The Oprah Podcast - Be Ready When the Luck Happens | The Oprah Podcast with Ina Garten

Episode Date: December 24, 2024

BUY THE BOOK! "Be Ready When the Luck Happens: A Memoir" by Ina Garten, published by CROWN PUBLISHING | PENGUIN RANDOM HOUSE, is available wherever books and audio books are sold:  In this episode of The Oprah Podcast, culinary icon and bestselling author, ‪Ina Garten, opens up about deeply personal stories from her number one New York Times best-selling, no-holds-barred memoir, Be Ready When the Luck Happens.  The Barefoot Contessa herself shares details about overcoming a difficult childhood, her love story with her husband, Jeffrey, and lessons she's learned as a woman ahead of her time with a legendary career. Follow Oprah Winfrey on Social: https://www.instagram.com/oprah/ https://www.facebook.com/oprahwinfrey/ Listen to the full podcast:  https://open.spotify.com/show/0tEVrfNp92a7lbjDe6GMLI https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-oprah-podcast/id1782960381 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Everybody, thanks for being with us on the Oprah Podcast. Around this time of year, there's nothing I love more than being comfy and cozy at home, maybe with something delicious bubbling on the stove. I hope that all of you are surrounded by those you love or maybe getting some much-needed alone time to decompress. That feels just as good, too. When I think of my guest today, I think of comfort and warmth. Just the recipe we need right now. She is one of the most beloved cooks in the world. Oprah. Ina. How are you?

I'm so good and so nice to see you. So nice to see you. The Barefoot Contessa, Ms. Ina Gartney. nice to see you. The Barefoot Contessa, Ms. Ina Garten. So everybody, thanks for joining us on this podcast. I have to tell you, I am just thrilled to be joined by a living legend, the Barefoot Contessa herself, Ms. Ina Garten. Ina, so good to be with you. From you, Oprah, that's unbelievable. Thank you. I'm good. I've done everything I need to do in my life now. Thank you. Oh, it's so true, Ina. You just, you are all those things. You're an icon.

You're so beloved and you feel like a part of our lives. Are you zooming in from your famous kitchen we love so much? I'm in the kitchen in East Hampton, exactly. That's what I call the barn. But a few people have said barn isn't exactly what comes to mind when they see it. No, that's some kind of special barn. Thank you for actually doing it there. It's like, oh, I know this kitchen.

We know the kitchen. So your memoir, Ina, Be Ready When the Luck Happens, is a New York Times bestseller. So I appreciate you taking the time out of all the things. Are you kidding? I mean, it's just a thrill to talk to you. Yes. Thank you so much. How did you know you were ready to tell this story? I know that on page 293, you write, I had spent so much time avoiding the painful periods in my past, especially my childhood, that I wondered if I'd be able to open those doors and what would be behind them. And I have to say, I read a lot, a lot, a lot of books, read a lot, a lot of memoirs.

This is one of the best written, best exposed, vulnerable, generous, gracious memoirs I have ever read. It's just wonderful. Can I just sit with that for a second? Thank you. Yes. And I read a lot of them, but this just, I know you do. Yes. This just feels like you did the work to make it real. You did the work to bring it home and make it so relatable. I have to say it is so much work that I've, I have not done it. I have not written a memoir yet because it is so much work. And I read that you did research on your own life to write this book. You even went to old homes you lived in and you went through 50 years of letters to and from your husband, Jeffrey, that we all adore so much. I think I never really made a decision to write it. I just decided I would

start. And I was working with a friend of mine whose name is Deborah Davis, and she's an amazing researcher. And she would interview me and record what I was telling her, the stories I was telling her. But she took me back to places I'd been and asked me about it. And I recalled things I didn't remember. But I think when I started, I said to her, let's just start this. I'm really not sure it's going to be interesting because it's my life. I've lived it. I never look back. And I said, at any point that I think it's not interesting enough for people to read,

then I want to just pull the plug. And she said, fine, let's just start. I think she knew it was going to be more interesting than I thought. But the process of doing it changed how I feel about my life. It was just quite extraordinary. Tell me how so. I thought, well, you and I are going to talk about this, I'm sure, because I always thought I'd been incredibly lucky in my life.

