Joanna Gaines Takes AD Inside Her TV Kitchen
Like it did for so many of us, the COVID-19 pandemic changed Chip and Joanna Gaines’s plans. Their new television network, Magnolia, was supposed to launch in 2020. It is now on hold until further notice, but that didn’t stop the duo, who rose to fame renovating houses on their HGTV show Fixer Upper, from getting to work creating some of the content. A selection of programming originally meant for the network launch has been slowly rolling out on the new streaming service Discovery+, including Magnolia Table, Joanna’s new cooking show, which she filmed during the pandemic.
“We went through all the [necessary] things from a production standpoint to make sure we were being tested weekly. I felt super safe on-set. It was almost like the cooking show crew was our quarantine family,” she says. “It is hard because we are still in [the pandemic]. But it has forced a lot of creativity out of a lot of us. I swear if it were any other year we would just get into it. Now, I feel like things can be more thoughtful and intentional.”
The end result is a show that is incredibly down to earth and relaxed, and is really more about getting to know the Gaines family in a new way than it is about teaching cooking techniques. Cooking is a passion, but design is really Gaines’s forte, which is clear from her on-set kitchen, with its bare stone walls juxtaposed with top-of-the-line appliances for an interesting look that stands out from other cooking shows.
Below, Gaines shares more about designing her TV kitchen, the new recipes she’s working on, and more.
Architectural Digest: When designing the set for Magnolia Table, where did you start?
Joanna Gaines: The Gristmill, where the show is filmed, is this old piece of history. Late 1800s. For me, when I was thinking about the design, I just wanted it to be completely authentic to what it was. So as we researched and dug deep, we heard there was a whole interior of rock. We started getting into it and taking all the drywall off. All the beams that were painted, we sanded down so you could see the raw wood…and then just updating it with the new cabinets and brass hardware. I wanted it to feel really textural and simple and clean.
It totally looks like you are in some kind of natural structure, but then you have a really fancy stove.
Which they told me I must call a range! Even now, I watched the cooking show a couple of times, and I said stove about 10 times. I’m like, Oh shoot!
What are some of your must-have kitchen appliances?
I would say I have a ton of wooden spoons. That is like my comfort thing. I always love to cook with a wooden spoon. My Kitchenaid stand mixer. I feel like I use that every day. Also a food processor. But I would say the things I use the most are a wooden spoon and a whisk. Just super simple.
Is there anything you use at home that you haven’t brought into the TV kitchen yet?
I was thinking about that yesterday. My rice cooker. I make rice a lot. My kids are only a quarter Korean, but they like to eat like they are full Korean.
Is your home kitchen anything like the one at the Gristmill?
The TV kitchen is a lot larger and more organized. When you open up my cabinets, they are all over the map and it takes me 10 minutes to figure out where the salt and pepper is. In the Gristmill it is just lined up perfectly and everything looks just very organized. I would say typically I function well in chaos. When I organize, Chip will always say, “It looks really good!” And then a week later it’s all back to the way it was.
Have you developed or perfected any new recipes during the pandemic?
I have a really good fried chicken recipe I need to share. My kids love it. I call it fried chicken Tuesdays, which makes absolutely no sense. But it is fun to just kind of play around with things. When I do these cookbooks, these recipes become something I get super familiar with because there’s a story and a history. In the development process, I practice them 10 to 15 times. Tonight I am doing a Korean dish that I have never made before. My mom says it is pretty hard. She’s never made it. I am super excited about it just because I want to continue to stretch myself. I think I was pretty open about it when we were filming, but I feel [more] comfortable with design. I feel like that is kind of my language. With food, it just naturally became something that was another story I could tell because I love the idea of gathering my family and friends around the table.
How do you think fans will get to know you in a new way on this show versus on design shows?
That is a great question. With design, when I walk into a house, I have this end goal in mind that I see in my head and until it gets there, I won’t stop. When you put me in the food world it is a little looser. Maybe I am type A over here, but on this side I am a little more casual. I don’t want to be a perfectionist in the kitchen. When I come home from work and it is a full day of meetings and design I want to cut myself some slack and just let it be a creative thing that kind of fuels me. There just seems to be a little more room for error. Hopefully people will see that vulnerable side. My biggest hope is just that people watch it and want to start a recipe in their own kitchen and get in the kitchen that night and try something fun.
It seems like your kids are great eaters. Is that true?
They are only picky when it is not my food. They have their palate. When I am doing the cookbook I will tell them to be open-minded. Once I set them up for that, they are the best as far as letting me know what they like and don’t like. But they like their mom’s food. They like familiar. The more they try it the more they like it. But also when my kids were little my mom would feed them these soups and Korean recipes that most [kids wouldn’t eat].
And what about your husband? Is he into trying a lot of new foods?
He is the most open-minded! He will eat the most exotic things. Chip will just try anything. He is the easiest for sure.
Originally Appeared on Architectural Digest
