Meghan Markle has returned, and this time, she's bringing more than just her acting past or royal controversies. She’s stepped into the culinary scene, donning an apron and presenting a pasta recipe—one she seemingly forgot to credit.
Enter Martha Stewart. In the first episode of With Love, Meghan, she introduced a dish she called a family favorite: a one-skillet spaghetti meal that looked suspiciously familiar. Familiar as in Martha Stewart did it first—and better—years ago, and with viral success to back it up. The episode, titled Hello, Honey, featured Meghan alongside her longtime friend and makeup artist, Daniel Martin. Together, they dove into Pinterest-style activities: curating welcome baskets, arranging color-coordinated vegetables, baking an aesthetically pleasing cake, crafting beeswax candles, and of course, cooking a pasta dish that looked nearly identical to Martha’s iconic one-pan recipe. Meghan tossed raw spaghetti, cherry tomatoes, garlic, greens, and just enough water into a skillet—a cooking method pioneered by Stewart, who notably gave herself credit when the dish went viral.
Martha, unsurprisingly, took notice. Just weeks before Meghan’s series dropped on Netflix, Stewart’s team quietly renamed the recipe on her website to “The Original and the Best.” It was a subtle, yet unmistakably pointed move. Martha didn’t have to mention Meghan at all—the passive-aggressive rebranding was sharp enough to speak volumes. The internet, naturally, devoured the drama.
To Meghan’s slight credit, her version of the dish had a few modifications. She doubled the tomatoes and added lemon zest, kale, chard, and arugula—because no Los Angeles-based duchess would dare make pasta without at least one bougie green. But even with her tweaks, the dish felt less like a reinvention and more like a copy-paste job with a garnish of originality.
The bigger problem? Meghan’s new show isn’t just being accused of copying recipes—it’s also drawing unflattering comparisons to other lifestyle brands. Viewers have likened With Love, Meghan to a mash-up of Goop, Magnolia Table, and every over-polished wellness brand to grace a marble countertop. Critics describe the show as more of a curated aesthetic than a genuine look into Meghan’s life. It's less of a cooking show and more of a lifestyle catalog with subtitles—immaculate, scripted, and painfully safe.
Despite promises of an intimate glimpse behind the scenes, what audiences received was more of a highly filtered home décor spread than an authentic portrait of the duchess. The whole thing feels like someone tried to host a dinner party from inside a brand identity mood board.
Trying to emulate Martha Stewart is a tall order. Stewart is a domestic powerhouse with actual culinary prowess, a prison stint that somehow boosted her street cred, and a wit sharper than any kitchen tool. Meghan, in contrast, is out here smudging sage while Martha is out burning bridges—and still getting invited back.
