stimulating the collagen. So I believe in doing less of the needles, like no fillers. But I want to get away from the Botox. So what I've been told and I've been doing it and I saw a lot of improvement is this. electromagnetic field and they put it on your forehead and they basically put it wherever you have

the most droopage and since I'm almost 50 or 20 years younger than me, here is where it drops a lot, right? Depending on the structure of your face. And so they put all of these electromagnetic things and they stimulate and it really helps and it lasts like eight, nine months and then you got to do it again. And I'm sure as I get older I'm going to have to do it. That is something that I've been doing and I found a lot of success in a lot. Okay. Well, if I know what that's called and we'll put that in the show notes. I scrub my face every night. With you, you have the, wait, no, your scrub, is that your like Italian secret? Yes, yes.

Okay, can you talk to us about your Italian secret scrub? It's basically my olive oil, my Jodzi olive oil, which is high in polyphenols, and it's monocultural, so one olive. I use that plus rice flour. That's it. And you just scrub it on after, like, is your skin clean? Is your skin not clean? Yes, so I take all my makeup off. Okay.

Okay. And then I scrub it and a lot of times here, because I find that make it. Like on your temples. On my temples, on my chin, around my nose here, and a higher, forehead because makeup artist is always putting stuff on my top forehead. It hydrates my skin. I also have slightly dry skin. And as we age, our skin gets dry. And as our hormone switch, it really gets dry, just like the hair or the nails. It all gets dry. So this hydrates my skin. So it hydrates, but it also cleans and scrubs all of the extra makeup and all of the junk in the air off of my face.

I always wear sunscreen on my face and my neck and my chest. Always. I live in Los Angeles. So we drive a lot, a lot of sun banging, like just hitting us in the face. I don't think we realize our hands and our face as women, well, anybody. But so sunscreen on your hands as well every day to protect yourself from the UV. And I never go for a walk outside without a hat, ever, ever, ever. How often are you doing the scrub? Every night. Every night? Oh, wow. It's part of my routine. For my skin, it works really well. I'd say if you have super sensitive skin a couple times a week, is probably enough. I will say, I don't think that, you know, there's been some celebrity brands that are, like,

based around olive oil and they're like, it's the genius solution to everything. When I was traveling in Italy, we were doing this, like, olive oil tasting thing around Italy, and we were drinking raw olive oil pretty much every single day because we were tasting it every single day. And there was a group of, like, eight of us on this trip. And every single one of us had insane skin by the end of it. Like, our skin was glowing. It was crazy. Well, think about what olive oil does.

It's an anti-inflammatory, right? It helps the inside, but it also. helps the outside. I think that's the thing that some people need to understand. There's superfoods that actually can be great not just to eat, but they can be great for your skin, for all sorts of things. And I think Europeans use a lot of superfoods in their food that makes our food more nutrient dense. And I think that's the problem in the U.S. We eat a lot of food that has no nutritional value in it. And then we wonder why we all get sick or why we can't have kids, all of this stuff, right? And we have to learn that it's quality over quantity.

I think we think a lot about buying a lot of stuff. We should buy less, but buy better. Because a lot of us don't want to spend the money on the good ingredients, but those ingredients are the ones that are going to keep us off. Of all sorts of pharmaceutical drugs, they're going to help us feel better in our bodies. They're going to help us have mental clarity, great skin, great hair, and nails over a long period of time.

Diet has a lot to do with it. You can do so much with diet. I think we never realized it in the past. We thought we needed the medications, but we really don't. Tell me about some food that you've added or taken out of your diet that have made a real difference and how you've felt. Well, I've taken out sugar. Completely?

Pretty much, yeah. So the whole chocolate fridge is no longer? I have one square of dark chocolate at night after dinner. It has to be within two hours of ending dinner. It cannot be more because the blood sugar won't. be as affected if you eat an actual meal. If you have it as a snack in the afternoon, which is what I used to do, that's when you do this up and down on your cortisol. And that's where your blood sugar spikes and drops. And that's when we don't feel well. And that is when you become diabetic. And then

you need the insulin and then blah, blah, blah. I have one square at night. Unless it's like my birthday or something super special. But again, I'll make sure I do it after I've eaten a meal, for sure. And then I would say I actually am careful about what types of protein I eat only because I have high cholesterol. Genetically, I try to eat as lean as possible, but I also eat way more small fish like sardines and anchovies. I think we forget how these small little fish are so, so great for our bodies. Yeah, I think a lot of people think Italian and they think pasta, they think pizza. They're like, this is my indulgence food. This isn't necessarily my nutrient-packed food.

