An Interview with Ellen Bennett, Host of ‘Kitchen Glow Up’

Photo of Ellen Bennett Courtesy of Tastemade and Hedley & Bennett.

Ellen Bennett is a highly accomplished chef and entrepreneur. For she brought life to the iconic brand, Hedley & Bennett, which offers upgraded cooking gear for use in professional and home kitchens. Ellen’s latest project is serving as the host of Kitchen Glow Up, a new series on Tastemade where Ellen transforms kitchens in need of upgrades, and we here at NTG had the distinct honor of sitting down with Ellen, to discuss her new project!  
 
John Betancourt I was very curious to learn what inspired the creation of this series?
 
Ellen Bennett: Well, I am a deep food lover, and nerd, and chef. And so, I wanted to combine all of that. My several years of cooking professionally, but I also love design. And I felt like there was this missing opportunity here where people should be able to not only make their kitchen look awesome, but also work. And in professional kitchens. Nobody cares about the visuals of it. They just care about, does it flow? Can you pump out 400 dishes a night? Can you find things easily? Can you not waste food? Can you maintain your food margins, right? And so, if we could apply some of those to the home consumer, oh my god like what a game changer and with my background about fitting professional kitchens. After cooking professionally through Hedley & Bennett, my company, I feel like I got a firsthand look at restaurants. And now we also outfit home cooks too. So, it's kind of like, my whole career has been embroiled in outfitting inspiring dignity and pride in the kitchen on all these different facets. And now I, I get to go into people's actual homes that are not professionals and be like, guess what, you're not professional, but we can make you feel more professional. And it's not expensive. And you can do it in all different facets. I mean, the show has everything from single people on the show to married couples that have kids, one family had five kids, another one was a retired family that had like two people 75-80 years old, that is like every single person's parents. So, you kind of got to see all the ways that kitchens had a lot of dysfunction and how to fix it in lots of different capacities.
 
John Betancourt: So, this is something you're really passionate about, what is it about the process of going in and doing this kid of work, that just gets you so excited?
 
Ellen Bennett: Well, I love to cook. And I recognize that every person on the show also loves to cook, and they have all these like barriers stopping them from having a good experience in it. And so, you can change that, you're actually kind of doing a lot more than just giving somebody a glow up, right? There's like a life change in that. And there were a lot of moments in the show that got really emotional for people, like they were letting go of things that you know, they had loved ones that passed away. And they'd been clenching and holding on to pans and pots and plates that were from grandma, etcetera. But it was ruining their day-to-day life experience. And so, it was almost like watching people get out of the past and into the present a little bit. And that was awesome. And I really enjoyed that. Not just because I love food, and I love to make people look great in the kitchen like that's the whole ethos of Hedley & Bennett, but it was it was this like catharsis that I inevitably gave them that made it really special and kind of purposeful, like there was like soul to it. So, it made it not be just like a random design show. Oh, look at the kitchen. Look how pretty it is. It's like, no, no, we're fixing your kitchen, we're fixing your life a little. And we're also going to make you look and feel better when you're at home in the space that you're using every day. Like no one takes a day off from using their kitchen. Right? It's always there. You always got to eat. 
 
John Betancourt: Which brings me to a follow-up question. There’s an upcoming episode where you really go above and beyond to help someone in the kitchen. What does it mean to you to be able to do that for people?
 
Ellen Bennett: That episode was wild, John, like I, first of all, she didn't really want to do it. It was her daughter that signed her up. So, you know, there was there was some of that attached to this. So, I feel a real responsibility to get her there to the other side. And, you know, at the end of it when she walked through that kitchen, she was like, “I can't believe the changes that you made that I didn't even realize I needed to have those changes made.” And to have like an older person who sort of set in their ways say that, to me was like pretty amazing. And I felt like it was transformative to her because you know, she had a stroke, like she had all these life ailments. And that was the first episode that I realized this is so much deeper than just a kitchen remodeling show. And it made me have an even bigger commitment to like getting this right. And it's not just for TV magic, it's like, in fact, our entire crew was like, “Whoa, this is so much deeper,” as far as the output than a normal show, because the normal remodel show, you just paint stuff, and you shove everything away in the cabinets. And no one looks inside, because it's just like, okay, get the good shot and hide everything. Whereas for us, it was like, no, every Cabinet had to be labeled, reorganized, emptied, purged, cleaned, restructured, put into containers, like that is a level for TV magic, that doesn't normally happen. So, I think it was pretty cool. Because our whole crew, it was an experience for them to they were not used to that level of detail. 
 
