Gwyneth Paltrow and “dieting” go together like peanut butter and chocolate. As much as Gwyneth pretends to eat peasant food, she’s never really been a fan. She’s always been a rabid fad-dieter, and she’s constructed an entire Goop-industry and series of cookbooks around her f–ked up relationship with food. She’ll try any diet, especially if it comes wrapped up in fake science and whatever hokey holistic bulls–t you can sell her. She’s always been this way, for as long as she’s been famous. So it is surprising to hear that back when she was with Chris Martin, she ate “nothing” according to her private chef at the time?
What’s it like to cook for Hollywood’s rich and famous? Celebrity chef Kate McAloon has an idea. In an interview with news.com.au, McAloon, 59, dished on what was it like to cook for former celebrity couples—including Gwyneth Paltrow and Chris Martin, Miranda Kerr and Orlando Bloom and Courteney Cox and David Arquette.
Starting off with Paltrow and Martin, McAloon said she started working for the actress and Coldplay band member around the time Paltrow was filming Iron Man with Robert Downey Jr. The couple announced that they were separating (or “conscious uncoupling,” as they called it) in 2014; however the divorce wasn’t finalized until 2016. Apparently, the Goop leader and her ex had very lean diets.
“I had a brief from their assistants … they eat nothing,” she told news.com.au. “They are very strict. They avoided any sugars, anything sweet, no dairy, just more vegetables. When I got there, I was trying to stick to the brief,” she continued. “And I realized as I started adding more ingredients in, they said, ‘Your food is getting better.’ That’s what happens when you eat more than grass.”
McAloon also worked for Kerr while she was still in a relationship with Pirates of the Caribbean actor Bloom—Kerr has since married Snapchat CEO Evan Spiegel. It should come as no surprise that the supermodel and her ex had a healthy diet. “[Miranda and Orlando] both love my curries, light chicken or vegetarian curries with coconut, as well as quinoa, salmon and vegetables,” McAloon told the news outlet. “I do a chicken salad with a lot of fresh herbs and chia puddings for breakfast.”
McAloon worked for Chris and Gwyneth circa 2008 then and yeah, no surprise, they didn’t eat anything. I bet Gwyneth was SHOCKED and APPALLED when she learned that her private chef was, like, sneaking some carbs into their family meals. I truly don’t understand famous people or rich people – if you’re going to actually hire a private chef, why not let the chef do their job and make good food? If I had a private chef, I would demand Chicken Kiev and homemade mashed potatoes and brownies and amazing Caesar salads. Money is wasted on the rich.
Photos courtesy of WENN.
Chia pudding is like lumpy frogspawn. Most vile.
Agreed. It is literally the most disgusting thing I have ever eaten.
The only ‘chia pudding’ I’ve had that I’ve liked is the mango chia we make for baby. Mashed up big mango, teaspoon of chia seed, little bit of vanilla, and some coconut milk. So tasty I eat it myself sometimes.
But just plain chia? Gross.
Yep that chia goop. Ugh. I think I actually got sick from looking at it. And I am vegetarian for over a decade, some days, lol ,health nut, some days not but NO to that horrid pudding. Laughing cause I was looking for some one positive here in articles that I could say something nice about and then saw Gwyneth. Well I give up. That will not happen. Oh well have a great day all. I’ll say something nice about you all and the writers here, …Love ya and I think you are great. But Gwynenth, nope. never. Sick chick. Oh her parents were actually okay. Blythe is alright, if pretentious ,but okay and Gooper’s brother is a nice guy. Can’t blame her family, goop is just goopy. Always has been.
@Glisten
Glad to see you participating and welcome. 🙂
I actually like chia pudding (prepared like @Scal mentions) but what annoys me so much about it is the fad. SO healthy, SO cool, while you pretty much get the same effect with some linseed, which are a quarter of the price too.
I love the chef shade… ‘ That’s what happens when you eat more than grass’…lol!
I have a real problem with eating disordered celebrities publishing unhealthy cookbooks.
Recently I’ve been getting so angry with myself and society over our relationship with food. It’s so f*cked up. The guilt most of us feel over food! There’s no balance anymore, only extremes. I feel like the spectrum of EDs is massive and you can’t tell looking at people. I can’t count the times I’ve witnessed a friend go “Oh I need to go to the gym tomorrow.” over a muffin or “Oh I shouldn’t eat this.” or “Tonight calories don’t matter.” It’s ALWAYS something. I don’t now if I’m friends with one single woman who does not feel bad over food.
And THIS one is not helping so I agree.
