I have never not liked Ina Garten.
I remember in the good ol’ days of the early 2000s when her show first began, I would watch her on Food Network where she would gently hold my attention. My mom would often make her recipes for dinner and we all enjoyed them.
Ina’s existence was much like the air I breathe, a constant force in my life that I regularly took for granted.
However, recently, I have been awakened to what has always been true. Ina Garten is one of the greatest humans to ever have lived.
It all started last December when I had one of the shittiest jobs1 I had taken in a while. I had a mini mental breakdown while on the job and was advised it might help if I find an audiobook to listen to in the car.2
I chose to listen to “Be Ready When the Lucky Happens” by Ina Garten and boy did I choose right. I had bought the book as a gift for my mom for Christmas and felt inspired to hear the story myself.
I was really struck by her terrible childhood. I honestly had no idea. There’s never been any reason to suggest she would have faced such cold neglect based on the way she carries herself with such peace, ease, and self-assuredness. I feel healed in her presence. She lets me know that a happy ending is possible.
I also hadn’t realized Jeffrey had been in her life so long3. I was kind of fascinated by the role he played in her life.
The truth is, she probably wouldn’t be who she is today if he hadn’t been in her life. He supported her4, encouraged her, and believed in her!! When they needed a separation period in their 30s to find themselves, he didn’t argue, he didn’t push, he didn’t stop loving her.
Honestly, I found all of this to be kind of revelatory for my world view. I’ve always felt5 that most romantic relationships are more of a weight and hindrance than a help. To know that there is even one pretty healthy, long lasting, loving relationship in the world that has helped both partners grow into versions of themselves greater than what they could have achieved alone felt like, an insane thought.
I just feel so relaxed in her world, and I do not feel relaxed otherwise.6 I guess it’s just my nature, but I seem to need to escape to a rich white lady fantasy worlds these days7.
So lately, when it comes to consuming content, I have turned to the loving arms of Ina Garten.8
First, there is Back to Basics.
I literally binged all of Season 1 in less than a week.
Here are things of note:
1. Barefoot Contessa: The Musical9:
I literally c r i e d after I watched this. Tears ~streaming~ down my face.
2. The Food
Funnily enough, Ina’s catch phrase is, “How bad can that be?” and I admit, as much as I absolutely adore her, I often find myself answering, “oh it could be bad.”
She will also ask, “who wouldn’t want that?” and I’m like, “me. I would not want that. I deeply don’t want that.”
For example, in the very episode where the pure magic of Barefoot Contessa: The Musical occurred, she makes Lobster Corn Chowder with bacon. It also contains milk, heavy cream, and white wine.
Obviously taste is personal, so apparently everyone loves this and I’m happy for them. I would just go without food rather than eat this.
For starters, I hate seafood. I barely like seaweed. I find it unnatural to eat any living creature that comes from a body of water. The thought of it makes me gag.
Then, this has to be like the least kosher meal on the planet. It’s not like I intentionally keep kosher myself, because I don’t. I just find the combination of seafood and milk to be disgusting… plus bacon!? You had to bring a pig into this boiled pot from hell?
Ina does not hold back when it comes to handling meat.10 In one episode, she shares how to hack into backside of a chicken carcass and rip out its spine. It’s extremely graphic. It reminded me of the very reason I try my best to be a vegetarian11
In a more recent episode from her interview series, “Be My Guest,” Ina and Nathan Lane make mussels in some kind of milky saffron sauce.
Nathan Lane says12: Oh, so those mussels in that bowl of water and flour are alive?
Ina Garten: Yes
Nathan Lane: Oh that’s very sad.
Ina Garten: 13 Ladies and gentlemen, this is very sad. They've lived their lives for this moment. So you can have fabulous mussels and saffron. It's a sad end for the muscles. They don't know what's going to happen, They're just hanging out in the water.
Nathan Lane: I know, but you think a lobster might have told them something was gonna happen.
Ina Garten: So I'm just going to drain it because you don't want them to know, they're wondering where are we, where are we going?
…. Right, okay, we need salt and pepper. Put in two teaspoons of salt And one teaspoon of pepper.
Okay, and now more wine, of course, cup of wine.
Nathan Lane: All the muscles will be happy.
Ina Garten: Very happy. They won't even know what hit them. Right, They'll have no idea and they'll die with smiles on their faces and I put a little bit of water in just to thin it out.
Honestly, psychotic. I love it.14
3. Barefoot Epistemology
One particular Saturday15 I watched an episode of Back to Basics and thought, “okay just one more and then I’ll get up and do something else.”
Watching one more episode of Back to Basics happened at least five more times in a row, until I had spent the good part of a day doing literally nothing else.
However, I did not feel any guilt about this, just a sort of quiet awe that this show could hold my rapt attention. Few things in this scattered age have held my focus quite like Ina has.