And I also thought I did this and then I did that and I did something else and I figured it out, but I don't know how I did it. And when I had to go back and look at the whole, my whole life, I realized that connecting the dots was really easy. I continued to do the same thing over and over again. I kind of challenged myself at each time. But at the moment that I started doing a specialty food store, I realized I had already figured I taught myself how to cook. So I actually was ready. I didn't think I'd done the work, but I actually had. And so writing the book made me realize that I was prepared for each stage that I got to. Well, what you just said about connecting the dots, Ina, is something that's so powerful

because I believe that a lot of people are looking for purpose in their lives and most people think that it's some big thing that you're going to find out there somewhere when really every day you're creating purpose. And if you look back on your life and connect the dots of your life, that thread that connects the dot would have been your purpose. You know, even though you may have never defined it for yourself, there is a thread that connects the dots of all of our lives. And that is so evident in Be Ready

When the Luck Happens. I was so, when I first heard that this memoir was coming out, I thought, hmm, that's an interesting title coming from Ina Garden, Be Ready When the Luck Happens, because I remember years ago us having a discussion about- Do you remember? Yes, about, I didn't remember where it was. I didn't remember that it was the Matrix Awards, but I remember having a discussion and I didn't remember slapping you, but I did remember. Maybe it was a love tap. It was a love tap. I don't remember slapping you. You were just like, whoa, wait a minute. You make your own luck. And I was like,

no, I've just been really lucky. Because in my mind, you were already an iconic figure. This is back in 2010. And a powerful woman. And you were, you know, in your speech, in your acceptance speech, over and over again, you mentioned luck and luck and luck and luck. And I come from this belief that luck is preparation meeting the moment of opportunity. So anytime I hear anybody saying, I was just lucky, I was just lucky, unless you just fell up on, you know, a pile of money somewhere, I think. Yes. So where did the title come from? um the title came from a very dear friend of mine rob marshall who's the broadway and movie director um was when he was on broadway when he's i think he was 23 or 24 he was the dance captain for liza manelli's show and liza said to him be ready when the luck happens and he never forgot it

and what he she was saying is do the work when the luck happens, you're ready for it. Preparation. And I was almost done with the book. I didn't have a title. I was just coming to terms with the idea that I actually, yes, I'd been lucky, but I was ready when it happened. I'd done the work so that I was ready when it happened. And I thought, oh, my God, that's what my life has been about, is getting ready so I'm there when the luck happens. And that's why so I I asked if I could use that as a um as a title that's a great great perfect well I think you know titles really help define a story and I think that having that title is what has caused you to

be yet again a number one bestseller because just picking up the book with that title, you think, wow, I wonder what this is about. And then what you've revealed in the pages. I love in the beginning where you say, I was trapped in a cycle of neglect and abuse. My parents didn't believe in me or my potential, but they held me to impossibly high and arbitrary standards. Nonetheless, if my father told me to do six things and I accomplished only five, there was hell to pay. And what's interesting to me about that is even the trauma and the challenges in our lives, they affect us and can be turned into power later on in our lives. Is that what you experienced? And that's why I told the story. I know you have the same experience. It's in a different format, but still, we have the same experience.

I wanted people not to know that I had a terrible childhood. Certainly, people have had worse childhoods than I did. But I wanted them to know that you can make a decision with enormous determination and change your life and not make that the definition of your life. And I just remember when I was 15, I remember making that decision. I wasn't going to live like this. That if I was dating somebody who so much has raised his voice to me, I was out of there. That I wanted to be with somebody who was supportive and positive. And I wanted to surround myself with people that were positive. Yeah. And what's so interesting about your story is that I was raised up in dire poverty and never having enough and all that. And if I were looking

at you from the outside, I would have thought yours is the perfect life and that's the family I want to belong to. And that's the way your mother and father wanted it to seem. And yet what is so important, I think, in you sharing these stories is that nothing is ever as it seems. And, you know, it's interesting because when Jeffrey, I met Jeffrey when I was 17, and he thought I had the perfect family. Yes, yes. And he thought, you know, my father was a doctor, my mother ran a real estate business. I mean, it all looked perfect. We were very, you know, upper middle class.

