Everything I do for magazine I pound out in 15 to 16 hours. I sit down at 11 a.m., get up at 1 in the morning and I'm done.

I do 280 episodes of TV a year, write 15 recipes for the magazine, and publish an annual book. With all of that, we try to get one weekend a month with Isaboo at our home in the Adirondacks to relax and recharge.

I tried to bake a cake for my mother's birthday - it took me four hours. It was terrible, and I cried for three days.

The magazine, the daytime show, we've always tried to write affordable, accessible. Those are key words for us, and I do mean us, a huge staff of people at the magazine who love to cook affordable, friendly food that helps families eat better for less.

I used to work in kitchens, doing 12 or more hours a day of physical labor, so today, eight to 12 hours of cooking, chatting or filming feels like a vacation. When I have a scheduled 'day off,' I spend several hours writing, then I clean until I crash from fatigue. I don't relax well.

I felt I'd earned the Good Housekeeping Seal when I designed an oval-shaped spaghetti pot, because spaghetti is long.