John Betancourt: I don’t think anyone is to be honest. Because you made me think about things I should perhaps fix up in my own kitchen from an organization standpoint.
 
Ellen Bennett: And you know, it's funny, John, is that there were days where our camera crew would go home. And they would say Ellen, and we're talking about like a 40-year-old dude. Right? Who's like, not mister kitchen guy. And he'd be like, “Ellen, I went home, and my wife and I organized our spice storage.” And I would be like, “yes, it's working. This is awesome.” And it's like, it's so it might feel so silly and small. But like if that made that guy, cook more at home, have more time with his wife create more memories, like I'm actually impacting people in a bigger way than they realize.
 
John Betancourt: Now one important question I need to ask, is how you selected the participants for this show.
 
Ellen Bennett: So, good question. So, they had to love cooking. This is not just a show for like anybody who has a kitchen sign up. You have to love to cook, and you have to hate your kitchen. So, it's the juxtaposition of polar opposites. It's like they are committed to cook in their kitchen. They're so terrible, regardless of how bad they are in the kitchen, right. And so that was that was kind of like check number one. And then the other one had to be each one needed to be different enough from another so that we could show people that it didn't matter if you had $10,000 or $50,000, you can, actually make a change in your kitchen and have it be approachable. And not just like some luxury before and after design show. And you know, there's kitchens all over New York City that are the size of a shoe box, right? And professional kitchens and home kitchens. So, we want people to be able to watch these episodes, and be like, “Well, there's my mom in episode two. Now I need to go do that for her. Oh, here I am in episode four, a single lady, you know, out and about, but loves to throw big dinner parties. Okay, how can I change my kitchen.” And I think that's what's fun about it. There's like a real kind of, there's shifts in it. It's not the same cookie cutter edition for each kitchen, which was challenging for me too. Because it was never like just rinse and repeat. It was like, “Oh, damn, how are we going to tackle this kitchen with their five kids and the dogs and all that?” 
 
John Betancourt: That brings us right to my next question that I wanted to ask, what kind of challenges you ran into in creating this? Because you had a very small crew. Definitely not a truckload coming in to work on this stuff overnight. You guys really did the DIY thing.
 
Ellen Bennett: Yeah, well, you nailed it. Small crew, like I was the designer. And I led all of the drawings and the layouts of you know, that was like the chef lens. I think the one of the big, big tricky parts was, in many cases, it was a little bit of like time, right? So, we gave ourselves two weeks per episode to remodel an entire kitchen. And sometimes we were taking walls out. So that was pretty intense and aggressive. And I think the other challenge was convincing people to let go of things that they had for a really long time without making them do anything, like we were there to help them right. Like I am there as their, sort of copilot, and counselor, if you will, but I cannot force people to get rid of their grandma's favorite ceramic dishes. So, it was a happy dance of respecting their things that they had these huge emotional connections to while also kind of making sure that they could trust me enough to say, “You know what Ellen, like by holding on to these 40 plates that I haven't used, except for at Christmas. I'm ruining my experience cooking 364 days the rest of the year because I have to move All those plates to get to my pans every time and that sucks.” And then I'm just gonna go out and order crappy Thai food, or whatever, like crappy takeout. And so, I think it's important to note that piece that was hard. That was really hard, like people, people got emotional. It was it was tricky to navigate that.
 
John Betancourt: Well, that makes sense. Because I mean, there is a very emotional attachment to food I think we all have. It means something to us to cook a certain meal sometimes, and things like that.
 
Ellen Bennett: There are memories attached to them too, like memories with your grandma or memories with your dad. And, and so you're like asking people to get rid of these memories in a way. But then I was also like, “Hey, by bringing you to a present moment, you can actually create new memories, instead of being held on to all this stuff.” That's just like weighing you down, and you didn't even realize it.
 
John Betancourt: Now on the flip side of that, we do see your team working to overcome some of those logistical challenges, and I’m sure for running time’s sake we just saw a sample that. So, I am curious, what did we not see on camera when it came to those logistical surprises?
 
Ellen Bennett: I think what we didn't see is just the tremendous amount of effort and care that the team put into doing it, right. Right? Like there was so much reorganization that wasn't even captured, frankly, like, there were not drawers that we skipped over, because they didn't go on the show. We did every drawer, we did every notebook, we did every sink, we did every under the counter of the sink, right. And so, you know, there were days where we're there till midnight, and we were organizing and labeling things, which is not usually typical of a design show, like your, you know, the contractors are running behind, and they're painting and that's the stuff that like gets shown. But we were making sure that when we walked away these people actually had a pro great kitchen that they could live in. And that took way more work than anyone anticipated, including our entire crew.
 