I went to great schools and, you know, everything looked great. And yet it was, the more I looked back, and I think as a child, I didn't understand that it was so different, that it was so wrong. I just thought, this is the way people grow up. And I think it took me until I was maybe 40 to really sort out how stressful that situation was and how wrong it was. Yeah. And you know, so it takes time. And you've said too, you say many times in this book and you show us, first of all, I love the pictures too. Thanks for including the pictures. Oh, thank you. Most memoirs have the pictures in the well, in the middle. And you have to sort out where's that picture from. Yes, yes, yes. My book designer, Mary Sarah Quinn, and I decided we wanted it to be a picture in the beginning of a chapter and a picture at the end of the chapter.

And maybe even a recipe from the story. Yes, that's why it's so beautiful. You've said many times that Jeffrey helped you find your voice. How so? Jeffrey never told me what to do. Which was so the opposite of what my upbringing was, where I was told how to do everything. He just made me feel like he believed that I could do anything and that we would talk stuff out,

and he would say, have you thought about this? And have you thought about that? And we would have a conversation about things. So he just made me, right from the beginning, he would say to me, do what you love. If you love it, you'll be really good at it. Because he knows I have a lot of enthusiasm and energy for things. He was so ahead of his time, though.

I mean, nobody was saying that then. Nobody was saying that in the 70s. I mean, when I was, you know, when we got married in 1968, he said to me, you need to do something with your life. Otherwise, you won't be happy. And it's funny. The other day when I made number one on the New York Times bestseller list, he turned to me. He said, you know, you really need to do something with your life. It just reminded me where it started.

It was just great. After all these years. But he just thought I was very capable and I would be happy if my life was productive. Yeah. If I did things I love doing. He was a man ahead of his time. And in 1978, you were working, writing nuclear energy policies at the White House. How crazy is that?

How crazy is that? I know. I look back and I think they left it to 25-year-olds. I can't even understand it. Ina Garten was writing energy policies. Okay. And then you see this ad in the New York Times. And what about that ad struck you?

I have no idea. We'll be right back with more of my conversation with the legendary Ina Garten. Hey there, I'm back with Ina Garten talking about her extraordinary memoir, Be Ready When the Luck Happens. I think when I was working at the White House, actually the whole time I was in Washington, I was teaching myself how to cook just because I thought it was fun. And I was buying old houses and renovating them because I thought it was fun. And I think my work was serious, but it wasn't really fun. And so I did these other things. I always thought I'd either go into the food business or I'd go

into real estate, and I didn't know which one it was. And so then I saw this ad for a specialty food store for sale in a place I'd never been before. It was in West Hampton Beach. And I thought, God, that sounds like fun. And I went home and told Jeffrey about it. And I said to him, I really need to do something fun. I really, you know, my job's just not fun. But you know what's so interesting to me? Your mom didn't, you weren't even allowed in the kitchen and she didn't like carbohydrates and only made your first carbohydrate meal. It was when Jeffrey came. When I married Jeffrey, I started at baking bread.

Yes, yes. This is great. I can make anything I want. It's not like you grew up in a home where you were learning to cook with your mom and your mom was teaching you different recipes. I think I was starving. I was starving for flavor. I was starving for fun. I was starving for connection. I was just starving. And then Jeffrey came along and he just encouraged my craziest whims. So you see this ad, you see this ad in the New York Times and you describe the moment that you

walked into the doors of the Barefoot Contessa's standing in that adorable little place you write named after an Ava Gardner movie surrounded by beautiful baked goods. Tell us what you felt when you stepped into that. Well, I had driven, Jeffrey and I had gotten in the car in Washington and driven, I don't know, like six hours to this small town in the Hamptons. And it was April. So it was dead. I mean, there was nobody in town. There wasn't even a cat walking down the middle of the street. And I turned into this little store. It was like 400 square feet. And they were baking chocolate chip cookies. And there were specialty cheeses, and there were smoked salmon, and there were dinners for sale.

