Meghan Markle has launched her much anticipated cooking and lifestyle series With Love, Meghan – but it’s far from the first time she…
Meghan Markle has launched her much anticipated cooking and lifestyle series With Love, Meghan – but it’s far from the first time she’s shown an interest in the area.
As well as previously running a lifestyle blog called The Tig, Meghan also demonstrated her love of cooking in 2016 when she appeared on a segment for NBC’s The Today Show to make a grilled Caesar salad with shrimp.
In front of cheering crowds, the then-Suits actress cooked up a storm and shared her best cooking tips, which included grilling lettuce.
She was joined by former host
Matt Lauer, who was later fired from the NBC show in 2017 amid accusations of sexual assault from several women.
The video, which sees Meghan instruct on how to make ‘easy’ and ‘yummy’ handheld salad boats, has resurfaced in the wake of her new Netflix show announcement.
The show, in which Meghan promises to ‘elevate the ordinary’, sees the Duchess host and cook for a handful of close friends, including The Office star Mindy Kaling.
The TODAY segment, filmed in the year Meghan started dating Prince Harry, saw her explain in a four-minute segment: ‘It’s really simple. We’re just going to do a nice grilled romaine salad with shrimp on it.
‘So we have Italian seasoning, red chilli flakes, honey, you can do any sort of dressing you want.’
Meghan began by marinating the shrimp, adding olive oil, lemon and salt, before advising viewers at home to leave it for an hour in the fridge. However, she added that it should be room temperature before it is grilled.
The actress explained: ‘This is what I love. You can grill lettuce and it has the most amazing flavour.
‘It holds up. You can grill radicchio, kale, whatever you want.
‘You want to halve it lengthwise so that it ends up still keeping that base on there because ultimately you can end up holding it like a hand-held salad.’
She then put everything on the grill, while Lauer admitted he ‘hadn’t heard’ of anyone grilling lettuce before.
Meghan said: ‘They’re going to cook really quickly, but again because it’s a sturdy lettuce it’s not going to break down.
‘You’ll get a nice char mark.’
After assembling the salad, Meghan said: ‘It makes this little boat shape so it’s really easy to fill in. They’re really yummy and so easy!’
At the time, Meghan also ran lifestyle blog The Tig, which she closed down before her wedding to Harry in 2018.
The video has resurfaced on social media in the wake of her new cooking show being announced on Netflix, with fans writing: ‘Meghan is a good teacher! Very informative!’
Others said: ‘You go girl!’;
‘Meghan regained her voice’.
The Duchess of Sussex, now 43, said she was ‘so excited’ to share the series with her followers, a day after her new Instagram account posted its first reel to ring in 2025.
The long awaited lifestyle series, which fans were promised when lifestyle brand American Riviera Orchard was first teased last March, will launch on January 15 after a year of speculation as to when the episodes will drop.
The trailer shows the Duchess cooking in her Montecito kitchen, picking produce from her garden and chatting with very famous pals while The Lovin’ Spoonful’s Do You Believe in Magic plays over the top.
Posting the trailer on her Instagram account, Meghan wrote: ‘I have been so excited to share this with you! I hope you love the show as much as I loved making it.
‘Wishing you all a fantastic new year! Thanks to our amazing crew and the team. Beyond grateful for the support – and fun!’
She signed off: ‘As ever, Meghan.’
Describing the series in an official synopsis, Netflix says: ‘In With Love, Meghan, we join Meghan in the kitchen, garden — and even at the beehive — as she prepares to host friends both old and new.
‘Sharing some of her favorite tips and tricks for cooking, gardening, crafting, and more, Meghan reveals how even the most minute details can help add beauty to our lives and, most importantly, help bring people together.
‘Whether it’s preparing take-home gifts for guests or adding a sprinkle of edible flowers to breakfast, it’s truly the thought that counts.’
Speaking in the trailer, Meghan says: ‘I’ve always loved taking something pretty ordinary and elevating it, surprising people with moments that let them know I was really thinking of them.
‘I’m going to share some little tips and tricks and how you incorporate these practices every day.
‘This is about connecting with friends… We’re not in the pursuit of perfection we’re in the pursuit of joy.’
Elsewhere, Meghan speaks about ‘making new friends’ and learning new skills – such as beekeeping.
