Before Ina Garten’s memoir had hit bookshelves, everyone was abuzz about one topic: her separation from Jeffrey. Yes, the Barefoot Contessa—the Food Network star and cookbook author whose 56-year marriage had become the stuff of legend, particularly in Hollywood, where divorce seems inevitable—thought she and her husband might not make it.
This was the woman who wrote an entire cookbook devoted to their relationship! It was shocking—and yet, somehow refreshing. Her fairytale wasn’t a fairytale; Garten was living in the real world, full of ups and downs. And, despite her signature catchphrase, not everything can be summed up with a simple, “how easy is that?”
Honestly, that’s the folly that I—and so many others—made. We conflated her signature easygoing, store-bought-is-fine vibe with her whole life. And, as her new memoir Be Ready When the Luck Happens reveals, it wasn’t all lucky breaks. But it did involve treating every break as if it could be.