And I just walked in and just inhaled the fragrance of it, the cookies baking and the cheeses. And it just looked like so much fun. And it just looked so pleasurable. And I just walked in and I thought, oh, this is where I want to be. You know, I wanted to come to work in sneakers and an apron and bake cookies. And if they sell, great.

If they don't sell, we'll bake something else. And it seemed to me like a big puzzle to figure out. And I love that. You weren't afraid at all of taking on something that you'd never done before? You weren't afraid at all of taking on something that you'd never done before? You weren't? I remember thinking at the time, this is crazy. I don't know how to run a specialty. I don't even know how to run a store. I'd never had an employee before. I didn't know anything. So I made a deal with the owner that she would stay with me for a month and teach me

what I needed to know. And she was a great teacher. And I remember thinking, do I really want to do this? And Jeffrey said, if you do what you love, if you love it, you'll be really good at it. And I thought, okay, I'm going to go for it. And looking back behind me at running, you know, writing nuclear energy policy papers, just that wasn't an option anymore. So I thought, this may not be where I end up, but I'm going to start the process. And, you know, who knew? Who knew that's where we were You certainly didn't know that a $20,000 investment would put you 13 times on the

bestseller list and that you would create this empire from... What did you expect to happen? Even better, it gave me a life that was just so much fun, surrounded with people that I love to work with, doing something I really care about, taking care of people. I mean, in the store, we've made dinner for them, which was taking care of them. But writing cookbooks, I feel like I'm giving people the tools

to make dinner for people around them. So they create a community for themselves. I love the fact that your first catering opportunity was a drug dealer and you didn't know that. And then after that, you learned from your mistakes. All right, check out who your customer is. I think a lot of women, Ina, are responding to your revelation that in the early days of Barefoot Contessa, that you had asked Jeffrey for a separation. What was going on? Well, I think, you remember, we got married in 1968. And the 70s women are kind of sorting things out. And when we got married, it was assumed that he would be the husband and I

would be the wife and I would make dinner and he would do the finances and we would have kind of prescribed roles. And I think those roles kind of annoyed me in the 70s. Even though Jeffrey thought of me as an equal, I just feel like, I don't know, we just had roles that we were playing. And then when I bought the store and I found I had my own business and I had my own life, I found those rules really confining. And so I just said to him, I just feel like I need to be on my own for a little while. And he, I mean, as Jeffrey would, he said, if you feel like you need to be on your own, you need to be on your own. And so we kind of took a break for about four months. As Jeffrey would, he said, if you feel like you need to be on your own, you need to be on your own. And so we kind of took a break for about four months.

And he was at the State Department. He went on this big trip around the world. And afterwards, at the end of the year, we met in Palm Springs. And we just talked. We just sat and talked about what he wanted and what I wanted. And he always has this great attitude. Let's just figure out what each of us wants and how we can do both of them. It's never about what he wants to do or what I want to do.

How can we do both of them? Wow. Sounds like the perfect mate. Sounds like the perfect mate. He's the best. He's the best. He really is. He should be a role model for every guy. Yeah.

I know you did a book, Cooking for Jeffrey. We should have all of Jeffrey's sayings. We need Jeffrey's philosophy. He really is so wise. He is. And so his advice is never, this will be good for me. His advice is always, this will be good for us. At one point, you were working so hard.

You describe this in the book that you decided to see a therapist therapist and you say that it was one of the most important decisions you've ever made. How did therapy help you and why did you need it at that time? I think I was working all the time and I wasn't having fun. And I remember going to her the first day and I said, I'm just not having fun. I mean, it's just I work all the time. And it's easy to get wrapped up in that. And these were the days, and it was true for us for a long time, when Jeffrey would leave on Monday. And if he was an investment banker, he'd go to New York or Zimbabwe or Costa Rica.

Or when he was in the government, he'd go to Washington on Monday and then come back on Friday. So the weekdays I pretty much had on my own. And I would just work all the time. And so I went to this therapist. And, I mean, we did a lot of really good work. But the first day she said to me, what would be fun? And I was like, I don't know. I really don't know.

Maybe a convertible. Maybe a masseuse. You know, just I needed something that wasn't work that would be fun. And she said, go do it. And so that week I rented a red Mustang convertible, which was so much fun. And I hired a masseuse who literally has been coming every single Sunday at six o'clock for 40 years. Wow. Isn't that amazing? Yes.

