Meredith Hayden ‘Was Afraid Everyone Was Going to Hate’ Her After She Quit Private Cheffing. Then the Opposite Happened

Meredith Hayden is playing a game of This or That on-set of her PEOPLE cover shoot when she’s met with an impossible choice: Ina Garten or Martha Stewart? “Don't tell her,” she whispers, as if her second choice is in the room. Then gives her answer: “Martha.”

The truth is Hayden, 29, a content creator and soon-to-be cookbook author better known as Wishbone Kitchen to her followers (2.3 million on TikTok alone), has been a longtime fan of both lifestyle stars.

“I literally modeled my career off of theirs,” she says. “You know when you're applying for jobs and you see a company you really like, you find someone on LinkedIn that works at that company, and you kind of go through their history. Where did they go to college? What internships did they have? What jobs did they have before that job? I want to get that job, but how did they get there? I literally did that with Ina and Martha.”

Garten and Stewart each started out by opening a specialty food store and a catering business in the Hamptons and “were able to turn that experience into flourishing cookbook careers,” says Hayden. “Writing cookbooks was always my goal.” Her equivalent was applying for a private chef position in that same high-end beach town after graduating from culinary school in 2019.

“I was like, ‘I guess I could figure that out. They did it, and they got to where they are. So maybe if I do it, I could find a way to get there too.’ ”

And get there she has. On May 6 Hayden will release one of the most highly anticipated spring titles, The Wishbone Kitchen Cookbook, her first with a publishing company after releasing two self-published cookbooklets.

The Wishbone Kitchen Cookbook joins her growing business empire, which also includes strategic brand partnerships on her social media pages, collaborations with stars like Jason Momoa and Kelly Clarkson, a Substack and a YouTube show, which recently had its name and theme allegedly copied by Bon Appétit. Her influence — stemming from the viral “day in the life” video diaries she filmed during her private-chef days — is vast.

“The lore that Meredith carries into our generation inspires so many,” says Sage Cofone, 26, a rising lifestyle influencer who looks up to Hayden.

“From her recipes to her unique hosting tips, she has the ability to make her audience feel like they're right beside her in the kitchen, from the comfort of their own home. Whether I'm grilling outside on a hot summer day or curating the perfect dinner party menu, I always refer back to her content and think, ‘What would Meredith do?’ ” she says. “She is my ultimate comfort creator.”

It’s easy to see why she captivates an audience (and nabs multiple magazine covers, including Better Homes & Gardens). Hayden brings sharp humor to the kitchen, has impeccable style (a red Gucci coat she purchased on a trip to Paris inspired plenty of envious TikTok chatter) and is always learning a new skill that she can then document for a video. On-set with PEOPLE, she casually mentions needlepoint and drapery as her latest side quests.

“People are always like, ‘Oh, she's so Martha.’ Because I'm blonde and from New Jersey, and I like to cook and have dinner parties,” she says. “I'm like, ‘Okay, well, I’m my own person.’ ” She feigns annoyance before coming to a realization. “We have different hobbies, probably — maybe not, but we could. We actually, definitely don't. I don't know,” she says with a laugh.

Hayden first realized she had a knack for entertaining in college at Clemson University, where she was studying marketing. “I started cooking in high school and threw my first dinner parties in high school. But it wasn't until I had roommates in college where I saw what I would make for dinner and what everyone else would do, and I would be like, ‘Yikes. Maybe I am good at this,’ ” she says. “I just felt like it came more naturally to me.”

The need to feed was passed down by her mom, Nancy, while growing up in Wyckoff, N.J. (home of the Jonas Brothers, Hayden is quick to point out). “My mom would make us a roast chicken every week for dinner, and when she would carve the roast chicken, she would save the wishbone for me and her,” says Hayden. “Then at the end of dinner, when we were cleaning up, we would pull it apart, and whoever got the bigger half got to make a wish.” The memory served as the inspiration for her moniker.

Still, after college Hayden briefly explored the fashion industry, working as a marketing intern for Tommy Hilfiger — and kept cooking as just a hobby. But she quickly learned, “I was a really bad intern. The corporate life was not made for my brain.” So she pivoted, enrolling at the Institute of Culinary Education. A restaurant job followed before she landed her gig as designer Joseph Altuzarra’s private chef, cooking for his family in New York City during the winter and in the Hamptons on weekends in the summer.

“She was so young and yet so poised,” Altuzarra tells PEOPLE of his first impression of Hayden in 2020. “In a lot of ways, I don't think she has changed much since her career really took off. She has remained very grounded, generous and open-hearted.”

Hayden chronicled her stunning work environment and extensive menus like duck confit and peanut butter chocolate cake (two of Altuzarra’s favorites) for three years before stepping away from the job that made her a star. With financial freedom, thanks to brand deals, Hayden could dedicate her time to content creation and writing The Wishbone Kitchen Cookbook.

