Ina Garten is not just a barefoot contessa, she is also a kitchen goddess, full of ancient wisdom which she sometimes bestows on mere mortals. The other day, Maria Yagoda, the restaurant editor of Food & Wine, published a blog post summarizing the most important things she has learned from Ina. These include “Freeze your bread in chunks,” “Make two cakes at one time,” and “Store-bought is fine.” The list inspired one reader named Mary to write a poem called “ina garten,” which she shared with Yagoda via email and which Yagoda shared with the rest of us via Twitter.

　　Here is the whole poem. It is truly lovely.

　　We butchered our own chickens growing up

　　and my mother said never buy

　　chicken over 3 1/2 pounds. Ideally, it should be

　　around 3 pounds. My

　　mother once said all the chickens now look like

　　they have boob jobs.

　　I only make one cake and unless you’ve got like

　　six people in your

　　family nobody should be eating a whole cake

　　anymore, especially at my

　　age, so I actually only make one and split it and

　　my friends know

　　they’re getting half a cake. They don’t mind.

　　I like to try something new when I have

　　company over because I will

　　Splurge. That being said, I usually have people over

　　that are close to

　　me and they don’t care if I screw up. If I didn’t know

　　the people that well

　　I would do a tried and true.

　　Yes store-bought is fine occasionally, but most

　　of us can only get

　　Pepperidge Farm puff and I am not that

　　fond of it. It doesn’t

　　have any butter. WTF? It would take me an

　　hour and a half to two

　　hours to get to Trader Joe’s on I-4 which has

　　been undergoing

　　construction since 2001 with no end in sight

　　and is considered the

　　most dangerous highway in the United States. I

　　try to avoid this road.

　　When I lived in California, the French bakery

　　would sell puff pastry

　　dough by the pound... I loved those people.

　　There is a special place in

　　heaven for those people.