In each episode, Meghan invites friends old and new to roll up their sleeves and join her in the kitchen, or garden, as they share candid conversations and top tips.
As well as Mindy – who previously appeared on the Duchess’s podcast Archetypes – Prince Harry and chefs Roy Choi and Alice Waters also make appearances.
Meghan also welcomes some of her closest friends, from Suits co-star Abigail Spencer to her ‘sister’ and ‘fellow polo wife’, Delfina Blaquier, wife to the Duke of Sussex’s pal Nacho Figueras.
Professional polo player Nacho was the first of the Figueras family to feature in a Netflix series from the Sussexes, after starring in Netflix’s Harry & Meghan, as well as the Duke’s Polo show.
Meghan’s make-up artist Daniel Martin, who is often described as the mother-of-two’s best friend, also featured in the trailer for the Duchess’ new programme.
Daniel is believed to have known Meghan for over a decade, having met her while the former actress worked on Suits.
The pair then kept in touch and while working on her former blog The Tig, Meghan asked Daniel to give her a helping hand.
He has remained in contact with the Duchess throughout her life in the royal family and was by Meghan’s side on her wedding day as he perfected her make-up.
The series also features celebrated literary agent Jennifer Rudolph Walsh and Harry and Meghan’s multi-millionaire neighbour Vicky Tsai, who sold her beauty brand Tatcha to Unilever in 2019 for a reported $500million.
They’re joined on the show by Tracy Robbins. Mrs Robbins and her husband Paramount boss Brian Robbins are friends with the Sussexes and invited them to the Bob Marley film premiere in Jamaica in January.
Meghan’s best friend Kelly McKee Zajfen, co-founder of Alliance of Moms, is also included on the guestlist for the series.
Kelly and Meghan first met through the Duchess’ ex-husband, Trevor Engelson, who is friends with the former model’s entertainment lawyer husband.
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex have formed a vital part of Kelly and her husband Julian’s support network following Kelly’s son George’s death aged just nine in July 2022 after being found unresponsive in their family home.
Kelly, who co-founded Alliance of Moms, a non-profit that supports pregnant and parenting teens in the foster care system, praised Harry and Meghan for being a ‘guiding light’ following the tragic death of her son.
Meghan’s announcement comes a day after the Duchess dramatically returned to Instagram with a video of her laughing on the beach near Montecito.
The Duchess of Sussex, 43, shared her first clip on the Instagram account earlier today, simply captioning it ‘@meghan’.
Prince Harry was behind the camera of the new video, which sparked a frenzy online, as tens of thousands of people followed it in a matter of minutes, ballooning the account from 115,000 fans to almost 170,000.
It has long been rumoured the profile belonged to her after the account was set up back in June, 2022, but remained empty. She then teased fans again in 2023 when she declared she was ‘getting back on Instagram’.
Now the mother-of-two has confirmed the profile is hers, by posting a clip walking towards the shoreline at the beach in California, where she lives with Prince Harry, and children Archie, five, and Lilibet, three.
Meghan’s new series invites friends into her kitchen where she prepares food for friends and family
The move is a huge u-turn for the Duchess, and is understood to be part of a new chapter for the couple and their lives in America, with her and Harry having previously ditched social media after quitting their royal duties.
In her new clip, Meghan is seen drawing the digits of the New Year – ‘2025’ – into the sand, perhaps hinting an upcoming project.
A beaming Duchess is then filmed running off camera as she giggles.
As well as her first post, the @meghan account also updated its profile picture to a black-and-white shot of Meghan smiling and wearing and elegant white dress.
The return to Instagram comes after the Duke and Duchess of Sussex vowed never to return to social media after claiming to have dealt with an ‘almost unsurvivable’ amount of abuse.
Meghan originally shut down all of her social media accounts in January 2018, just after getting engaged to Prince Harry.
‘Ms Markle is grateful to everyone who has followed her social media accounts over the years, however as she has not used them for some time she has taken the decision to close them,’ a Kensington Palace source said at the time.
In 2020, Meghan and Harry stopped posting to their Sussex Royal Instagram and Twitter accounts.
The royal couple have frequently spoken out about the abuse they received online, despite continuing to use online media to promote their ‘progressive’ new roles in the US – including most-recently via a podcast on Spotify.
But in 2023 it was revealed that Meghan had set up an Instagram account – although today is the first time she has posted anything on it.
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