John Betancourt: But they do look great. I must say the first ones that I saw like… that is quite the transformation for sure. 
 
Ellen Bennett: So, I mean on a shoestring budget, because if you've got like, true kitchen renovations are like 75 to $100,000. And you're not talking about like a mansion in Beverly Hills, you're talking about like a normal kitchen. So, the fact that we can pull this off with 10,020 like the older woman's house… that was a $10,000 remodel. 
 
John Betancourt: Now, not everyone that tunes in will want to commit to doing the full on, you know, kitchen swap out or tearing it apart like that, which is totally fine, too. But obviously every series wants to accomplish something from a messaging standpoint, so what do you hope people that tune take away from this series?
 
Ellen Benett: I think it's really like, it's gonna give people creative inspiration, that whether they want to tackle one drawer or the entire kitchen that they have the assets to do it. It starts with themselves and time, right? Like, it doesn't cost anything to purge an empty every drawer out, right? If you want to just start with your pots and pans. And you're like, these are a disaster. And I've been holding on to pots and pans for 16 years that I got from my wedding registry, and I haven't used them once. It's like, okay, cool. Well guess what you can give it to a friend, you can donate it, or you can move it into storage, but it doesn't need to live in your kitchen anymore. And I guarantee you, if you just do one of those, one time, like one little zone, you're going to be cooked because there's this like, catharsis that comes with it and in a sort of therapeutic appeal. And I'll tell you what, during COVID I redid my kitchen, like three different times, organizing it and when I got stressed out, I'd go redo my pantry. And it was just really, I would step back at the end of the night and have my hands on my hips. I'd be like, “Look at this, this looks so good. And I would feel better.” So, I think people are going to hopefully be inspired to do that. So instead of just watching TV to watch TV, have a watch TV and get something out of it and then go you know, apply it in your real life. That's what I hope. 
 
John Betancourt: You’ve accomplished so much, and your passion is endless. What about all this drives you so intensely?
 
Ellen Bennett: You know, I started my company when I was 24 years old and I had no money, no connections, no resources. And I really did… it began with like, I want to give people dignity and pride in the kitchen. And it was the kind of vessel if you will, was the apron. And that vessel just keeps like morphing into more things and Hedley & Bennett, knives, etc. But I've always kind of played this like long game approach. And so, by getting to build little bricks of foundation on this thing that I built, which was heavily invented, and then getting to build something like this, this TV show, to me, I'm just like adding more bricks to the wall. And I'm not necessarily looking for like, instantaneous results and output, but I'm thinking about like, the long game. How can I show people this dignity and pride that I created and Hedley & Bennett, but for the home? Well, a huge factor in people getting into the kitchen is that they don't have any organization in it. And they can't find their pots and pans. So, then they don't cook at home, and they go do something else. So, let's remove that barrier and get them to cook in the kitchen. Right? So, it's kind of like all intertangled in a funny, Twizzler way, it all has to do with like making people feel better. And that's a purpose. And so, I'm not just doing it to do it. I'm like, there's a why behind it. And I think that drives a lot of the inspiration. And some of my best memories in my life have been in kitchens and around kitchens, and it's offered me so many channels and opportunities. And as a, you know, woman that was raised by a mom, that single Mexican mom with not all the opportunities in the world, like, how awesome that I get to do all this stuff, doing something that I love to do. So, like, yeah, I'm just grateful for all those opportunities.
 
John Betancourt: Last question that I have for you today is What are you most proud of when it comes to this particular project?
 
Ellen Bennett: I am really proud of this, John, that I saw this in my head many, many years ago with Andrew Zimmern. And we didn't know what it was gonna look like. But we knew we wanted to do something together. So, to see it kind of like bloom out of nothing, is maybe one of my biggest joys in being an entrepreneur. It's like you see an idea. And then you see it come to life. And this is truly something that was very much in my head, and I didn't have all the words to describe it. And the show is even more than the words to describe. It's like that is what I wanted. I wanted to show people how to make a kitchen better, I wanted to glow it up, I wanted to make it approachable and that anybody could do it. And I didn't want it to be like elitist in any way. I wanted everybody to feel like you know what, “I can do this. I'm gonna go tackle that. And I'm very pro action.” Like, I wrote a book called Dream First Details Later. That's this show in a nutshell. Like, we're not planning every single thing. We're like, we're getting in there and we're finding all the skeletons and then we figure out how to deal with them. And so, action is my middle name. So, I think with this show is that… I hope it makes people feel enthusiastic to go and tackle their kitchen with a lot of action.
 
This interview has been lightly edited and condensed for clarity.

---