I was also astonished because, for all intents and purposes, very little happens in every episode.
Sure, Ina will deliver on 3 or so meals of varying levels of appeal16 and we will meet some of Ina’s successful friends17.
The biggest challenges that happen in the series are:
— Ina’s hot gay friend T.J. promises to make one of her dessert recipes for a “potluck” dinner, but he caves and buys store bought meringues.
— Ina thinks Jeffrey is chained to his desk all day18
— Ina’s friends are away on vacation and coming home so late to an empty fridge, that she must come to their rescue with truffle mac and cheese ready to be popped into the oven
Basically, there is absolutely no conflict whatsoever.
This struck me, because as someone who has spent her life studying the crafts of film and television, one of the principal rules you are taught all the time is that you NEED CONFLICT to create an engaging story.
You might argue, this is a cooking show! Of course it doesn’t have any conflict!
But I counter that even another very gentle, easy-breezy beloved baking program, The Great British Bake-Off, has more conflict baked in19 than “Back to Basics.”
My issue with this narrative that all stories need conflict is that it potentially means that we are trained to look and think about conflict at all times. It’s like we might even sometimes create conflict unnecessarily just so we won’t be bored.
Yes, I am linking to my grad school short film, but only because in this I literally question the widely held, rarely questioned adage that you always need conflict to engage and move people. I wondered if the insistence on conflict in storytelling was a symptom of patriarchy.
"What about dance sequences?” I’d think. I like those. There’s usually no conflict there.20
”Or what about scenes where people are just being really good to each other?”
At first, I felt convinced that “Back to Basics” proved my theory that meaningful entertainment could indeed exist without any conflict whatsoever.
Because even though they are light, each episode of “Back to Basics” does tell a story. For example, Ina’s friend Miguel is taking photos of historic homes in the Hampton’s and will be over in two hours for dinner, can she make something out of what she has in the pantry?21
But then as I thought about it more, I stopped being sure that “Back to Basics” acted as the proof I’ve been looking for that one can escape conflict when it comes to a piece of culture that expresses an aspect of the human experience.
Because the truth is, there is lots of conflict surrounding “Back to Basics.”
For one, there is her deprived, sad, abused childhood, which perhaps lingers ever so subtly in the background. I never watch her lavish lifestyle and think, “you don’t deserve this Ina! Fuck you!”
No, of course not. I think, “Oh I am so happy for you Ina. I wish all of this and more for you, you perfect angel.”
Perhaps it is only because she has already overcome her life’s major conflicts that I am able to enjoy her fully in her excess. Maybe if it were not for the years of sadness and loneliness she suffered, her Hampton paradise might ring more hallow.
Then, there are of course, the conflicts I am facing in my own life.22 There was a reason I started retreating into Inaland in the first place.
I never watched six episodes of “Back to Basics” in a row on a Saturday when the show first aired in 2002. Granted, I was 13 or something, but even if I had been a thirty-something at that time, I doubt I would have felt the need to retreat to Ina’s perfect, idyl world. At that time in my life, no matter my age, I bet I would have still believed the American Dream was possible for me, and I would have been out and about trying to make that happen.
So, perhaps my love of “Back to Basics” actually has everything to do with conflict.
Whatever the deeper meanings of the Barefoot Contessa legacy may or may not be, all I know is that for the foreseeable future I will likely keep visiting Ina, Jeffrey, and friends in the Hamptons. How could that be bad?23
basically being an elf for the rich and famous
the job entailed driving across the expanse of LA, areas of which have since caught on fire
pretty much all of it except her childhood! she was a teen when they met!!
emotionally as well as financially
based on my experiences
I need not explain the context of my present moment
see also, Nancy Meyers
I deleted Instagram and YouTube and replaced both with “Back to Basics” and “Be My Guest” which is honestly the most mentally healthy thing I have ever done in my life
okay yes, I got back on YouTube for a second, but only to share this specific clip with you!!
pun intended
I am not perfect, but I’m probably more vegetarian than most
I am paraphrasing
I actually found a transcript of the whole conversation so from this point forward it’s verbatim
even if I do not love mussels, or the idea of boiling any living creature alive
Shabbat
She insists on salt, which is a lot for my taste.
ie. Rob Marshall, who was basically directing “Chicago” during this Season 1 era
He is not. He is out shopping for a romantic surprise for their anniversary
pun once again intended
okay yes there are dance battles, I get it
yes, a risotto, which I actually would eat and I bet is delicious
Existing in Los Angeles, which is in America, in the year of our dark lord 2025
You know what’s insane? There’s actually more I can think to say about Ina, like how I love the title of her memoir because she is so honest about how luck is involved in success which I admire and appreciate, but I will stop.
Did you end up cooking any of her recipes? I wanna know what you enjoyed.
Love this! She is beautiful as are you. Thanks for sharing the short film too. I really related to it and thought it was soooo well done ❤️