Ina Garten gets candid on separation from husband Jeffrey: He ‘expected a wife that would make dinner’

At one point in time, Ina Garten needed to add certain ingredients into the mix to make her marriage work.

The Food Network star, 76, who has been married to her husband, Jeffrey Garten, for 56 years, detailed their one-time separation and near-divorce in the 1970s in her upcoming memoir, “Be Ready When the Luck Happens.”

Ina was working overtime running the specialty food store that would later shoot her to stardom, the Barefoot ­Contessa, but Jeffrey, 77, “expected a wife that would make dinner,” she wrote, in an excerpt obtained by People Tuesday.

“There were certain roles that we played, and I found them really annoying,” she continued. “I felt that if I just hit the pause button, I would get his attention.”

Ina decided to quit her job in the White House, where she and Jeffrey both worked, to run the Barefoot Contessa full-time. Jeffrey stayed behind in Washington, DC, and visited the Hamptons on weekends.

Ina acknowledged how the dynamic shifted after that.