And that's one of the things that I love about your books is it dispels that rumor. Correct. The biggest chapter in the book is the pasta chapter because at the end of the day, that is what I'm known for. And that that is what I grew up with. And I think that pasta is not the enemy. It's the type of pasta that we're eating. So just a couple things to think about when you buy pasta. Whether you buy my pasta at Jodzie or whether you buy whatever you buy on the store shelf, you should look for. You can usually see the pasta. So the window, you should see pasta that has some texture to it. That's number one. the texture will tell you that usually it's cut on bronze dyes and slow dried. So that's what you want. Bronze dyes slow dried because manufactured pasta is cut with plastic dyes.

And the pasta is heated to a very high temperature. So what that does is spikes your cortisol and your blood sugar. That's why sometimes people eat a plate of pasta and then their sugar gets jacked. And check the protein. Our pasta has eight grams of protein. It should have a lot of protein in it. Oh, interesting. And pasta, the ripe pasta that only has two ingredients, water and Durham wheat semolina,

should have a high level of protein. If you see it that it doesn't, or it has more than just water and semolina flour, you probably should not be eating that pasta. Do you have any other secrets for making our food more nutrient dense, but also more delicious? My Sicilian Pesto. So Sicilian Pesto just means it's not green. It's from Sicily, where they grow a lot of tomatoes, so it's got a tomato base. cherry tomatoes, lots of almonds, which are, again, very good for you and high in protein.

So I use that as a condiment to chicken, to salmon, to whatever. But I also use it to toss my pasta. And then I top it with a little bit of shrimp, and there's my meal. So a lot of these condiments are there to help you add a lot of nutrition to the actual meals you're making every night. So all the dishes in the book have a component of that in them. So if you make a few of these, and you can just pick and choose the ones that you want to use for that week or that two weeks, there's Parmesan dressing in there that's got a lot of olive oil and it's really balanced with apple cider vinegar and all this stuff, that again, you just grab and go. It makes your life so much easier.

That's the way I grew up eating. There's a seasoning salt that I make myself, that I teach you how to make, makes a batch of seasoning salt. You use that for everything. The only thing I wouldn't use it for is when you cook the water for cooking the pasta, because that's going to really eat up a lot of it. But other than that, I use it on everything. Anything I season has my seasoning salt on it. So that way you control what you're eating.

You really know what you're putting in your body because I think a lot of us buy a lot of packaged things. Even when we buy packaged seasoning mixes, do you know that there's a lot of heavy metals in those? That's what they use as anti-caking agents. The pre-grated parmesan cheeses, the pre-grated cheeses, I'm telling you, they're dusted with all sorts of things that you really don't want to be eating every day. Once in a while is okay. It's okay. moderation.

But you can't eat that stuff every day. That cannot be your go-to on a regular basis. We have to put a little bit of effort and a little bit of time in what we're putting in our bodies. We put time and effort into everything else we do. This shell has to take us until the very end. Yet we tend to ignore this shell. And that just doesn't seem to make sense. In Europe and in Italy, we pay a lot of attention to this body.

We take naps. We organize our meals. We spend our meals with people we love. You know, there's something to be said with the people that you surround yourself with and who you eat with and who you share your time with. That is a part of this superfood situation. It's not actual food, but it's an ingredient in your life that makes you happy that doesn't spike your cortisol that keeps you level. They're all part of the beginning of the book. Are there any other healthy living secrets that we could steal from Italians?

Well, we would probably work a little less. They don't prioritize works that much. We take more breaks. We spend more meals with our families. We cook more. We actually physically cook more. And we're very passionate people. So we are eager to share whatever we have with other people.

