Giada le Laurentiis, also known as Giada Pamela De Laurentiis, is an Italian American chef writer born on August 22, 1970 in Rome, Italy. Eldest child of the Italian celebrity couple Veronica De Laurentiis, an actress and Alex De Benedetti, a film producer, Giada along with her siblings and mother moved to Southern California, after her parents were divorced. On completion of her schooling at Marymount High School in Los Angeles, Giada got her bachelor’s degree in Social Anthropology from UCLA in the year 1996. Having studies at Le Cordon Bleu, Paris, Giada le Laurentiis specializes in Italian food with her culinary expertise extending to various other cuisines as well. In fact, she has been hosting Food Network’s cooking program “Everyday Italian”, since 2003. A self confessed chocoholic, becoming a pastry chef was a keen interest of Giada le Laurentiis.
Professional Life of Giada le Laurentiis
Giada le Laurentiis is the granddaughter of the popular Italian film producer Dino De Laurentiis and she spent most of her time in the family kitchen and her grandfather’s restaurant DDL Foodshow. She started working as a professional chef in many restaurants of Log Angeles, after returning to United States on completion of her studies at Le Cordon Bleu, Paris. One of the more popular restaurants, Giado le Laurentiis was associated with was the Spago, owned by Wolfgang Puck. Thereafter, she worked as a food stylist with Food & Wine Magazine, which brought focus of various television networks, one being the Food Network, in the year 2002. Food Network started a program “Everyday Italian”, which went on floor and is being anchored since 2003, by Giada le Laurentiis.
Noteworthy Works of Giada le Laurentiis
Giada le Laurentiis has been part of many cooking programs on the American Television for almost 7 years now.
Achievements
Giada le Laurentiis was awarded the Outstanding Lifestyle Host during the Daytime Emmy Awards in th year 2008.
Giada was ranked #6 “sexiest mom alive” on the Café Mom, in the year 2010.
She is the Spokesperson for Barilla, a pasta manufacturer.
Popular Media Shows
Giada le Laurentiis gained a lot of popularity with her show “Everyday Italian”, which made her a household name and gave her the opportunity to host “Behind the Bash” from October 2006 onwards. This program deals in examining the catering process behind huge events such as the Grammy Awards. By 2007, Giada was on her hatrick of hosting culinary programs and this was the popular “Giada Weekend Getaways”, a new program on Food Network. The show is all about Giada visiting her favorite locale culinary destinations, such as Seattle, South Beach, Napa, Jackson Hole, Wyoming, San Francisco, etc.
Giada le Laurentiis also competed in the November 2006 episode of Iron Chef America, along with Bobby Flay, though they lost to Mario Batali and Rachael Ray.
Giada also appeared as a presenter in the year 2007 on the inaugural awards show of Food Network. She also hosted a two-part special called “Giada in Paradise”, on Food Network. This show featured two locales of Santorini in Greece and Capri in Italy.
Giada le Laurentiis was also the guest judge during the third season of The Next Food Network Star, in the year 2007 and thereafter in the year 2010 mentored the finalists of the same show.
Cook Books
Giada le Laurentiis has many cookbooks to her credit. Her first cookbook “Everyday Italian: Simple and Delicious Recipes”, was published in the year 2005. This book was followed by the Giada’s Family Dinners book that was released on April 4 2006. Exactly a year after that “Everyday Pasta” was released followed by “Giada’s Kitchen: New Italian Favorites”, which was released on 30th September 2008. A year and a half later i.e., on 30th March 2010, “Giada at Home: family Recipes from Italy and California”.
Giada le Laurentiis Trivia
Giada le Laurentiis, who is just less than 5 feet 2 inches, was dubbed as “a petite powerhouse” by Town & Country magazine.
Giada belongs to a family that comes from the show business. Though, initially she was not comfortable in front of the camera, soon she relaxed and the show gained a lot of popularity, for both her beauty as well as culinary skills. In fact, people who watched the show initially accused the show producers of using a model/actress to pretend to be a chef. But with her trademark over enunciation of foreign words while she spoke English, gave her the distinct edge and made the show more realistic.
Giada le Laurentiis has rendered her voice to the animated character “Paulette” in the children’s show Handy Mandy.
Giada le Laurentiis introduced her own range of kitchen supplies in the year 2010 exclusively for the manufacturing giant, Target Corporation. This range of kitchen supplies consist of stainless steel pots, pans, cooking tools, utensils and even stainless steel counter tops such as Coffee Maker, Food Processor and Panini Press.