TVSquad

According to that journalist without peer, Ted Casablanca -- yeah, I'm sure that's his real name -- Food Network diva and Emmy-winning talk show hostess Rachael Ray is working on a new project.

No, it's not a new cookbook or anything about food or travel, her two specialties on FN. Rachael Ray is writing her memoirs, the story of a kid from upstate New York who's made in big on TV.

Rachael, who turns 40 on August 25, has had a meteoric rise on TV, and as I wrote last week, she's one of five TV stars I think have exceeded expectations. In a very short time, she's become a force with which to be reckoned.

Her first TV show, 30-Minute Meals, debuted in 2001, just seven years ago. She's equally popular and unpopular with the masses, which has done nothing to diminish her success. She's done TV shows, DVDs, cookbooks, cookware, commercials, a monthly magazine, a comic/cookbook for kids -- even a Christmas CD (not singing; it's just her favorite songs)!

One thing that I can tell you will be in Rachael Ray's memoirs will be self-deprecating humor and graciousness. When I interviewed her in 2007, I asked her about her success on the talk show and she told me, "It's all been terrific. I'm very, very proud of all the people who work on our show, and our viewers. I never saw me being on TV for any reason whatsoever. That's what's been so cool about this. It's been an organic, fun thing."

Her being asked to write a memoir, even this soon in her career, is not too surprising. Everything she's touched has turned to gold. Somebody will make a lot of money publishing her story, including every EVOO, stoup, garbage bowl and sammie.

Also, if she doesn't write her memoirs first, somebody out there will write a biography that's likely not to be authorized. In fact, I can hear the keys clicking now from some PC far, far away.