“I was afraid everyone was going to hate me,” she says of quitting. “You follow this person because they're posting XYZ type of videos, and all of a sudden things change. And the hope is that people continue following because they like you for you. And while I'm not cooking for other people for money, I am cooking for other people for fun. And thankfully a lot of people who follow me seem to still be hanging around.”

The backdrop of her videos has changed but not all that much. In October Hayden purchased her own Hamptons home for $2.8 million. “We have to rip the roof off and put a new one on, but we knew that,” she says. “The house is from 1870, and I love it. It's like a living piece of history, and I'm just so excited to make it my own. Slowly but surely, that's kind of the approach I'm taking. Still, whenever I go there, I don't even fully process that it's my house, but I'm sure as we continue to make it mine and add my own personal touches, it'll start feeling more like home.”

Like with many influencers, Hayden’s fans are just as invested in her personal relationships as they are in her recipes. When Hayden posted that she broke up with her boyfriend around the time she bought her new home, online commenters assumed the worst.

“They were like, ‘Yeah, the breakup was really messy because they bought that house together,’ ” she recalls. “I'm like, ‘You guys, stop.’ ”

In reality Hayden had purchased the converted barn on her own (with her parents’ stamp of approval) and had kept their breakup a secret for six months.

“I wanted to process that on my own, and I definitely recommend it to anybody going through a breakup,” she says. “I can't imagine dealing with my own emotions plus input from strangers.”

Since things ended with her boyfriend — whom she only ever publicly referred to as “chicken man” because of the roast chicken recipe she used to impress him with early on — Hayden makes it clear that she’s not ready to step back into dating right now. “I'm open to talking to people in a social setting. I'm not an ice queen, but I'm not seeking out another relationship, for sure.”

Instead, Hayden is raising her Bernese mountain dog Poppy and looking forward to hosting dinner parties as the weather warms up (get her spring party guide below and exclusive recipes from The Wishbone Kitchen Cookbook here), and she remains laser-focused on her career. Asked if she can pinpoint a moment when she realized she had “made it,” she struggles for a minute.

“I don't know. I think it's still happening right now,” she says. “Maybe right now, this interview. This is the moment.”

Meredith’s Guide to Entertaining

Start with Simple Decor

“I try not to buy table decor for specific occasions or specific seasons, because then you just have a bunch of holiday stuff that you can only use once a year,” she says. “I like to stick to a white linen tablecloth, a neutral place mat, and then dress it up with fun little card holders or candles and switch those out, so then your base can meld with the seasons.”

Make It Pop

“I love when the table is just bursting with different colors from all different vegetables,” says Hayden. She compliments the food with bright flowers. Peonies, poppies and tulips are all favorites. “Hydrangeas are also great because they're so big and billowy that you don't need a ton, and you could just pick up a bunch from Trader Joe's, and it fills a whole vase.”

Take Store-Bought Shortcuts

“Maybe since I was a private chef for my profession, whenever I'm with my actual friends, I'm wanting to spend the time with my friends, and it's like my time off. So I try to find as many semi-homemade, store-bought sort of opportunities as I can. I'm famous for inviting friends over on a weeknight and just ordering a bunch of sushi, but then dressing it up with different accoutrements.”

Know Your Crowd

“If I’m hosting my best friends that I've been friends with since kindergarten, there's no end time,” she says. “It's just like, ‘Come over.’ But if it's a more mixed crowd, I think people like direction, and people like to know what I can anticipate out of the evening. ‘Okay, it's 7 to 9.’ But I don't think you have to include an end time.”

Set Boundaries as a Host

“If you're over 30 minutes late, I find that not fashionably late. So I would say the sweet spot would be 15 to 20 minutes. But I hate when people get there early, which is funny because I used to love it when my friends would come over, and we would all get ready together, but then I realized it was just too distracting. I'm like, ‘I have stuff to do. You guys have to leave.’ ”

Send Guests Home With Leftovers 

“I like to get little deli containers or cardboard takeout containers before I have a dinner party so that I can give them to people, instead of putting stuff into Tupperware,” she says. “I just put it directly into these takeout containers, and I shove it in people's purses as they leave because I'm like, ‘This is your responsibility now.’ ”

Practice, Practice, Practice 

“My biggest piece of advice is to accept failure as part of the process, because a lot of people are like, ‘How are you so good at cooking?’ And I'm like, ‘Talk to me 10 years ago, I was not good.’ It's something you have to learn. It's kind of like if you want to run a marathon, you can't just wake up one day and run a marathon. You have to practice, and you have to have those days where you run really slowly or you don't run the whole distance you were supposed to. For cooking, you burn this and you overcook that, and whatever. I could give as much advice in terms of how not to burn this, but my advice isn't going to stick as much as your failure will.”

Credits

Photographer Caroline Tompkins

Cinematographer Josh Herzog

Hair Romina Manenti / Home Agency

Makeup Taylor Fitzgerald

Manicurist Kylie Kwok / Tracey Mattingly

Stylist Arnold Milfort / The Only Agency

Prop Stylist Suzy Zietzmann

Food Stylist Jamie Kimm

Read the original article on People