I am so with you @littlemissnaughty. All of the effing time we women (and to a lesser extent men) spend depriving ourselves of food we like or enjoy! All the time and money we spend trying NOT to eat. Its absurd.
Yup, I’m getting to the point where I think more people than not have a disordered relationship with food. I think it’s a major cultural/society issue. It’s rare for me to meet a woman anymore who isn’t on some sort of diet or talking about her body in a negative way.
Yes. And she’s not well. I’ve read some of her stuff on her blog what with all the diets, detoxes and colonics. I used to have a horrid relationship with food until about two years ago when I just said Fuck it!! I’ve never been happier. But I still have most of my girlfriends on diets, a close male friend who is severely eating disordered and basically lives on air, and as you said, so much negativity around food and bodies surrounding me anyway. It actually makes me feel bad that I’m eating sometimes because so few people I know are (and enjoying it). I’m not blaming anyone who’s still in that because I know what it’s like and the anxiety is very real, but I agree it’s a symptom of something gone really wrong in society. Gwyneth can shut up about her sugar free gluten free vegetables only diet. She’s friends with Crazy Tracy (Anderson) anyway, who recommends 600 calories a day diets for women while working out up to 2 hours a day. They’re nuts.
I agree. I don’t know why we, as a culture, simply cannot handle something so basic and necessary as eating, but I strongly suspect that it has a lot to do with how we have devalued agriculture and farmers, there are massive corporations that profit vastly from selling us crap “food”, and the fact that human beings really aren’t meant to live with such abundance. We can have almost anything we want at any time regardless of season or climate, which overwhelms our monkey brains and trashes our traditional eating practices and diets.
The growing of food no longer central to our society, and many, many people have only the vaguest idea of where their food really comes from. This disconnect between the origin (and the work and sacrifice involved) and the end consumer strips foods of any value except their mere monetary price. Now add in the fact that keeping us nutritionally ignorant is hugely profitable to very powerful companies, and it’s just a recipe for disaster. And of course, let us not forget beauty standards and the whole unhealthy gamut surrounding women’s appearance.
My relationship with food is … unbalanced, to say the least. And at this point I don’t think it’s first and foremost about my weight. It’s actually the way I think about food. In terms of good and bad, healthy vs. unhealthy, reward and punishment. It’s f******cked! I noticed about 6 months ago that I cannot eat a meal or even a piece of fruit without having the word “calories” entering my thoughts. Sometimes it’s only in the back of my mind but more often it’s flashing bright red. CALORIES. BAD. It’s exhausting and while I’m not a fan of shaming others by reminding them that people are starving all over the world, sometimes I have to remind myself of that just to keep perspective. Food is not the devil. It’s delicious, it’s necessary, it’s a luxury.
It’s hard work to try and correct all that and people like G are permanently on my sh*tlist for trying to sabotage that.
ETA: Wren, yeeeeessss! It’s so silly but my mom grew tomatoes this summer and the way we ooohhhd and aahhhd over them and made a damn occasion of eating them … we should do that all the time.
Wren. Perfection!!!
@Wren That makes perfect sense. I hadn’t thought of it like that, but it is true about the origin of food and feeling disconnected. More and more restaurants list the sources of their food now, local and sustainable and it does seem more personal. Hmm. *nodding*
@littlemissnaughty *Hugs* You know you are my favorite feisty German Celebitcher. Don’t be so hard on yourself. Trite I know but our society sends powerful messages, and it is hard to sidestep all of them.
Even though I am a vegan because of my feelings about animals and the environment, I don’t feed my family grass or worry about calories. I worry about taste and comfort. My kids are free to try foods that aren’t vegetarian if they want to since this is my choice and I don’t want to make them feel guilty for eating a cheeseburger. It is easy to go overboard, and I was heading there, and then I had to put the brakes on cutting out this or that for healthy eating.
But the thoughts sneak in as I read labels and overreact to the ingredients like one bite and it is instant death because there is a preservative listed.
@Millenial
“Yup, I’m getting to the point where I think more people than not have a disordered relationship with food. ”
I mean, this goes without saying. Look at the obesity rates.
@magnoliarose, thanks. 🙂 I hear you about the going overboard. I have thought about going vegan but when I’m really honest with myself, it’s a terrible idea for me to strike foods off my list as a rule. I’m like a damn child, I’ll just want it more then. I rarely eat meat because I think our meat industry is vile and I just don’t like it that much. But once or twice a year I’ll have it and I know if I start calling myself a vegetarian, it’ll end with a schnitzel. People just need to be realistic.