And we don't think of ourselves first. We kind of think of the collective first. And I think we've sort of moved away. away from that a little bit here. We don't think of community as much as we think of me, me, how's it going to impact me? I think we need to start thinking a little bit about us because we all have to live here together. And we walk. Italians walk. They walk a lot. It's hard to do in a lot of American cities. It is. So get a pedometer. Stick it on you from the moment you wake up, those pedometers are like 15 bucks. Put it on and try to get as many steps as possible. Go for a walk

if you have to, but if you count every step from the moment you wake up, you can add them all up. And you can see how little or how much exercise you get. Well, and it motivates you to, if you have a five-minute break, take a walk around the block. And you got goals. And you can do it with your friends. And you can be like, I got eight today. What did you get? I'm like, how many steps did you get? He's like, I got 10,000. But he has longer legs. So I always tell him. He goes, he moves faster than I too. I have to do double time to catch up with him. Oh, my husband says the opposite because I'll get so many steps on a hike. And he'll be like, well, it's because you have teeny tiny little legs. So you're like cheating. And I'm like, I'm still taking the set.

Okay, fair enough. But anyway, it can create a fun game, is I guess my point. Is that I think we need to have a little more fun in our regular lives. And instead of seeing everything as, oh, I have to work out. Like, it doesn't have to be that. It's just about movement. It doesn't matter. You don't have to sweat.

Just move. Just step or, like, go, I don't care if you just go to the bathroom and come back. Go fix your lipstick. I don't care what you do, but move. You are an incredibly busy person. getting all your steps in, you're writing books, you have Jadzi, you have a child. I would love to dive into some of your habits and routines. Do you have a morning routine? Yes. I wake up early and I have a cup of bone broth with collagen powder and I drink that. Then I go work out and do,

I don't know, 3,000 steps. That's usually what I have time for, which is like 20 minutes. And like a treadmill? A treadmill. Okay. Yeah. Well, right now on a treadmill. I used to do it outside, but I live in Los Angeles and we do not have good air quality these days after the fires. So I a treadmill. Then I jump on my trampoline for about two minutes. I have a trampoline. It's small. Really, it's like a mini trampoline. I love it. It just gets my lymph nodes moving. It just gets my body moving, believe it or it's really changed the way I feel. And then I start usually work or I do yoga four days a week. So I'd say four days a week, I go immediately into an hour of yoga, where I do strength training and stretching. And then I start my day. I make sure and get my meals, even if I have

to pack them and take them on the road with me. I ate right before I got here. And I drink two liters of water a day consistently. When I need something, I drink a roasted dandelion tea regularly. Yeah. I love it. Cold, hot, doesn't matter. It's a great anti-inflammatory. I tend to get cold a lot. So holding a cup of tea, I used to do coffee. I switched and now I do dandelion tea. And then I usually around five o'clock start making dinner. And my daughter comes in around six because she does theater rehearsals. And then I just hang out with her for a while. She either comes in the kitchen or we just chit-chat. We eat dinner and my boyfriend does the dishes. And then I usually will go chill with my boyfriend or with my daughter depending on who needs what from me.

And then at about 8 o'clock, I try to run a bath and take a bath and start my process of going to bed because I have like a 30 minute routine. Flossing, brushing my tea, taking my makeup off, doing that scrub. It's a 30 minute process. That's it. And then usually I try not to watch TV or even look at my phone. and I try to just put a meditation or something on. What meditations do you listen to? I usually listen to either tropical rainforest,

and I try to breathe or breathing guided meditation. Breathing is a clearly as you now noticed. Breathing is a big thing for me. I really struggle in the breath department, so I need to spend extra time thinking about breathing. Listen, I wish I could meditate, but I think my yoga, my breathing or my meditation because actual meditating,

I've never been able to be successful. I've tried. I'm not successful. So far. So far, yeah. I shouldn't put a limitation on it. I might become successful at it at some point, but I have not been able to do that yet.

Do you have anything that helps you be productive or focused or anything as you're managing all these different parts of your busy day? I try to make my schedule so that I have 10-minute breaks in between things so that I have time to decompress, use the restroom, get a bite to eat, I would say too that my animals, I have three dogs and a cat. And those guys really help me decompress. They help me be in the moment. One of my dogs is always hanging out in between my feet and is always looking for a pet. And I think those little moments of focus on something other than me or work or whatever chaos is going on in my house really helps me to kind of take it down a notch. I'm genuinely confused how master class gets literally the absolute top people in every single field to teach every single one of their classes.