And I still have a convertible. Not the same one, but I have a convertible. And it was, you know, when I think back, very often when you can't, you know, when you're not having fun, you can't figure out what's fun. Yes. But I knew those two things would be fun, and they still are.

Wow. You know, I think this is a really important lesson for young women in particular. And I read where you fought like hell, you say, to protect your image when you wrote your first book that's now a classic, The Barefoot Contessa Cookbook. And the publishers were trying to change you, but you stuck to your own vision and wouldn't let them because I think they were trying to make you like Martha Stewart or Martha does it this way and all that.

What did you learn through that experience? Just trust your vision. I think the thing that works is if you're really true to who you are. If you believe in it so fiercely, somebody out there is going to believe in it too. It's true. It's not, I'm going to become this perky, whatever it is, person that people will love. Just do what you, just who you are, just put out who you are and do the best job you can possibly do. And I think people trust that

they, they, they honor that they believe in that. And I always see it as like I'm on a train and people are trying to pull me off the train and I just keep it right on the tracks. I just, if I feel like I'm so sure what I'm doing is right, I don't let people pull me off my game. Does it not, how do you discern then the difference between I feel that I am right and this is the right vision and being able to take in other information that could be helpful to enhance your vision? That's a really good, that's a really good question. More of my conversation with Ina Garten after these messages. So I'm glad you came back to join us with Ina Garten. Her memoir is called Be Ready When the Luck Happens.

What I tend to do is I talk to everybody in the beginning, and I get everybody's point of view, and we kind of build something together. But at the end of the day, it's my job to choose. And once I've got all the information in, and I love surrounding myself with really creative, smart people, once I've got all the information in, and I love surrounding myself with really creative, smart people, once I've got all the information in, I know exactly what the right thing to do is. Do you feel that way? I feel exactly the same way.

You take in all the information, you get everybody's ideas, and then instinctively you will know. Yes, and build. Yes, absolutely. But instinctively, you know what's right. Absolutely. And it's right for you. It may not be right for somebody else. That's right. Somebody may be able to say something that adds onto something that you were doing or change your perspective. I'm certainly always

open to that. And what I love about you too is that you understand that one of the secrets to success and I found this too, is treating your people well. And I loved in those early days when everybody was working 22-hour days. So hard. So hard. And they were college kids. Yes. I mean, they weren't even professionals. I mean, they were, but they were

young. Yes. And that when you would close at the end of the summer, that you'd have a big party and celebrate them all? Yeah, I would. I think it's, and it's really important to me. I love working with happy people. And you have to invest in that. So, yeah. Yes. You share a few lessons.

At the end of the day, I want to come to work and have fun. Yes, and you want the people around you. Yeah, you want to surround yourself with happy people. So you share a few lessons that you've learned from, I think, your decades of barefoot business experiences. Can you give us, what are your top two that you want our listeners and viewers to know? I think one of the things I learned from writing the book, and I hadn't really thought about it before, is that I always do what's in front of me today. I do the best job I can possibly do on it. And then at the end of the

day, I decide what I'm going to do tomorrow, get everything organized so that I can do it tomorrow. I don't have a long-term vision. I don't have a goal. I don't think, oh, I want to get over there in a year. I don't have a five-year plan. I never did either. I just do the best job I can't think, oh, I want to get over there in a year. I don't have a five-year plan. I never did either. I just do the best job I can do now, and then tomorrow I'm going to do the best job I can do then. And things happen along the way. And I think if you're looking at your goals,

first of all, the goals are the wrong goals because things happen along the way that you would never have imagined, like television coming along. I mean, I would never have imagined being on television. It just wouldn't have occurred to me. And it turned out to be a great thing. So I don't have those long-term goals. And I think it leaves people,

it left me at least to do a really good job because I'm not busy looking around. I'm just doing a good job on what I have in front of me. And it also leaves me open to what things that might come along. I love that too. I never had a five-year vision plan either. You didn't either? Yes.

