It's True: Ina Garten's First Food Business Was Reselling Dunkin' Donuts

Food Network host Ina Garten has a new memoir out, and it couldn't have a more appropriate title. In "Be Ready When the Luck Happens," Garten reminisces about her first food business, straight out of an episode of "I Love Lucy" (her analogy, but it's hard not to agree).

In college, Garten found herself in a financial pickle. The newly married Mrs. Garten had to turn over all the cash her husband, Jeffrey (from whom she just revealed she once had a brief separation), had given her for the month for an order she'd previously placed for a fur blanket to keep her cozy during the frigid winter. She needed cash to get through finals, and she needed it ASAP. So Garten traipsed down to the local Dunkin' Donuts and bought dozens in different flavors. Then she carted her sweet inventory back to the dorm, where she sold them individually — at an increased price — to her dorm mates studying for exams so she could make enough cash to pay her debt.

Born from necessity, Ina Garten discovered something from upselling donuts. In her book, she tells readers, "I made enough money to pay my debt, and I learned something about unit pricing and profit," and though it would be years before it would be needed, she added, "I filed [it] away for the future."

Garten worked for the government before hanging up her power suits to buy and operate a quaint little food store in the Hamptons called Barefoot Contessa — lending to both her nickname and the name of her Emmy-winning TV show. She sold the store in 1996 after two decades to host Food Network shows, eat bougie toast, and eventually write a memoir.

Garten also jokes that the experience turned her off donuts. It's a good thing she opted for pastries instead of poultry back then. Otherwise, many an at-home date night could have gone horribly awry without Garten's ultimate roast chicken.