I use it when I want to learn things directly, like the cooking class from Thomas Keller has all of the wisdom that you would normally have to go to culinary school for. But also, I'm being honest, this is like a use case I don't hear a lot of people talking about. I'll just watch it for entertainment when I want to do something that's far more interesting than scrolling. Christina Aguilera taught me to sing, Shan Boudrum's Art of Mastering, Comfort. and sex appeal class. It's 10 out of 10. There's menopause classes with leading doctors. There's script writing with Mindy Kaling. Literally, you name it, they're on masterclass. And it is such a good way to get off your phone, but have something that's like not quite as long or hard to get into as a TV show or a movie and that it just keeps you entertained and interested. And you are learning.

There are over 200 classes from the world's best, all for just $10 a month when billed annually. and you get unlimited access to every class on the platform so you can learn at your own pace whenever you want on your phone, your computer, or even in audio mode like a podcast. If you're looking to stop scrolling and start consuming entertaining content that makes you feel excited and helps you learn, Masterclass is it. And the best part, every membership comes with a 30-day money-back guarantee so you can start learning risk-free. Right now, our listeners get an additional 15% off any annual membership at Masterclass.com

slash Liz Moody. That's 15% off at masterclass.com slash Liz Moody, Masterclass.com slash Liz Moody. The number one rule of habits is to make the things that you want easier and the things that you don't want harder. Yet so many of us want to eat healthier, but so few of us actually take the steps to make eating healthier easier. That's where Marley Spoon comes in. What I love about this company and what's different than all of the other companies out there that are doing like stuff in the same arena is that you can customize your choices based on the effort that you want to put in. So if you want them to send you an ingredient so you can make your own 20-minute meal and get into your chef energy, they'll send it to you to all be in perfect portions so you'll eliminate waste. Great, that's sorted. But they also

have meals that you can just heat up. They have ready-made breakfast, which is always such a tough time of day to get a healthy meal in. They have grab and go snacks. Everything is made from farm fresh produce with high-quality proteins and you can select by dietary preferences. including Mediterranean diet, which is the top diet that doctors on this podcast recommend. Also things like gluten-free, dairy-free, low-sodium, anything that you need. The food is so good and it's so gourmet feeling like you feel like you're at a nice restaurant. We're talking like chicken Milanese with a crunchy cucumber arugula salad or everything bagel salmon with truffle chive potatoes.

My favorite recent meal was the creamy lemon chicken tray bake. I had one of those moments where I looked at my plate and I was like, wait, I made this. and so quickly, like so easily, it's just so little effort for so much reward. Marley Spoon just makes eating well feel easy instead of stressful, and honestly, that is everything. This new year, fast track your way to eating well with Marley Spoon. Head to marlyspoon.com slash offer slash Liz Moody for up to 25 free meals. That is right, up to 25 free meals with Marley Spoon.

That is marleyspoon.com slash offer slash Liz Moody. So remember to get the offer in there. Marley Spoon.com slash offer slash Liz Moody for up to 25 free meals. If you have headaches, allergies, brain fog, skin irritation, or you've been dealing with hormone issues, you are especially going to want to listen to this ad. Every single thing that I just listed has been linked to chemicals and household cleaners. One study found that regular use of cleaning sprays was associated with a lung function decline comparable to smoking 10 to 20 cigarettes per day.

Synthetic fragrances are a well-eastern. well-documented migraine trigger and a number of studies have linked ingredients in common household cleaners to fertility issues, thyroid dysfunction, mood changes, and more because of their impact on our endocrine systems. Luckily, you can just make one simple swap and you can eliminate all of those risk factors that you get from common household cleaners. Branch basics makes cleaning products that are plant and mineral based, completely fragrance-free, and made safe certified, meaning they are screened against thousands of known and suspected harmful chemicals. And best of all, you literally use one product, but you mix it with different amounts of water

to make your kitchen spray, your bathroom cleaner, your laundry detergent, your produce wash, your glass cleaner, literally everything. It does not smell. It does not give me headaches. It does not give me rashes or itchiness from clothes because you are. Remember, we're using this for laundry. We're using this for literally everything. And it works so well.

