I was fortunate enough a few months ago to work with our new first lady. I was walking her through the recipes she would be cooking with my wonderful boss, Paula Deen. It was a special and crazy day. Luckily one of the cameramen kept their camera rolling during the set up. I won’t bore you with the entire thing, here are just a couple of grainy stills taken from the tape and a few things I remember about Michelle Obama and that day.
*Like Princess Diana (me shamelessly telling you I met her in Vail years ago) Michelle Obama is even more beautiful and stately in person.
*She’s TALL…I’m 5′7”…as you can see from the photo she is towering over me at 6′
*She was nervous…like they all are before they have to cook on camera…they don’t realize the director will cut a ton of times and they don’t have to memorize anything no matter how many times you tell them.
*She insisted on using Purell to wash her hands and not the clean towel I had supplied Paula
*Her staff was young,cute, full of energy and gracious
*Secret Service wanted to get their photos taken with Paula
*The place was a zoo with GMA, Inside Edition, Secret Service, Bomb detection dogs and a ton of cameras when it was supposed to be a closed set, our camera men could barely move around to get what they needed for the show.
*After seeing all of the hard work that goes into two simple cooking segments, she stopped on her way out and thanked me personally…I’ll consider that a job perk.
Me 5'7'' short....
Pointing to the deep fryer...not fencing.
what a cool experience!
I think you were fencing. Don’t lie.
Awesome! I’d say you were fencing, too.
She definitely seems to be listening intently to your instructions. It’s quite cool you got to experience this, even with the zoo-like chaos.