Rachael Ray

Rachael Ray comes from a family, region, and culture where food is a way of life. She was born in Massachusetts (August 25, 1968), where seafood, Italian food and old style pubs are prevalent and deeply ingrained in the culture. Her family owned and operated several restaurants, stretching across state lines into New York. Rachael Ray’s broad exposure to the restaurant world gave her a keen eye for good ingredients and a clear idea of what people really wanted to eat. She gained valuable contacts working at the upscale, Macy’s Marketplace, located in New York City. A gourmet foods store soon noticed her abilities and chose her to select their products and create new dishes.

If Rachel Ray’s sharp sense of the public taste were her only talent, it would be likely that most of us would never have heard of her. But Rachael Ray is also an increasingly popular broadcast talent, and offers viewers delicious recipes that are easy to prepare. Her ability to connect with people was demonstrated by her highly successful cooking classes. People noticed that she was a photogenic, vibrant instructor, and it wasn’t long before she made the jump to television. Her class concept—“30-Minute Meals” —became the title of her Emmy award winning television program and subsequent cookbook.

Although her roots and predominant cooking style being Italian, Rachael Ray incorporates vegetarian recipes and urges a holistic, balanced approach to eating. She herself balances rich soups and deserts with a daily exercise regimen that includes 100 pushups and 200 sit-ups. The proof is in the pudding, as they say, and the readers of men’s cultural digest magazine FHM ranked her an impressive #92 out of the Sexiest Women of 2004. Rachael Ray’s versatility has allowed her to take on new roles, and she is busily preparing additional cookbooks and managing her new talk show. Rachael resides in the Adirondacks with her mother and her husband, John Cusimano.