Everything gets so clean. And I know that I'm protecting myself from all of those long-term issues, too. And I'm protecting my kittens who are much tinier than me. So anything they're exposed to has a much greater impact on their little tiny systems. And they're running around on their little paws and then they're licking them. So I'm protecting them too. branch basics is now available at Target, Target.com, Amazon, and branchbasics.com, so it's easier than ever to make the switch. And if you want to grab their premium starter kit, you can use code Liz Moody for 15% off at branchbasics.com. That's code Liz Moody for 15% off the premium starter kit at branchbasics.com. And when they ask you where you heard about us, please make sure to mention the show. That is branchbasics.com and use code Liz Moody. You are in your 50s and you recently did this huge pivot where you left the Food Network after decades of being there and you have Jadzi, which I think you started in 2016, right? Yes. And you have these books and all these things. A lot of people put these limits on themselves. Like at this age, I can't make a huge shift. Did you have any fears around making this change? Of course. Yes. Actually, you asked me earlier if I've ever had a panic attack. Maybe I had a panic attack when I left the Food Network, when I actually left. I thought about it.

for many years and I was too afraid to leave. And then I did. And then probably that for a week I had a panic attack now that I think of it. Yes. Incredibly scared. Incredibly scared to the point of sometimes debilitating. How did you push through that? I have a friend who does IFS. Do you know what that is? Internal Family. Yeah. We had Dick Schwartz, who's the founder on the show. She did some IFS with me for a little while, and it really, really helped. It really helped tap into probably the little girl that is afraid. The little girl who, you know, I grew up in a family where it's like, I saw a lot of actors and a lot of people come in and out of favor. And so I think in back of my mind, the fear is that at one point you will just be discarded. I saw that happen a lot when I was growing up

because my family was in the movie business. So actors were discarded all the time. They were like on a rotating. Yeah, you can't even enjoy your moment because you don't know when you're moment's going to end. Right. So I think my feeling was, oh, this is what it feels like when your moment ends. What the hell am I going to do now? I think part of it too is the pressures on me because I take care of my daughter, I take care of my ex-husband. I have a lot of responsibilities. And as a woman, it just weighs on you. Like what happens if I can't deliver anymore? But at the same time, I'm not happy where I am anymore. And I feel like I've hit my limit. I've hit the ceiling of what I could do. And I didn't have the time to spend it on things that I really wanted to spend the time on.

But I also wasn't making any money on those things. So it's this like really weird limbo. But I realized I have to try. I will never forgive myself if I don't try. So I worked through it with IFS, I think, and with yoga and with breathing. And I think support from my family and my boyfriend and my daughter. Because for me also, I've always thought like, I don't tell my daughter all these things, but I know she sees it.

So I try to just emulate what I hope she will take from this. For me, I think she realized, like, mom, maybe this isn't what you want to be doing anymore. I want her to see that at any age a woman can take a leap of faith. What would you say to somebody listening who is debating a big change and doesn't know if they should do it and doesn't know if they'll make it through? Well, you never know if you're going to make it through, right? If I've learned anything in this life is that nothing is permanent. and don't hold on to it too tightly.

Because a lot of times that's when it gets ripped away from you. So I think we have to realize that what we have today isn't necessarily what we have tomorrow. And a lot of us in Los Angeles have really realized this. You know, a lot of us had homes and then didn't have homes overnight. Your ex-husband lost his home. Correct. So I think a lot of people have really realized this in the last month and a half that you can, like this, the lights are off. So that philosophy is the way we need to live our lives.

So if you want to make a change, why do you want to make a change? What are the reasons you want to make a change? If you truly believe in your heart that that change will bring some good, it'll also bring some bad. I mean, I haven't been on TV TV other than reruns in almost two and a half years. That's a long time to be off a television. But I hedge my bets. So this is the other thing. You've got to be smart when you do these things.

I hedge my bets because where do people mostly consume their information these days? On social media. Correct. So what did I do? I put all my eggs in the social media basket. I have lovely young ladies that work with me that I couldn't possibly do this without, who give me great ideas as well as my daughter. And I think I've stayed relevant in those two and a half years off of TV because of social media and because of my social media. And Jodzie helped me do that. And being an entrepreneur has been one of the most rewarding jobs I've ever done. I feel like I'm in somewhat control of my own story in a way I never was before. I never had the opportunity though before either. And that

