Chrissy Teigen admits her cookbook recipes are ‘evil’

‘This is evil! I can’t believe I did this to people!’ model says about her recipes

Years after the release of Chrissy Teigen’s three cookbooks, she is opening up about what she would have done differently.

The model appeared on Live with Kelly and Mark on Wednesday 24 January, where she revealed that she doesn’t cook the recipes she’s made on previous episodes of the talk show, nor any of the recipes published in her cookbooks.

“If I were to do a cookbook now it would be like 10-minute recipes because I don’t cook the way I used to,” Teigen explained to co-host Kelly Ripa.

The lack of time to cook largely stems from the quick addition of extra children in her home in 2023. In January, she and husband, John Legend, welcomed their third child and second daughter Esti Maxine. In June, they welcomed their fourth child and second son, Wren Alexander Stephens, via surrogate.

With more people to feed comes the need to cook more quickly, which is why Teigen made the point that she would no longer do the more meticulous tasks that she tells people to do in her recipes.

“I used to tell people outrageous things like: ‘Make sure to get fresh thyme and take the time to pick the leaves.’ And now I’m like: ‘Uhhhhh, no!’” she said on the talk show.

Ripa laughed at the cookbook author as she replied: “You told us that right here on the show!”

Teigen responded: “If I make my lasagna now I’m like: ‘This is evil! I can’t believe I did this to people!’”

Despite thinking that it was “weird” to be on the show and not cooking, the mother-of-four said she has been enjoying other parts of the food world. “Right now we are selling products nationwide in grocery stores and I’ve got my cookies and my banana bread and pancakes and waffles and those are so fun to create and then take pictures of and design the boxes, that’s so much more fun to me personally,” she told the co-hosts when comparing it to writing a cookbook.

Even though she has a well-known presence in the food scene with her new series Chrissy & Dave Dine Out, Teigen explained last week during an interview with Jimmy Kimmel what kind of eaters her children are.

Teigen commended her seven-year-old daughter Luna for eating all her healthy greens. “Luna is the best eater. Luna is amazing, she eats salads, vegetables,” Teigen said. However, when it comes to their five-year-old son Miles, he’s a bit more picky with food.

“Miles has still not had a vegetable,” Teigen revealed. “He is six, almost. He accidentally ate a broccoli floret in fried rice and was so upset about it.”

She continued to admit that it had become such a “struggle” getting her children to eat fruits and vegetables she joined “a Zoom call where they talk about picky eaters”.

“They say that it’s the only thing they really have control over at that age, so he uses it,” she added. Kimmel then joked that while children may have no control over anything, “they seem to have control over every aspect, every minute of our lives,” to which Teigen agreed.