I am just living. That is my philosophy. You live this moment as powerfully as you can, and that leads you to the next one and to the next one. And you do your best in every single circumstance, and it leads you to the next one and to the next one. And you do your best in every single circumstance and it leads you to the next one. So no, I never did. Isn't that interesting? I never really thought about it until I wrote the book. And actually, I was talking to Stephen Colbert and he said he has the same philosophy. So it's obviously working for some people. Well, it works for some people. And then, you know, there are other people

like Stedman has visions and vision that he has all, you know, operates from a very different kind of strategic kind of driven force that I that I never have been. It doesn't work for me. You reference a quote that I think I counted around five times in the book. It's something that Jeffrey had said early on to you in your relationship. He said, you never know your good breaks from your bad ones. Isn't that a great quote? Oh, that Jeffrey. Jeffrey does it again.

He really is. That Jeffrey. I mean, it really means something bad happens, and you don't know whether it's bad. It could turn out to be the best thing that ever happened. That's right. It opens to something else. It opens to something else that wouldn't have happened.

And it's, I mean, in my show, Be My Guest, it's been really interesting because so many of the people who are guests have had something really horrible happen to them. And they didn't let it stop them. They pushed right through it and they figured it out and they kept going and their success wouldn't have happened if that bad thing hadn't happened. That's right. And it's so interesting to me to see that happen

over and over and over again. Well, I have to say, when you were able to take everything that, I believe that we all do this and that the people who do it the most powerfully end up being successful is taking everything that has happened to you in your childhood, the good things and the bad things, the things that you wish for and didn't get the things that you did and using that as a force in your life, you know, to create the luck for yourself. Can you see how you did that? I don't, I think my, the force was that I was determined not to recreate that. Yes. And I think a lot of people say, I'm not going to live in that, in that world. I'm going to

create a different one. And then they end up marrying somebody who's just like their parents. Like their parents. Am I right about that? Oh yes, most people do. Because it's just like their parents. Am I right about that? Oh, yes. Most people do. Because it's comfortable. I think the thing I learned from... It's comfortable and familiar.

That's the reason why it happens because it's so familiar. Yes. I think I learned from a difficult childhood when I was uncomfortable. I learned to, sounds strange, but be comfortable with being uncomfortable. And I kind of use that to push myself to places that are not comfortable, like starting a specialty food store when I don't know what I'm doing. I love the challenge. I love to decide what I'm going to do as opposed to somebody else deciding it and then really challenging myself to see if I can do it.

And every time I think there's no way in hell that this is going to work out, but I'm going to try doing it anyway. And it always turns out better than I thought, which is, I don't know. I just keep doing it over and over again. So there must be something there. What I found so interesting about you from the book is I was surprised to learn that your hobbies and jobs, and I think it was also Jeffrey who encouraged you to try different kinds

of things, including those early years when you're working at a place called the Body Shop and you thought they were not repairing cars. It turned out to be a strip club. I had no idea. Yes, yes, yes. That job lasted a week. Yes. But you were an airplane pilot. You worked in a bookstore where you got fired. You were an analyst at NASDAQ, a secretary, as you say, at a strip club. And so you were just always open to trying new things until you found the thing that landed with you. Yeah. My therapist actually described it as a lot of people stand on the side of the pond convincing themselves there's something, you know, that pond is dangerous, that bad things are in that pond. But you can't figure out what you want to do until you jump into the pond. And then when you're in the pond, you figure out where the stream is, where the stream is carrying you along. you along. If you're knocking against the riverbanks, then you're not in the right stream.

But if the stream is just carrying you along, that's the right stream for you. And I think that's why we have to try different things. It's not like I want to be a lawyer, I want to be a doctor. You just try different things and see which one works and which one feels exciting and that where you feel like, you know, it's's carrying you along and I think that's what I've been able to find at each point in my life and it's just been it's just been amazing what I also love about the book is that it is a food adventure you share recipes and take us into your creative process uh and I love what you wrote on page, I love this on page 148. And when I read it, that is true. You said, one thing I learned and continue to learn every day is that the food we enjoy most connects to our deepest memories of when we felt happy, comfortable, and nurtured.