in the end of the day is more important to me than the shininess of being on TV. And even though I will be on TV again, because now I've shot a show, which will air, but there was a good two years where, you know, I think being a woman in this industry is tough. It's tougher than being a man. The guys get more opportunities as they get older. In fact, like a great wine, they age beautifully, but somehow we can't. So that's another battle, right? But I feel like it's a chess game. So if you want to make a change, look at the landscape that you're making a change in. Is there an opening for you? Do you have a perspective that's different than everybody else? If all those things align, go for it. You have one life. And I don't know if we're all going to be here tomorrow or not. Make it the most you can make it

today. Today is the most important day of your life because tomorrow, I don't know. I don't know what happens tomorrow, you know? I went from one day living in my house to being told I couldn't live in my house for a month and a half. Like things change all the time and we've got to be full. flexible and be able to pivot. That's the only way we're going to survive, especially now. It's moving a lot faster than it used to 20 years ago. I think if you really want to make a change, go for it. So what? Will there be a downside? There's always a downside. If it's better than what you got today, go for it. Why not? And I also think often we think we can't go back or make a change from our change. Very few things are forever. We're always changing. We're changing every single day,

whether we like it or not. So if you want to make a change, you can make that change. And then And if that change doesn't work, you can make another change. Of course. And who says we can't do things? Who says that we have to stay in a box? If you listen to the people who tell you have to stay in a box, you probably aren't going to be very happy most of your life. And I think that's the older generation I think that's happened to.

I mean, my own mother was like, sure you want to do that at your age? Sure you want to leave? I want to talk about your family really fast. It's just like a last thing because there's a lot of conversation online about nepo babies. And you're sort of like an original nepo baby in that your grandfather won Academy awards, your whole family's in the movie business. But from what I can tell from my research on you, it wasn't necessarily a positive thing at the beginning of your career. Can you talk about that?

Well, it's what I told you from the beginning is that people look to be like, oh, you put a cute little actress model to cook. What do you think you're doing? No, nobody that watched Food Network had any clue who my grandfather was at the time. But also, didn't your family not want you to do any of this? My grandfather, you have to understand that 23 or four years ago, which is how long I've been to TV, especially cable TV, was in its infancy. And my grandfather was like,

I built this unbelievable, recognizable, glamorous name. Yeah. Right? In the movie business and you're going to go take it to cable television?

Are you out of your mind? It's kind of like some famous person, right? And then their kids at the beginning of social media doing TikToks, dancing and doing this stuff, right? And they're like,

what are you doing? And then years later, as their TikTok story. Exactly. They didn't mean it in a negative way. It's just they didn't know any better. It's like my mother didn't know any better, but to drink and smoke and whatever in the 70s. Like, they don't know any better.

So I don't fault them for it. But yes, my grandfather was like, I am not supporting this. Has anybody in your family come back to him? Oh, my God. Sorry, girl. I mean, my grandmother's been gone a while now. He's been gone 15 years. But in the beginning, what would happen is because food network just exploded, okay?

He would be at the airport. and someone would stop him and go, oh my gosh, are you related to Jada? And he would be like, she's related to me. God damn it. I'm her grandfather. So you see like, see how it's switches? So yes, they are very proud and nobody could have ever believed it. Nobody.

What do you think of the whole Nepo baby thing? It's a born and bred Los Angeles. Well, not born in Rome, but bread in L.A. I think in this life, use the connections that you have. And if you don't have any, start making some. get a mentor in your life and get them to help you. We all need help. Nobody gets to where they are without somebody helping them.

Meaning, Liz, you're a very successful podcaster, but I'm sure that along the way, you've had people mentoring you and helping you out. None of us get there without it, not even Nepo babies. Okay, we all need help. So wherever you're going to get it from, get it. What are you wasting your time? Who are you trying to prove it to? Nobody gets anywhere. Nobody. I don't care who you are. You've had a mentor. You've had somebody help you along the way, at least if for nothing else to give you advice. That's it. Love it. Can you just end us on the best advice that you've ever gotten? My grandfather used to say to me, make us proud. Do not make any decision with your name attached to it that you'd think I would disapprove. And I have never stopped living that. And he's been dead 15 years. But your whole career was something.

Yes, but the choices that I made were all choices within a certain boundary. And I never crossed that boundary. I tried never to associate myself with something I did not believe in. Whether it was an endorsement of any kind, never make choices based just solely on money if it wasn't a brand that I believed in. And I turned down a lot of stuff, a lot of stuff. But at the end of the day, I wanted him to be proud of me, even if he's not here. and I wanted my whole family to be proud of me.

