Celebrity Chef: Dawn bites back

From TV Guide Canada - November 5th, 2001 by Brian Hartigan

"Food is good," says 15-year old Michelle Trachtenberg, who co-stars on Buffy the Vampire Slayer as Buffy's half-sister, Dawn.

Yet while a fast food join -- Hollywood hot spot In-N-Out Burger -- is the first place she thinks of when pondering good eats, she still enjoys time in the kitchen, especially when it's with her mom. "My mom is a great cook," Trachtenberg says. "She is amazing, everything she cooks is great."

Especially wonderful, she says, is her mom's broccoli quiche. "We call it broccoli pie and I just love it," she gushes. "And if you add just a little bit of ketchup, it's perfect."

And then there are her mom's famous stuffed mushrooms. "I love mushrooms," she says. "And my mom stuffs them with things like bacon and cheese... and secret things that even I don't know about."

In fact, Trachtenberg says, some of those ingredients are so secret that her mother won't even hint at them when Michelle tries to whip something up herself. "I love to cook, but my mom will put out all of the ingredients and then leave some out," she laughs. "And then she'll say: 'Okay, let me finish that up for you.' It's like: [sarcastically] 'Thanks mom!'"

While Trachtenberg doesn’t really mind covering her eyes while her mom adds a dash of this or a pinch of that, she jokingly admits that her mother's stellar home cooking has had at least one negative impact on her life: it's turned her into a picky eater. "When I go out to a restaurant I'll be, like, 'oh … this is, um, good,'" she says. "but it's never as good as my mom makes." Hey, not much ever is.