What’s crazy is her first cookbook is great, with a variety of recipes in terms of health (some lean, some indulgent) and all fairly simple to make. I go back to that cookbook often. Whether she’s drastically changed or got a different ghostwriter I don’t know but it’s a shame.
Her cookbooks are fine; it’s the weird pseudo-science she hawks on her website that is unhealthy and unsafe.
Of course they’re fine! She didn’t write them!
And really, from looking at her in that first picture, where everything on her looks dry (her skin, her hair) Goop could use some nice healthy fats in her diet. Maybe even unhealthy ones. She looks like she doesn’t eat any at all.
Private chefs are wasted on the rich. Gwyneth should send whoever’s working for her now to me. I actually like food!
Call me crazy- but if I have a chef, I too would ask them to prepare healthy food instead of crap food. They sell crap food everywhere. Healthy food- not so much. Health is wealth. But do eat something, please. Truly. Unlike Goop here.
Me too. I would take advantage of having someone prepare my meals and ask for healthy options.
I am with you. A good chef can make healthy food taste incredible.they really can. I can make or order my own so so semi junky stuff on their days off. Apple’s a sweet kid, met her a while back. Thought my son and her might have a thing. They didn’t. Kid friendship. Sweet. but Apple was here one night and Gwyneth called about 8 times to check on her eating. As we all do when having a child over, we ask about allergies, food preferences, all that before hand. Double check it. But Gwyneth went bonkers. Finally Chris called her and told Gwyneth to chill out. Even my Mom was visiting and told her to also. Sheez.
But scratch made, no off flavors comfort food? You either make that yourself or go without. I eat less junk food just because it has hit the uncanny valley in which I can taste more plasticized, lab-created chemicals than I can taste food.
I know exactly what you mean! Awhile back I cut out most processed food from my diet and now when I eat it I can taste the artificial flavors and feel the texturizers. It’s not nice. After not drinking soda for years I had one at a friend’s house and it tasted so awful I had to surreptitiously pour it down the drain.
I figure if I’m going to eat junk, it should at least be good tasting junk…. I like plain potato chips but won’t buy those made with untasty oils (soybean, cottonseed, canola). The oil makes a big difference in taste for the unflavored chips. Likewise for roasted nuts. Oddly enough, cheaper house brands often have the better potato chip oils.
I’ve found sodas made with cane sugar and natural flavors/colors, and the Popsicle brand now has a line of popsicles called Simply Popsicle made from cane sugar and natural flavors/colors. The difference in the popsicles is especially remarkable. Unlike their regular lines, there are no odd aftertastes at all, and they actually taste like what they are labeled.
If you’re drinking and eating so much of that stuff that you have to worry about the calories, you’re eating and drinking too much of it. Slow down, make it a more occasional indulgence, and enjoy.
Also there are carbonated fruit juices now if you like carbonation but feel the urge for something other than straight sugar. Izze is good, Switch is not. Not sure how they managed to mess up fruit juice, but they did.
The Outshine line of frozen fruit bars from Edy/Nestle? is good but increasingly pricey. I used to get them to satisfy an ice cream craving (need nondairy) because they have that kind of thick texture. Hence my interest in the cheaper Simply Popsicle line when not in the mood to make my own.
Can’t stand the ubiquitous artificial sweeteners and stevia and monkfruit. And high fructose corn syrup (equally ubiquitous) just doesn’t taste very good.
This isn’t very professional.
Lol, my thought too. Don’t celebs usually have staff sign non disclosure agreements to prevent these kinds of unflattering revelations?
Lol, I thought, “Damn they are spilling all the tea!”
Maybe this Chef is retired or something, I don’t know, but if I was a celebrity I would not hire them.
Don’t go telling all my business to the media, that’s my job, Ha.
Celebrity chef tells the world about former clients eating habits. I wouldn’t hire this person if I was a celebrity.
But funny.
I thought the same thing. Surely she has all of her staff sign NDA’s. I know I would. Do those expire?
No, it isn’t, but it seems she wasn’t a fan of theirs so maybe she just couldn’t help it. lol
It’s funny how rich people will pay more to have less. They pay a personal chef to eat grass. They have vacation homes where there is no cell phone reception and nowhere to buy a bottle of milk. They pay thousands for dresses made of spider webs. They pay for yoga classes – and all the accoutrements – to learn simplicity. They pay thousands to send their drug-addicted kids into the wilderness with nothing. Weird ways to indulge.
That is a very interesting observation. I’d never thought of it that way before.
Well, they often also pay lots to have lots, too. When you have many cars, when you’ve taken dozens of holidays in five-star resorts, when you’ve filled your wardrobe with expensive clothes and your wine cellar with 1er crus, then eventually you need something more “interesting”.