I feel like my family didn't choose to be in the spotlight, but they're going to reap the rewards or not. And I'm definitely afraid, so I don't want to be in trouble. All right. Well, on that note, can you just tell us a little bit in your own words about your beautiful new book, Super Italian? Super Italian is a journey of the last few years of me going back to Italy and reconnecting with my roots

and understanding how Italians produce food in a different way than we do in this country. And so it is packed with nutrients, dense little secrets and hacks of how to make your food even more craveable at home and feel good doing it. Wait, can you tell us where should we be going in Italy that's like not the places that are completely ruined by social media these days? I would stick to smaller cities than the bigger cities. Like everybody's going to go to Rome just because it's the most popular, right? I have different travel guides on Jodzi that show you sort of

the slow version of Italy, rather than the fast-paced version of Italy, which is what we always see on social media. But I would say Iskia is beautiful and untapped. That's a little island next to Capri, right? Yes. Capri. Well, it's actually not a little island. Oh, that's a big island. It's the big island next to Little Capri. Yes. Everybody goes to Little Capri. Yes. Iskiah's phenomenal. And not only that. It has hot springs, doesn't it? Yes, for wellness. My grandmother used to go when she wasn't feeling well. And she dip her. Yeah, lots of sulfur in the water. So it's really, But anyway, big island. Okay.

Go there. The coast of Puglia is phenomenal to go there. Sail, if you can. Take a boat. The best areas are right on the water and some of them are hard to get to if you're not on a boat. Okay. Sicily is always lovely, but you have to be realistic about where you're going. It's rustic.

Okay. I've had a lot of people call me or email me or text me and be like, there's a chicken in my room. Correct. And I'm like, it's rustic. It's rustic, but it's some of the best food in the world. truly. All right. Yeah. All right.

Noted. I'm going to Italy this summer. Oh, have you been? Yes, I have been. And I've hit a lot of like the basics. I've been to Sissile. I went to Tower Mena before White Lotus and I don't know if it's like been spoiled by that whole situation.

It's been upgraded since then. Oh, okay. Yeah. I love Italy. So I'm very excited to go back. And this was such a wonderful conversation. And I so appreciate you taking the time. Thank you.

Thank you for having you. I'm a big fan. Unfortunately, that is all for this episode of the Liz Moody podcast. If you enjoyed this episode, I would so appreciate if you would share it with somebody that you think would love it too. And everybody loves Giata. So that should be easy. Just send it to anybody. And they will probably love the episode because she is just so charming. And make sure that you are following the Liz Moody podcast and Apple Podcasts on Spotify or on YouTube because we have got an episode coming up that dives into attention spans and why we do not have them anymore and how we can

get them back. Don't worry. There's a lot of hope in this episode. It's not just all problems. There's a lot of hope there too. And then in another. episode, I am finally sitting down with Zach and sharing how we decided whether or not we want kids, which is a long-awaited episode that I'm very, very excited to share. Following the podcast means that the episodes will show up right in your feed and you will never have to miss out on one. You'll never have to go search, hunt one down. And you can now watch full video episodes on YouTube and on Spotify too. So if you're watching right now, hello, thanks for hanging out. Also, we are able to bring you this show,

completely free because of the brands that you heard in this episode. I am so, so, so picky about the brands that I work with. I get so many requests and I turn down like 99% of them, literally. I turn down a zillion supplement companies. I turn down so many skincare companies because they do not meet my standards. And I stand behind every single recommendation that I make here. You can save money on amazing products while supporting the show by using the discount codes that we share. There's a full list of all of our active ones at Liz Moody.com slash codes. Liz Moody.com slash C-O-D-E-S. And remember to head over to Liz Moody.substack.com to sign up for our newsletter, the takeaway,

where you'll get key action steps for each episode, plus tons of bonus content. You can also come hang out on Instagram. I am at Liz Moody. I share tons of inspiring and always very real content. And exactly how I am using everything that we learn on the podcast in my real life. Okay, I love you. I love spending this time together and I will see you on the next episode of the Liz Moody podcast. Oh, just one more thing. It's the legal language. This podcast is presented solely for educational and entertainment purposes. It is not intended as a substitute for the

advice of a physician, a psychotherapist, or any other qualified professional.