From Demystifying Food
This just in: Rachael Ray, wildly popular TV cook who's never at a loss for words, has been struck speechless. Eyewitness accounts report that one word silenced the gabby Food Network star: figs. Well, almost one word. An intrepid admirer inquired which kind of figs Ray used in her recipe for Montepulciano chicken -- calimyrna or black mission -- and an unprecedented silence ensued. For about three seconds. Ray shot her visitor an incredulous look, then managed a nifty recovery. "What kind of figs?" she stammered. "Why, grocery-store figs, of course!"That's as complicated as cooking gets with Rachael Ray, 37, author of 30-Minute Meals and $40 a Day, who disdains the pretensions associated with the gourmet food universe. "I have a certain rule," she explains during a recent stove-top session in a sweltering Manhattan loft kitchen. "If I can't find an ingredient on an upstate New York grocery store shelf, I take it out. Simple as that. And when I write a cookbook, if I need an unusual spice in a recipe, I make sure I use it in six more recipes so that people won't get stuck with things they will never use again."
Such is the down-to-earth approach that Ray has perfected, drawing legions of faithful viewers to her TV shows, and something she hopes to expand on in her new magazine, Every Day With Rachael Ray. Published by the Reader's Digest Association, it hits the newsstands in October. "The magazine is where it will all come together," she says, "everything I've been working toward for the past four years. I want people to be more adventurous in the kitchen without having to worry about fussy details -- without being intimidated. And I intend to simplify the process for them with useful information, great recipes and simple preparations."
It seems so ridiculously, well, simple. Her idea is to make the kitchen a more interactive workplace and to demystify the process of throwing together a fabulous-tasting meal. No question, she's revolutionized everyday cooking by making it look easy. No fancy chopping methods, no exact measurements (she says measuring ingredients "would feel too much like science class"). Her inventive recipes satisfy time and budget constraints without skimping on taste.
Which brings us back to the silky-rich Montepulciano chicken that simmers noisily on a back burner of the stove. It's a one-two-three-step dish she created in honor of her wedding to John Cusimano, lead singer for The Cringe. The event took place in Italy in September, and will be featured in an upcoming issue of the magazine. "This was intended as a variation on coq au vin, but John told me I couldn't do that in 30 minutes; it was a whole-day affair," Ray says, rolling her eyes with exaggerated exasperation. "So I just cut some corners and threw in grocery-store figs to thicken it and give it sweetness."
The process, as she barrels through it, resembles one of her inimitable shows: straightforward, slightly irreverent, and seemingly off-the-cuff. But behind the scenes, Rachael Ray is a whirligig, everywhere at once -- furiously prepping vegetables, swigging bottled water, feeding the crew, gabbing on a cell phone that seems to be permanently attached to her ear, rummaging through a wardrobe for an upcoming costume change. New book projects beckon, the fifth year of her TV shows demand attention, and the magazine photo shoot is exhausting. It's a torrid pace, and Ray has a very hard time staying focused on any one thing, although she rejects the suggestion that she is spread too thin.
A Vision of Simplicity
"I've got so much energy I don't know what to do with it," she says, while instructing a makeup consultant how to touch up her hair. One of those ongoing projects is her image, less overtly glamorous than girl-next-door. And yet her appearance dazzles. Ray is short, with plenty of soft curves and a wide, toothy smile. Meanwhile, nothing seems to ruffle her.When confronted with the description that she is always cool-headed, she shakes her head in protest. "No, no, I'm an impatient girl -- and not at all like Martha Stewart," she says, wiping a knife blade on her jeans and dumping some garlic into the sauce. "I can't bake, and I can't make a pot of coffee. Besides, I make a huge mess in the kitchen. That's why I have a big dog! But I have a knack for putting things together."
That whopper, delivered with a straight face, makes her the queen of the understatement. Ray not only puts things together, she does so with more panache than a French couturier. Still, she's careful to rub the gloss off it, which may be an unconscious nod to her working-class upbringing.
Between preparations, she pulls a tray of meat out of the refrigerator and begins hurling it into a pot. "This is for my grandpa's Christmas pasta, which I'm going to adapt for the magazine. Everything went into his gravy: pork, spareribs, sausages, veal, grouse, anything he caught the day before."
Rachael Ray was raised in Lake George, New York, under the shadow of the Adirondacks and the watchful eye of her Sicilian grandfather, a father of ten who once worked as a liquor runner to pay for shoes for his kids, and is remembered as "the great cook of the family." Her parents divorced when she was 12, although each contributed individual components to her passion and palate.
"My father, who is from Louisiana, is a great slow-cook," she says. "His gumbo takes three days." But it is her mother, Elsa, whom she credits most for the boundless Rachael Ray persona that looms in the public eye. "I wanted to be just like my mother. She was loud and fierce, a great piece of work. She was four-foot-eleven in stiletto heels, which she always wore, and she did the work of any twelve men."
Ray adopted that Darwinian ethic, then took it on the road, working behind food counters, on kitchen production lines, and as a bus girl and barmaid, always watching, watching, watching. And waiting -- waiting for the right opportunity, no doubt, to stake her own claim.
Predictably, she landed in New York City in the early 1990s, "but I got mugged twice within two weeks, so I moved back upstate," where it seemed less threatening to nurse her ambition.
Her patience and persistence paid off. A cooking course she devised to boost sales at an Albany gourmet market proved so popular that a local TV station convinced her to turn it into a weekly segment for the evening news, which quickly blossomed into a series, followed by cookbooks, appearances, a devoted fan base, the works. An empire was born.
Ray maintains her life has been "a total accident," but that is so much blather. There is a savvy, methodical approach to her success, which is personified by her signature cooking. It looks "thrown together" or "simple," as she puts it, on the surface "a total accident," but that's merely a trick to disguise the fact that there is more on the plate than meets the eye. Everything she touches, especially her image, is a vision of simplicity that packs a wallop.
She smiles guilefully as she ladles a mound of Montepulciano chicken on a dish. "Whaddya think?" she asks, with a twinkle in her eye. But she already knows the answer. Its flavors are deep, satisfying and ridiculously complex. "Now I'm gonna simplify it for you," she says, and goes right back to work.