All the Food Network Stars Who Have Gotten Real About Their Personal Lives
Following his split from Gina Neely in 2014, the former star of Food Network’s Down Home with the Neelys didn’t think that he would ever get married again. But everything changed when he met his now-wife, Tamika, while appearing as a celebrity chef on the Tom Joyner cruise in 2015. “I guess you could say it was love at first sight,” says Pat, who shares a daughter Eriel, 4 months, and son Eijah, 5, with Tamika. He decided to keep their relationship private at first, but now he just can’t keep his joy to himself any longer. “I am the happiest that I have ever been as an adult right now,” he tells PEOPLE.
The network’s resident foodie nerd—who just tied the knot to interior designer Elizabeth Ingram—recently shared their love story, which started in 2016 at a book signing for Brown’s EveryDayCook. Though Ingram admitted to Architectural Digest that she knew little about him, Brown was a fan of her design work and later hired her to renovate the three-bedroom apartment in Atlanta that he recently purchased. They began working together on the seven-month renovation last summer, and soon a romantic relationship developed. “At some point, meetings turned into dates,” he said. “I’m not going to lie—and I can’t put my finger on when it was—I started looking forward to seeing her more than the space.”
The cookbook author, restaurateur and host of several Food Network shows opened to PEOPLE, describing her relationship with her boyfriend of 2½ years, Shane Farley. “After I got divorced, I spent about a year and a half alone, not dating, just figuring things out. I had been with Jade’s dad [Todd Thompson] for 25 years. I didn’t know what it meant to not be married,” she says. “Once I got settled, [Shane and I] reconnected and I felt like a kid again.”
De Laurentiis, 47, also gushed about about life with her 9-year-old daughter Jade, who she shares with her ex-husband, designer Todd Thompson. “I got lucky because Jade loves to be in the kitchen and she enjoys just being around all of the action,” she says. “She’s really getting into it. I don’t know how long it’s going to last, but I’ll take it for as long as it lasts.”
It’s been four years since the Down Home with the Neelys star divorced her husband and co-star Pat Neely. Now she is opening up to PEOPLE, saying she hasn’t talked to him since the day she left.
“I remember leaving with my purse and my duffle bag, and I was out of there,” Neely says.
The 52-year-old is now focused on herself and her own happiness: “You only get one life and like it or not, I chose to grab hold of mine and live it,” says Gina, who stars on Bravo’s To Rome for Love, which follows a group of single women in Italy. “This other half? It’s going to be on my terms.”
The loving relationship between the Barefoot Contessa host and her husband of 49 years, Jeffrey, is no secret. In 2016, the chef even released a cookbook titled Cooking for Jeffrey and she most recently opened up about how she knew he was “the one”: “I met Jeffrey when I was 15 and I have to say, I just knew he was the one. He’s kind, he’s smart, he’s funny and he takes very good care of me. He’s wonderful,” she gushed.
She also discussed why they decided not to have children on the Katie Couric Podcast. “I really appreciate that other people do and we will always have friends that have children that we are close to but it was a choice I made very early,” she said. “I really felt, I feel, that I would have never been able to have the life I’ve had. So it’s a choice and that was the choice I made.”
The Pioneer Woman was smitten with her husband 0f 21 years, Ladd, from the moment they met in a smoky bar in her hometown of Bartlesville, Oklahoma. “He was just completely different than all the boys I’d been crazy about,” she told PEOPLE in September. “I don’t mean to make it sound like Maria and Tony in West Side Story, but I was just sort of like, ‘Oh boy!’ My knees were weak.” Ladd, though far more reserved in his description of the evening, felt the same way: “There just wasn’t anything that I didn’t like about her,” he says.
When the co-host of The Kitchen split from Billy Joel in 2010, she opened up to New York Magazine about being married to the legendary musician. “I’m the first person to say having that last name helped me get a foot in the door, but I feel like I can stand on my own two feet working toward my dreams,” she said at the time.
The 36-year-old, who confessed they grew apart when their careers got busy, also said she wanted what was best for him. “…And I think he wants the best for me,” she added. “You make adjustments, but everybody is going through change now.”
For 22 years the host of Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives has been married to his wife Lori, whom he says he fell in love with when he first met her. “I knew as soon as I saw her, I just knew,” he told Delish. “The first time I cooked for her, she was just like, ‘You made all this?’ We both love food, so being able to cook, that was one of the things that impressed her.”
When the host of Semi-Homemade Cooking with Sandra Lee was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2015, her boyfriend, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, was “there every step of the way.”
“He was wonderful,” Lee told PEOPLE. “Even though he’s closing the legislative session now and was in the heat of all of his work, all work and focus, he never wavered and has always really been available.”
“It’s a true testament to dedication and loyalty and love,” she said of Cuomo. “There will never be enough time for me to thank him for the last year of support and love.”
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