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| Birth Name(s) : Rachael Ray |
Date of Birth: N/A |
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Single
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| Profession:
Model |
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Full Rachael Ray Biography
Rachael Domenica Ray (born August 25, 1968 in Glens Falls, New York) is an Emmy-award winning television personality and author, who currently hosts the syndicated talk/lifestyle program Rachael Ray and two Food Network series, 30 Minute Meals and Rachael Ray's Tasty Travels. Ray has also written a series of cookbooks based on the 30 Minute Meals concept, and launched a successful magazine, Every Day with Rachael Ray, in 2005.
Prior to the launch of her talk show, Ray hosted two other Food Network shows, $40 a Day and Inside Dish.
She also appeared in a few commercials for Schenectady-based grocery chain Price Chopper, which stocks all her books at their stores and retains her as an occasional spokesperson. Ray owns homes in Lake Luzerne, New York and Manhattan's Greenwich Village. On September 24, 2005 in Montalcino, Tuscany, Italy, Ray married John M. Cusimano, the lead singer of the band The Cringe.
Ray teaches simple recipes that she claims can be prepared in 30 minutes or less. She uses garlic and chicken stock as simple ways to boost flavors. She often uses recipes that include her Italian, French, and American heritage, and Ray emphasizes using fresh herbs whenever possible. She believes that measuring "takes away from the creative, hands-on process of cooking" and instead favors approximations such as "half a palmful" and "eyeball." On her television programs she has used catchphrases such as "E.V.O.O. (extra-virgin olive oil)", "yum-o," "so delish," "G.B." (garbage bowl), "Oh my gravy!", "stoup" (cross between a soup and stew), and "how good is THAT?" She often refers to sandwiches as "sammies."
She states: she cannot bake (because you have to measure ingredients), and is notorious for burning bread under the broiler. Ray says her Sicilian maternal grandfather, Emmanuel Scuderi, served as a strong influence on her cooking. To critics of her shortcut techniques, Ray responds, "I have no formal anything. I'm completely unqualified for any job I've ever had."
On November 12, 2006 Mario Batali and Rachael defeated the team of Bobby Flay and Giada De Laurentiis on an episode of the program Iron Chef America which featured the use of cranberries as the secret ingredient.
In 2007, The Oxford American College Dictionary announced the addition of the term EVOO, short for Extra Virgin Olive Oil, to its dictionary, a term which Rachael Ray has helped popularize.
In addition to Oprah, Ray has appeared on The View, The Today Show, The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, The Late Show with David Letterman, Late Night with Conan O'Brien, and Larry King Live.
Reader's Digest launched Ray's eponymous magazine, Every Day with Rachael Ray on October 25, 2005. The magazine featured seven issues in 2006. It will increase to ten issues in 2007.
Ray has endorsed products for Price Chopper supermarkets, and promotes a "Best in Fresh with Rachael Ray" recipe section on the company's website.
Ray has endorsed for Burger King, and has appended her name to a line of cookware and cutlery. Her knife of choice was the Wüsthof santoku, and as a result, Wusthof's sales rose dramatically. She now endorses her own line of modified santoku knives made in China by Australian based cutlery company Füritechnics.
In November 2006, Ray became a spokesperson for Nabisco crackers. She appears in commercials and on boxes for the many Nabisco products. Many boxes with Ray's picture have recipes written by her.
In March 2007, Dunkin Donuts announced Ray is its new pitchwoman. Ray describes Dunkin Donuts' coffee as "fantabulous".
Some have criticized Ray's "perky" demeanor as well as her lack of a formal chef's education and perceived lack of seriousness about cooking. Celebrity chef and Travel Channel personality Anthony Bourdain, who graduated from the Culinary Institute of America, has referred to her as a "bobblehead".
In a Slate article defending Ray, Jill Hunter Pellettieri summarized some of these criticisms by writing:“Ray's ditzy demeanor also makes her easy to dismiss. She giggles off-cue and constantly praises her own cooking. "Smells awesome already!" she says, making her Snapper in a Snap. "I am so psyched about that." She employs cute abbreviations—EVOO means "extra virgin olive oil", and gives her dishes nicknames, such as "You-Won't-Be-Single-for-Long Vodka Cream Pasta". The acknowledgments in her $40 a Day cookbook read like a high-school yearbook: "Don …You are the tallest man we've ever had on crew, and yet you pack the smallest bag—ever! Cool." And, it didn't boost her credibility when she posed for pinup shots in FHM. (One featured Ray licking chocolate off a spoon.) When the magazine hit newsstands, she said, "I think it is kinda cool for someone who is goofy, and a cook, just a normal person to be thought of in that way.”
The 30 Minute Meals concept has also been criticized because Ray doesn't account for certain preparation times in the signature half-hour cooking time. Many of these preparations, such as pre-washing herbs and vegetables, are not meal-specific, and Ray counsels they should be done ahead of time. In the Slate article that otherwise mostly complimented her, author Pellettieri went through several of Ray's "30 Minute Meals" recipes and was unable to complete any meal in under half an hour. |
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