Culinary expert and Food Network's "Barefoot Contessa" star Ina Garten has been married for 49 years. However, she and husband, Yale's dean and former trade undersecretary Jeffrey Garten have no kids and she recently opened up about this.
Garten spoke about her marriage and children in a podcast interview with Katie Couric. She revealed she and her husband made the conscious choice to not have children early in their marriage.
"We will always have friends that have children that we are close to," Ina said, as per People. "I really felt ... I feel that I would have never been able to have the life I've had," she added.
So, how does Ina deal with the stigma around childless couples? A new study suggests people often feel "moral outrage" as well as "anger, disapproval and disgust" for couples who choose not to have children, as per Live Science.
As for Ina, the Food Network star said she never felt judgment from other people. If they did, she never paid attention to it. Ina, however, admitted that there's one thing she envies about couples with kids — and it is the connection between parents and children.
"A lot of people's friends are the parents of their kids' friends," she said. "So we never had that connection with other people that I see, that network."
Ina Garten also shared the secret to her long marriage. She candidly said she never had to compromise with her husband because he "always agrees" with her.
48 years and I'm just getting started!
A post shared by Ina Garten (@inagarten) on Feb 14, 2017 at 8:38am PST
The "Barefoot Contessa" star and the economist/academic met in college. After they married, she learned cooking through Julia Child's "Mastering the Art of French Cooking" and she frequently hosted dinners with friends to hone her skills.
Ina briefly worked in the White House but found the environment stressful. So, she went back to cooking and opened a shop in New York called Barefoot Contessa, which existed for two decades.
The TV deals later came and Ina became a big figure on the Food Network after Martha Stewart. Jeffrey sometimes appeared on her show to sample his wife's cooking or assist her in the studio kitchen. Ina also released a series of bestselling cookbooks. Watch the Gartens celebrate their long marriage in the video below.