That is true. It is true, isn't it? What are yours? What are those foods for you? Well, I've really created it since then because I have none for my child. I mean, nobody would say broiled chicken and canned vegetables. That's right. Peas and fish at your table, I recall. Yes. Exactly. Peas and fish.

I think that I probably was always craving that. And I think in a funny way, if when you're a child, I mean, this wasn't me, but you're forbidden candy. All you want is candy. So I think since we were forbidden things that were delicious and felt good, you know, if I asked my mother for something, you know, for a cookie, she would just go, oh, just to eat an apple. She was always annoyed. I was like, nobody thinks that an apple is an appropriate substitution for a cookie. Yes. So I think as soon as I got married, I remember getting Craig Claiborne's The New York Times cookbook.

And I was making challah. I was making mashed potatoes. I was making stews and chili and things that were just satisfying. And, you know, that's, I think one of the things in my books is that my first requirement is just the title tell you what it is. It's lemon chicken with orzo. You think, well, that sounds good. That's a good combination. And that sounds like it would be satisfying to eat. So my first requirement when I'm writing a recipe is, what is the title? And then the second one is, what does the photograph look like?

Does it look delicious? Wow. I love the fact that you bring us into that process and that there are recipes just coming out of you all the time, that there are ideas coming out of you all the time still. It still is that stimulating for you. It is. I mean, after I finish a book i think that my team

is always like you're going to start right right away i'll make a list of 50 ideas of recipes that i want to work on and every morning i'll get up and think or at night i'll decide which one i'm going to do tomorrow so i have the ingredients for it and i'll just go you know it's a it's a it's a hot summer day and you know i'm going to make a salad or I'm going to make some grilled thing. Or if it's a cold winter day, I feel like I'm making some kind of a soup or stew. A stew, yes. And I'll pick something off the list and just start working on it. And I think one of the reasons why you've been on the bestseller list, obviously,

13 times is because of exactly what you were saying, is that every recipe feels like coming home to yourself in some way. Yes, it feels. And also, I'm very conscious of the person who's reading the book. Yes. It's very important to me, kind of the user experience, like, is somebody going to want to make this? And then I literally give the recipe to my team and I just say, can I watch you make this? So I see if they're going to have any problems making it. Do they have any questions about the text? Are they going to cut the carrots the right way?

I'm really conscious that I want somebody at home using the book to feel good about it and to know that they've got the recipe right. I do so thank you all for listening. We'll be right back in a moment with Ina Garten. Thanks for staying with us and welcome back to my conversation with Ina Garten, best-selling author and Food Network star. Do you still like hosting a dinner party?

Does it bring you- I do, but they've gotten smaller and smaller. Really? I used to like to have big parties, but now I like really small ones, like six people around a round table. What kind of parties do you like to give? I like six to eight.

Six to eight, six to eight. 10 max, because once you get to 12, it's hard to manage everybody in the same conversation at a table it's also a lot of dishes and a lot of food and it's a lot of glasses and a lot of yes yes i'd rather do like two parties of six than one party of 12 you're absolutely really can connect with each other absolutely absolutely and at the end of the day why we give parties you're doing it to connect yes you're doing it to connect. Yes, you're doing it to connect.

And do you have any tips for keeping everybody in the same conversation? Yes, I do. Actually, it's funny. I've developed this over the years. If I know all the guests, I can do this in advance. But if somebody brings a guest, you know, bring somebody and I don't know them, I always assess who the two most talkative people in the group are. And I make sure they're seated.

I always have a round table, so I have them seated at opposite sides of the table because if the two talkative people are sitting next to each other, they end up talking to each other, and everybody else is left out. But if the talkative people are opposite each other and the quieter people on the other quadrant, everybody's part of the same party. That is a good idea. And even if it's a rectangular, does that sound right to you?

Yeah, that's absolutely a good idea. Yes, because you're right. The two talkative people end up just talking to each other, and then everybody else is in their own conversation. Yes. Yeah. Yes. So I always kind of choreograph the table where people sit by that.

Tell me this. What brings you the greatest joy now? Do you still get the greatest joy from creating the recipes, being a part of the empire that you've created, being with your team every day? What brings you joy? It's a very small empire. Yes.

