What's a chef to do when she gets dumped by one
of the biggest networks on TV? If you're Sarah Moulton, you do the only reasonable thing you can:
serve up a platter of inspo for the Beastie Boys. Sara Moulton worked as the food editor for "Good
Morning America" as well as with pioneering TV chef Julia Child in her early career. Her work
had been primarily just adjacent to cooking on television when, according to HuffPost, the young
and upstart Food Network approached her in 1996 to star on her own demonstration show. Despite a
mediocre screen test, she got the job and became one of Food Network's earliest stars as the host
of "Cooking Live." That show lasted six years, running concurrently with the spinoff "Cooking
Live Primetime," and upon its conclusion in 2002, Moulton rolled into "Sara's Secrets."
That series aired its final episodes in 2006 — because Food Network let
Moulton go. As she revealed to Eater - "They dumped me. I'll say it. I was
part of the old guard and every time a new president comes in they make changes." The mid-2000s also witnessed a major
change in Food Network's approach, switching from a lineup primarily
of cooking instruction programs into reality TV and aspirational lifestyle
series. As Moulton summed it up - "They were more interested in really good
looking people with really big personalities." In the decade and a half since her exit from Food
Network, Sara Moulton didn't disappear from TV. She went on to host and produce a new cooking
show, thanks to a classic home for pre-Food Network TV chefs: good old public television. Her
show, "Sara's Weeknight Meals" has Moulton and friends sharing recipes for "quick and tasty
meals every night of the week." Moulton has been hosting "Sara's Weeknight Meals" since
2008, and the series is still going strong. As a renowned chef with an extensive media
background, Moulton is also a go-to guest for daytime talk shows that need someone
to do a cooking segment. Over the years, she's made regular appearances on "Good
Morning America" and "Rachael Ray." In 2020, Moulton filmed segments of a reminiscent nature
regarding her mentor and friend for the public TV miniseries "Dishing with Julia Child," a gig
she expanded on in the 2021 documentary "Julia." "She felt that making a mistake was a good thing, just so that she could then
show you how to fix it." Sara Moulton has produced four cookbooks that
grace the shelves of bookstores and avid home cooks. Her first book, "Sara Moulton Cooks
at Home," was released in 2002 and focused on healthy recipes specifically designed as an
alternative to fast food. Three years later, Moulton followed it up with "Sara's Secrets
for Weeknight Meals," a publication released in tandem with her then-current
Food Network show, "Sara's Secrets." In 2010, Moulton published her third book, "Everyday Family Dinners," notable for the
chef's innovative and influential chapter "Two for One." The chapter focused on how to
turn one night's leftovers into a whole new meal the following evening. Moulton's fourth
book was the 2016 release "Home Cooking 101: How to Make Everything Taste Better," which
emphasized getting dishes to be consistent. "So I wanted to address that issue and really
help people to have the same dish every time." Moulton also authors "Sunday Suppers," a monthly
column for The Washington Post Magazine, and the weekly feature "KitchenWise," syndicated
to newspapers by the Associated Press. In 2009, according to The New York Times,
periodicals publisher Condé Nast shut down the venerable "Gourmet" magazine. Helping to create
foodie culture and establish food as a pop culture entity, "Gourmet" had seen its revenues in decline
for some time. It was ironically muscled out of the market by more populist magazines like "Every
Day with Rachael Ray" and "Food Network Magazine." The closure of "Gourmet" caused Sara Moulton to
suffer financially. Before and after her time as a cable TV personality, Moulton served
as the executive chef at "Gourmet," a job that included presiding over the magazine's
exclusive dining room. As she told Food Gal - "I cooked meals for the advertisers.
We'd wine them and dine them. Then, we'd hit them up for advertising. I was making
the best food of my life in that dining room." "I had 16 seats and no food costs -
can you imagine that? That was fun." In the end however, Condé Nast
ultimately licensed the valuable "Gourmet" brand to other companies and
hired Moulton back on as a consultant. In early 2018, after the #MeToo
and #TimesUp movements exploded, Sara Moulton wrote an op-ed for HuffPost to speak
out about her experiences with such behaviors. The chef attended the prestigious Culinary
Institute of America in the mid-1970s, where, according to Moulton, the instructors
were primarily male. She wrote - "Men at every level in the school told me the
same thing: Women do not belong in the kitchen." That inspired Moulton to work
harder to prove everyone wrong, and after both graduation and a stint as the
head chef of a Boston restaurant, she took an apprenticeship in France working for acclaimed
chef Maurice Cazalis. During her time there, she recalled being the only female apprentice,
with all the others being around 15 years old. Moulton added that Cazalis wouldn't allow her to
do much more than prep work, and she didn't seem to be a fan of the chef. In her article she wrote
that Cazalis, quote, "was a lascivious character and probably loved having me there because
he thought he could have his way with me." He frequently and repeatedly made advances against
Moulton, even arranging a weekend food trip where he booked them one room, and took her to a nude
dancing show. Six months after the gig ended, Moulton mustered the courage to tell her mentor,
Julia Child, of Cazalis' behavior, writing - "Her response was, 'Oh dearie, what did you
expect? They're all like that. Get over it.'" Sara Moulton, old school TV chef, has crossed
paths more than once with old school rap trio the Beastie Boys. According to her website, her
Food Network series "Sara's Secrets" merited a thank-you in the liner notes of the group's
2004 album "To the 5 Boroughs-+." Moulton paid close attention to the track "Rhyme
the Rhyme Well," specifically the lyric - "Serving emcees on a platter like Baked Alaskan." In response to the lyric, she published a
recipe for "Baked Alaskan," a version of the classic ice cream cake "Baked Alaska."