That was way back when she was on her kick with some restrictive diet. When she got flack, she said it was only for a certain period of time, not permanent, blah, blah. She did get off of that. I think her kids’ diet is a lot more inclusive now regarding food.
But regarding the chef, I thought Goopy did all of her own cooking for her kids from the way her interviews read. LOL Oops. That pesky private chef spilling the beans.
when I read the title my mouth turned into a wide closed mouth smile a’ la the Grinch.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-oehGtcW6BU
I try to eat healthy, but if I had a private chef I’d eat even healthier because I would have them make all the stuff I eat when I go to restaurants and I’d probably never go out to eat again. Sometimes the lure of not having to make everything myself (and clean up after) is too strong. Or I really want something that’s fiddly and complicated to make that I’m bad at, or something requires equipment I don’t have.
I enjoy cooking, but damn it’s nice to just be served food. I could do with a chef like once or twice a week. They could bring a maid too while they’re at it.
That’s not living.
What’s most notable here is the chef is talking about Chris just as much as Gwyneth. People always acted like he was the normal one who wanted to eat cheeseburgers and fries, but really he’s a strict organic vegan who went further with a lot of this stuff than Gwyneth ever did.
I’ve read and heard him say the opposite, that he was vegetarian when he was with her but has backed off it a lot since they split.
Also that he would sneak out with the kids for fries, ice cream, etc. when they were married.
No, he was an extremely strict vegan before they even met. I think he’s relaxed that now, but at the time he actually seemed to exacerbate and encourage Gwyneth’s dieting.
He’s certainly never said anything about sneaking the kids out for junk food.
It sounds like the chef is shading her because of her perhaps less-than-stellar relationship with Paltrow. However, I’m turning a new leaf with Paltrow and women like her. Women bitching about other women is a big energy waste. We should be fighting for the revolution, not against each other (which works out very nicely for white males in power). I know it’s fun and addictive, but I’d personally like to stop. That chef serves delicious shade though.
I get what you’re saying but G is not good for women. She just isn’t. I could never put my finger on why exactly her website irked me that much until Lainey posted a link to a blog by a physician, Dr. Jen Gunter, yesterday I think. She laid it all out and I almost fist-bumped my laptop.
G is about money, not about empowering women. In fact, I would say a lot of what she promotes can be downright harmful to women. She also lies to sell products under the guise of making women’s lives better. But G is actively hurting that revolution you mention because she is distracting us with unimportant, expensive products and ideas that tell us we can and should be better but the only way is through her shop. So I say speaking out against her is part of the revolution.
I agree with littlemissnaughty.
As much as G wants to act like she’s great for women and anyone criticizing her is a huge misogynist, that’s just not the case.
She’s preying on the insecurities of women. She’s a good businesswomen, I’ll give her that; she found a way to exploit women that hadn’t been thoroughly mined. Take their money, sell them useless garbage, but wrap it all in words like “empowerment” and “self-care”.
I look forward to the day when Paltrow will do something else, anything else, with her hair. Is that what mega money buys now?
Are you suggesting that the cornhusk dolls we made in my 4th grade art class AREN’T the best fashion inspiration? Hmmmmm.
She looks like a dried husk, it’s apparent how she eats just from her appearance.
…And smokes cigs and suntans, all the while preaching *health* to the wealthy wanna-bes who “read” goop. Not to harsh on other women’s looks, but she is her own product; this is how she makes her money now, apparently.
This chef seems unprofessional and her statements contradictory (sounds like she just didn’t like goop).
There’s nothing wrong with “more veggies” or veganism (that’s how I mostly eat), and why not have them prepared well if one can afford it? Extreme fad diets, however, as goop has followed and proposed for years are bad for one’s health. And it shows.
She did spent a good amount of her 20s as a well-known bulimic as well.
What you/we call bulimic was her “macrobiotic” 90s, whatever the latter means (I still don’t quite know).
The “macrobiotic” phase when she’d get reporters taken off interviews with her for asking if she was okay when she’d come back from the bathroom in the restaurant after puking, and leave half a dozen burrito wrappers in the back of a car as a binge.
You can actually look like that from not having enough fats in your diet.
My sister is a registered dietitian and has an EO. Didn’t eat fats for years, and looked like Goop – all dried up. Added healthy fats and now looks much better.
She is on my list of those who mean absolutely nothing in the grand scheme of things.
This. No pun intended, but there’s no weight with her. No dimension. No introspect. Shrek (the ogre) has more layers. She seems to exist upon the very last waft of an exhale, you know what I mean?