I mean, my team is like the three of us. We meet at my office every day and we decide what we're all going to do. So it's, what I like is very hands-on. I like, I don't like doing a million different things and not feeling like I'm doing them well. I like doing one thing at a time. I like working on recipes and writing books and then doing TV and then going back to writing books. I really like that. I also like having things that are not work that are creative that I do. So I love working on the garden.

I'm not in the garden myself, but designing what the garden is going to be. I always have some kind of construction project, renovating the house or building something. I just like to feel that I have a life outside work that's creative as well as having a creative work life. I'm sure you did think about this, and you hinted at it earlier in our conversation, that once you do the research on your life and you take the time

to do a serious memoir like this one, that you have a different kind of assessment of your life and you see your role and your purpose differently. What do you think your purpose and your gift to the planet has been? I think writing the book has really made me realize this. Yeah. I think the thing that we can do is matter to each other, is that my work matters to other people. And it can be as simple as I've given somebody a recipe for a coconut cake and they've made it for their family

and their family goes, you made this yourself? So it makes me feel like what I've done, I've given them something that makes them feel good. And that matters to me. And the thing about mattering, which a very good friend of mine, Jenny Wallace, talks about mattering and she's writing about it, is that it's so actionable that we can do things that

make other people feel they matter to us. And that makes them feel good and vice versa. And it's as simple as bringing a pot of chicken soup to a friend who's sick. You're saying to that person, you matter to me. And that makes them feel good and it makes you feel good. And I feel like my books have mattered to people. And the TV show, so many people said I taught them how to cook, which is just amazing to me. I did it because I thought it'd be fun to do, but to have that as the legacy of it is just fabulous. Yes. And I think that really is everybody's legacy is did my work matter to people? Yes.

As yours obviously has done for decades. Well, Maya Angelou shared with me my favorite quote of all time, and that is that your legacy is never one thing. It's every life you touch. And in your case, it's every dish you've made. It's every recipe you've shared. It's every person who's now made that recipe and shared it with somebody else. That becomes your legacy. So that gift continues to unfold as an offering

of wonderful dishes, parties, people coming together with... Oprah. Yes. Thank you. That is what you've done. That is what you've done. And one of the reasons why I wanted to do this podcast is to talk, particularly in these times, about what matters to us all.

So I end this question with you. What matters to you now most? What mostly matters to us all? So I end this question with you. What matters to you now most? What mostly matters to you? What matters to me is taking care of people and that I give people the tools to take care of other people. I think we just need to stay connected. I think the world is very stressful.

And I think the more we can create a community around ourselves and take care of the people around us, the more we can deal with the difficulties. And I think cooking brings people together and it makes us feel good about ourselves. And it's not about being with people that love us. It's about being with people that we feel love for. And we can do that with cooking. I love that so much. All right.

Tell us how to be ready when the luck happens. Do the work. I think a lot of people say, how can I have a show on Food Network? Well, you know what? Bobby Flay said to somebody, first you have to wash the dishes in the kitchen and then you have to learn how to chop vegetables. And then maybe you go to culinary school and you need to do the work. You can't just go directly to a show on Food Network. You need the experience and the knowledge and the information that you can share with others.

And the truth is, had you not had that experience and learned what it means to run a kitchen, to have employees, to be able to, you wouldn't have been able to be prepared when the opportunity for the show came along. And an opportunity which you turned down multiple times. For years. For years, you thought you weren't ready. You thought you weren't ready.

I really, I thought, who wants to watch me cook on TV? I guess I was wrong. Turns out millions of people do, Ina. Turns out millions of us do. Ina Garten, thank you for the gift that this book is. And I know a lot of people feel it's like a blueprint, actually, for building the life of their own dreams. That's what you've done. Be Ready When the Luck Happens is available now anywhere you buy your books. And you can also download the audio version to hear Ina tell her own story. So if you're listening to the podcast, you can head over to my YouTube channel to watch the full video. Thank you so much, Ina. Thank you for being with us. Oh, thank you. Just such a joy to be with you.

Oh, a joy to be with you from your attention. You can subscribe to the Oprah Podcast on YouTube and follow us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen. I'll see you next week. Thanks, everybody. you