Moulton's knowledge of hip hop goes way back — she told Eater that she was a fan of
the Beastie Boys' and Run-DMC's "early stuff." She's also just two degrees
away from both of those groups, as well as other legendary '80s-era rap
artists. Moulton's husband, Bill Adler, has worked in different capacities in the
music industry, breaking into it in 1981 after he befriended Def Jam Records co-founder
Russell Simmons and offered to be his publicist. Sara Moulton seems to know all the cool kids of
the food world, including Christopher Kimball, whom she co-hosts the weekly "Milk Street
Radio" series with. It's available to stream as a podcast, with each episode lasting
a full hour. It's a high-quality show, as evidenced by the International Association of Culinary Professionals awarding it
as the "Best Radio Show" in 2020. Every week is full of something
fascinating from the culinary world, whether it's a masterclass with a cooking
great like Jacques Pépin or a tour of the poison plants at Alnwick Poison Garden. Because
of Moulton's wide range of food expertise, she doesn't shy away from providing live
answers to people who call into the show. Sara Moulton keeps busy, and her blog
is a good chronicle of what she's doing, what she's cooking, and where she's cooking
these days. Her website features her recipes, a list of the books she's published, information about her latest "Sara's Weeknight Meals"
episodes, videos, and a link to her blog. She seems to publish more recipes
than anything else on her blog. So, if you're looking for the perfect timely
food to fit the holiday or season, you'll want to keep a watch on what she's
posting. You'll see links to the "Milk Street Radio" broadcasts she co-hosts and recipes from
specific "Sara's Weeknight Meals" episodes. She also adds in more personal posts like
what she's eating or doing on vacation. You can also follow Moulton
on Facebook, Instagram, or X. While each of her social media
accounts has slightly different content, she often posts links back to her blog so
you won't miss what's happening with her. You can't have a food-based career like Sara
Moulton's without having a vast collection of cookbooks at your disposal. At one point,
she had about 1,500 different cookbooks, making Moulton's collection larger than most. She
can easily find something new to cook any time she gets bored with her normal meal rotation.
However, the collection isn't nearly as big after she gave away many of the books to a
small New York City cooking school in 2023. Part of the reason Moulton has so many cookbooks
is because of her work at "Good Morning America" between 1986 and 1996. Every time the show
featured a chef or a cookbook author doing a cooking demonstration for the audience, it was
Moulton's job to do all the prep work so they could instead focus on cooking and talking.
Having made so many friends with people who have put out cookbooks, she has amassed quite
a collection. Being a cookbook connoisseur, she sometimes recommends certain titles for the best
cookbooks of the year in publications like Bustle. Sara Moulton isn't just a culinary artist,
but also a creator of visual artwork. Moulton took advantage of all that social
distancing everyone did in 2020 to get back into watercolor painting. She searched the
internet to learn new watercolor techniques, taking online classes with Kateri Ewing and on
a website called Art Tutor. She admits that she struggles with the flowers in her paintings.
However, you wouldn't know it from looking. It turns out that being an artist runs in the
family. While watercolor painting is a hobby she enjoys doing alone, Moulton also paints with
her sister in Maine when visiting on vacation. Her sister has a dedicated painting area with
a relaxing and inspirational view of the water, so the two are able to sit back
and paint to their heart's content. Admiration goes both ways between Sara Moulton and French chef Jacques Pépin. In
2019, Moulton said in her blog - "There will never be another
Jacques Pépin. He is one of a kind. The food world is so lucky to have him." Pépin returned the favor in
2023 when he told Current - "There are many cooking shows on TV, but few are teaching anything. […] To
learn about cooking, look at Sara Moulton." Moulton is a big supporter of the Jacques
Pépin Foundation. She has been involved in many fundraisers for the organization, which provides a
free culinary education for people around the U.S. who need it most. She has even been a keynote
speaker for some of the foundation events. "So here is a tribute to zhoo- to you, Jacques
Pépin Foundation and all the good work you do." In 2021, Pépin released the second volume
of his "Cook With Jacques & Friends" video recipe book. Moulton was pleased to be among the
friends providing a recipe for the collection, and the two have been known to get together
when he's in New York City. In 2023, they met up for a meal when Pépin was in town
for a James Beard Foundation dinner in his honor. Sara Moulton has had the privilege of
providing cooking demonstrations aboard cruise ships to combine work with pleasure
and world travel. When the ship would stop at various ports, she could go on shore and shoot
on-location videos for her television show. One such cruise toured southern Italy. While
she was off the ship visiting Rome and Parma, she used local film crews to help her shoot
segments from places like a Parmigiano Reggiano warehouse that she could integrate into her
show. Then, when she was back on the cruise ship, she gave standing-room-only cooking classes
featuring dishes that fit with the region. One of the dishes she demonstrated while touring the
Italian coast was a twist on eggplant Parmesan.
