Rachael Ray has a childhood scar she considers a sign she's on the right track.
The US celebrity chef and talk show host has carried the mark for decades. It stems from an accident as a toddler. It's one of a series of 'mishaps', she believes, set her on a path to becoming one of the richest chefs in the world.
"My first memory, actually, was when I was three and I grilled my thumb to the flattop in our restaurant in Cape Cod," Ray, who's worth $150 million, told TastingTable in 2023.
"I have a 'Harry Potter' scar on my thumb. That marked me to work in food."
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Decades later, in the 1990s, Ray was given a job in the food industry by accident. At the time she was working in a grocery store as both the buyer and cook in the kitchen.
"We couldn't sell enough groceries at the store," she said.
"I thought, 'How can I help our business?' My boss said, 'Why don't you teach your food?'"
Ray had no professional qualifications as a chef but leaned on the experiences of her childhood in Upstate New York working in the kitchens of her parents' restaurants.
The 20-something quickly devised a plan to teach people six base recipes and five things they could do with each ingredient.
In her mind, she was imparting knowledge that could help people make a month's worth of food without repeating a recipe.
So, with a mix of football players, brides-to-be, the young and old, Ray taught a three-hour class. It was a hit and kicked off her 30 Minute Meals television career.
The local TV station ran a story on the cooking class and Ray, with her charisma and smarts, wrangled a regular segment at the station.
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Soon fans of her segment urged Ray to put her recipes in a book. It sold out in two weeks with a second print run required.
Then a 'storm of a century' opened a path to a spot on prime time, namely the NBC's Today show. The weather event had caused scores of guests to suddenly cancel.
Ray was called in to make "four hearty soups" for beloved US TV weatherman, Al Roker. Despite some nerves, the segment was a success.
Her path into TV celebrity would take one final turn, involving an impromptu radio spot.
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Ray had stepped in to help out a friend making Jambalika - a 30-minute knockoff of jambalaya - live on air.
Bob Trishman, the then senior vice president of the Food Network, took notice. Ray was soon called in for a meeting.
"When I went to the Food Network I outed myself," Ray told Vanity Fair in 2007.
"I said, 'Listen, you're champagne, I'm beer out of the bottle. I clearly don't belong here, I'm not a chef, you've been duped.' And I got up. And they said, 'No, no, no, stop. That's what we like. We don't want you to be a chef.'"
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In 2001, Ray signed with the network for 25 episodes of 30 Minute Meals and 40 episodes of $40 a Day.
In her first year with the Food Network she made around $300,000.
Despite her jump in pay, the early years for Ray weren't entirely positive. When she started on air, someone created a website called 'I Hate Rachael Ray'.
"There were a lot of people that were colleagues or chefs that thought, 'What is a person who's not Culinary Institute trained doing around us?'" she said.
One person who made little secret of his disdain for Ray in the food industry was the late culinary legend, Anthony Bourdain.
Bourdain most notably took a dislike to Ray after she inked an endorsem*nt deal with Dunkin Donuts.
He publicly criticised Ray's role in commercials for the company, likening them to "peddling crack to kids."
"A man who hated me more than anybody on the planet Earth was Tony Bourdain, and we ended up not friends but friendly. The way I got there is a joke that he made," Ray told Appetito Magazine earlier this year.
Ray said Bordain was writing about her and his dislike of her, and took a surprising liking to a band she had booked as part of producing duties for a South by Southwest event.
"He said, 'I don't know whether to kick a puppy or send her a fruit basket, but she has good taste in music'," Ray said.
"I asked my boss at the time to send the largest fruit basket in the world to Tony Bourdain with a note 'Just trying to save a puppy.'"
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Turns out the fruit basket landed with Bourdain at a highly opportune time.
"Afterward, Tony wrote an open letter to me and said that he'd never given me any reason to do anything but hate him," she recalled.
"But he came home late one night with his very tired daughter in his arms, and there was no food in their house, but there was a basket of fruit with cheese and crackers and snacks."
"He ended the post with 'I guess I give up'. The next time I saw him, he bent way down and gave me a kiss on my cheek. I burst into tears."
Bourdain died by suicide in France in June 2018. He was 61.
In 2023, Ray called time on her more than 20 year career with the Food Network.
After 17 seasons on her self-titled show Rachael Ray, and more than 30 Daytime Emmy nominations, she needed a change.
She is now the co-founder of Free Food Studios with her long time producing partners Brian Flanagan, Anthony Amoia and Sean Lee.
"My passions have evolved from the talk show format production and syndication model to a platform unencumbered by the traditional rules of distribution," she said.
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