Paltrow was filming at the time so perhaps her diet was more strict than usual because of that. And the chef crowing about sneaking forbidden items into the food is horrifying. What if one of those items was a genuine allergy? In any case, this is very unprofessional of the chef. Her job is to prepare what she’s told, end of.
So, what exactly is the difference between Paltrow/Martin and Ker/Bloom diet, according to this chef? They all seem to eat a lot of fruit and veggies. But somehow Paltrow doing that is doing something wrong? “They wanted more vegetables.” How is that bad?
It sounds like it’s a difference in degree. Presumably most celebrities eat lots of vegetables and lean protein, but Paltrow and Martin took it further and wanted very few other ingredients added to their recipes to make them tasty.
my relationship with good is extreme since ulcerative colitis and chrones run in my family on my mom’s Mexican side. we physically cannot eat processed foods and have allergies to gluten and the new wheat. we break out in tiny facial blisters we used to think was acne. we get lethargic, poop ferments or runs, restaurant food is a scary. we have to make everything from scratch to limit flare ups and inflammation. we get moody and lethargic if we don’t eat normal foods or what trend ppl call “eating clean” . it’s what we know, so i do believe that Americans have unhealthy relationships with food. just not always for a vanity purpose.
I wonder if she gets hungry? I was a dumb 20 something who once read her cleanse and tried a half day (blueberries and almond milk, miso soup, a half bowl of lentils) and I was so hungry.
The UN defines starvation as eating MORE calories than her 2-4 week cleanse allows, I later found out.
It is almost like youth is wasted on the young, or wealth is wasted on the rich.
I hope her kids get enough, I know it messed me up to see my mom do slim fast, fasting days, boiled veggie days. I think disordered eating has a strong familial component, which was why I tried her cleanse.
I know someone that went into extreme veganism after her children were born and had her small, young children follow the same diet. They did not look healthy to me at all. I’m not saying they weren’t or that it was negligent on her part but I understand where you’re coming from.
It takes some getting used to. I’ve been trying to change my diet to incorporate more protein and fewer fats along with cutting down on portion size. The first month really is torture, but your stomach expands and contracts depending on whatever your “new normal” is for food. Paltrow seems to have starved herself for most of her life. She probably would not know what it feels like to be full or the joys of indulging on hearty rich meals. There should be a balance, and unfortunately a lot of people have difficulty achieving that. They either starve or overeat. Food is wonderful and I refuse to deprive myself of that joy in order to be stick thin.
“Seize the moment. Remember all those women on the ‘Titanic’ who waved off the dessert cart.” -Erma Bombeck
God, I miss Erma Bombeck. She was so witty but also with such warmth and empathy.
My cousin worked on a movie with Gwyneth when she was in her macrobiotic phrase. She was required to eat a bowl of pasta in a scene. When they had to reshoot as the scene wasn’t quite right, she had a fit about having to eat more pasta. Apparently she was one of the best actors my cousin had ever seen though at being prepared and had her lines down pat every time.
I love food, I would marry food and have its children if I could. I am a good cook and experiment with recipes from many cultures. That being said, I don’t stint on things like butter or cream if a recipe calls for it. I do insist on ingredients being fresh and healthy, no pre-prepared sauces or frozen dinners even for a last minute meal, I just make big batches of whatever can be frozen and keep that on hand. I stay away from white bread/pasta/rice, potatoes and cereal. Instead I use brown rice, kamut, lentil or black bean flour pasta. Because I had breast cancer I stay away from desserts and sugary stuff. I usually use quinoa or barley instead of rice, but once or twice a month I allow myself forbidden stuff. Even a slice of good pizza FFS! This eating dismorphia is ridiculous. Food is to be worshiped for all the right reasons, including health, but for the love of cheese lighten up Goop, you’re looking like a dried-up stalk of corn these days!
Yep. Food and me go way back.
For someone that has been on the wellness bandwagon for so long, she looks kind of haggard. Whatever she’s doing is not helping her skin or hair.
Now I want a big old pizza. I’ll clip my chia pet and sprinkle that on.
How anyone takes advice from this woman with her bizarre view of food, skin of a prune and the hair of the Scarecrow and undernourished frame is beyond me.
Add to that her fascination with vagina’s and her need to steam clean and insert objects into them and she gets a hard pass from me.
A chef trained to cook everything is lard and duck fat is APPALLED. Let me tell you something, they mark on their resume that they specialize in cuisine for those with allergies and fresh veggies. Therefore, they are hired by people w/ allergies/vegetarian/vegan/or special diet.