The recipes that made Ina Garten Famous! (2024)

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The recipes that made Ina Garten Famous!? ›

Barefoot Contessa cookbooks

She carried on the Barefoot Contessa name in her 1999 sleeper bestseller, The Barefoot Contessa Cookbook. The book far exceeded both Garten's and publisher Clarkson Potter's expectations, containing the recipes that made her store successful.

Barefoot Contessa cookbooks

She carried on the Barefoot Contessa name in her 1999 sleeper bestseller, The Barefoot Contessa Cookbook. The book far exceeded both Garten's and publisher Clarkson Potter's expectations, containing the recipes that made her store successful.

For over 20 years, Ina Garten has shared her comforting and foolproof recipes with the world through her beloved cookbooks and "Barefoot Contessa" show. But before becoming a Food Network star, Garten wrote budgets at the White House and ran a Hamptons grocery store.

The Barefoot Contessa's simple, meticulously tested recipes have helped drag me out of every cooking rut I've ever found myself in. Happily for all of us, Garten has shared a number of her recipes (and cooking tips) with Food & Wine.

She mastered her cooking skills by working her way through Julia Child's "Mastering the Art of French Cooking." "I would have to say that Julia Child's my biggest culinary inspiration because she really taught me how to cook through her cookbooks," Garten told Today.

And Ina has that. She says it's just in her DNA. The rest is history: She didn't attend cooking school or learn from a grandmother, but she picked up skills out of necessity while running her specialty food store, Barefoot Contessa.

If it's a complicated recipe and I'm in the kitchen for most of the day, it's going to be worth the effort.” Garten meticulously crafts each recipe so even the most inexperienced of cooks can make them — perhaps the only skill set that transferred over from her budget analyst job.

According to Celebrity Net Worth, Ina Garten's net worth in 2024 is estimated at $60 million. When combined with that of her husband Jeffrey, that amount is estimated at a whopping $120 million.

Instead, he decided to trust Ina. Having made most of them, he has learned that the recipes always work if you follow them closely, and that when they are not simple, the extra steps are worth it. He said the feeling of mastery her recipes provide is what makes Ms. Garten so popular with inexperienced cooks.

Not just any old oatmeal will do when it comes to the Barefoot Contessa. "I've had the same thing for breakfast every single day for ten years: coffee and McCann's quick-cooking Irish oatmeal," Garten told Bon Appétit in a 2017 article. And her love of the stuff is well-documented.

What is the simplest dish in the world to cook according to Ina Garten? ›

The Simplest Dish In The World To Make, According To Ina Garten. After testing recipes for various projects all day, Ina Garten prefers to make something simple, quick, and ready straight out of the oven. Her favored dish is roast chicken.

1. Consommé Devilish dish: A clear soup made from meat, tomato, egg whites and stock, slowly simmered to bring impurities to the surface for skimming. Techn-eeek: Even some of the most experienced chefs cannot master the complex clarification process required to make consommé.

Garten is Jewish by birth and heritage, as is her husband, but rarely refers to her religion and ethnicity, though they are showcased through the inclusion of classic Jewish cooking in her television show and cookbooks, when she makes such dishes as rugelach, challah, and brisket.

Flay and Garten have been friends and colleagues for decades, so it's no surprise that Flay has such respect for her person and her cooking. And Garten has returned that love in kind. In an interview with the Food Network, Garten waxed impressed about the staggering achievements and stamina of Flay.

Ina husband, Jeffrey, is also a financial powerhouse. According to Celebritynetworth.com, Jeffrey is worth $100 million, mostly thanks to his former jobs as managing director of Lehman Brothers and Blackstone Group.

In a previous life, Garten worked at the White House, and her responsibilities were pretty impressive. She actually wound up working in the Office of Management and Budget, and later worked for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission where she was responsible for the budget of the nation's nuclear arsenal (via Vox).

Believe it or not, Ina Garten wasn't always the beloved cookbook author and TV personality that we all know and love. Before becoming wildly successful in the food world, Garten worked at the White House as a nuclear budget analyst.

"So many people ask, 'What does Barefoot Contessa mean?' It was the original name of my specialty food store after a movie with Ava Gardner and Humphrey Bogart," she writes, adding that for her "it means being both elegant and earthy," two personas which we think Garten has perfected.