Amanda Freitag Has Had Her Fair Share Of Kitchen Disasters - Exclusive
Everything Amanda Freitag does is easy AF, right? You'd be forgiven for thinking so. In recent years, the "Chopped" judge has made it a point — as she recently told Mashed — to "get people comfortable in the kitchen" by teaching them the basics like, for example, how to chop an onion. Don't know how to hard boil an egg? Don't sweat it. Amanda Freitag is there for you. (Spoiler alert: It's boiling water for 12 minutes before lowering your eggs in — at least according to Freitag's popular series.)
Call Freitag the Sherlock Holmes of home-cooking conundrums. With inexplicable ease, Freitag uncovers and explains the mysteries involved in all your wannabe culinary specialties, from crepes to gravy. But behind the scenes, things aren't always so elementary. "I've had kitchen disasters during #EasyAF," Freitag admitted to Mashed. "Some recipes that we started and filmed didn't work out, so we had to throw them away. We made the decision; we're like, 'Should we keep it? Should we put it out there?' I'm like, 'No way. I can't do this.' It was [because] we were rushing through [and] being really hasty."
Freitag's favorite kitchen disaster memory, however, heralds directly from a story fit for a Hallmark Thanksgiving special.
Her Thanksgiving disaster is completely relatable
Amanda Freitag is no stranger to prepping turkeys. "I'm a traditional roasting girl with a lot of butter and a lot of basting," Freitag once exclusively told Mashed. The celebrity chef is expert enough to separate the turkey's legs from the breast. "The dark meat is my favorite and they cook at such a different time and such a different rate. You're never going to have a juicy turkey breast and really well-cooked legs if you cook the bird altogether." It's as easy AF when she describes it like that.
No need to get too jealous, though. Turkey-making hasn't always gone smoothly for Freitag. As she copped in her interview with us, Freitag still fondly remembers a Turkey Day disaster at her "teeny, tiny little apartment in Chelsea." "I was cooking for 10 people for Thanksgiving. It was very [Julia] Child, and the turkey slid out of the oven into my lap, and I caught it before it hit the floor," the "Beat Bobby Flay" veteran recounted. "Everybody was like, 'You okay in there?' [in] this tiny little galley kitchen. I was like, 'I got it. Happy Thanksgiving.' That was intense. That's what an apron is for — to catch a turkey. Always wear an apron in the kitchen."
We caught up with Freitag at the South Beach Wine & Food Festival, which you can learn more about here. For more Amanda Freitag, tune in to "Chopped," shop her cocktail line on her website, and follow her on Instagram and TikTok, where you can check out her #EasyAF videos for delicious, beginner-friendly meals to try at home.