For nearly sixty years, the partnership between Ina Garten and her husband Jeffrey has been a cultural touchstone, admired as one of the most enduring celebrity marriages. The Food Network star, now 77, says the real secret is neither complicated nor glamorous. It is a principle so straightforward it almost feels radical in an era of fractured relationships and escalating conflicts about roles, careers, and expectations.

Speaking on the latest episode of Good Hang with Amy Poehler, Garten described the single practice that, in her words, has held their marriage together since the 1960s. “We keep it very simple,” she told Poehler. “Every decision we make has to work for both of us. Not one person wins, not one person compromises away their happiness. It has to work for the two of us, together.”

Garten and Jeffrey met as teenagers at Dartmouth College and married when she was just 20. Their marriage predates her global fame, his academic career, and the evolution of their public personas. Over the years, they have become one of America’s most recognizable long-term couples, maintaining a steady partnership away from the volatility of celebrity culture.

What makes their approach striking is how consistently they apply it, from major life choices to everyday routines. Career pivots, home decisions, travel plans, even something as small as choosing a movie are navigated through the same filter, she said. “It’s not about whose choice wins. It’s about figuring out how we both get to do what we want to do.”

Garten attributes the philosophy to Jeffrey. “He taught me this idea that the best decisions are the ones where both people’s needs are met. When someone is always losing, eventually the relationship loses too.”

That sense of mutual respect, she said, has shaped their marriage more deeply than traditional expectations ever could. In the early years, they slipped into conventional gender roles—assumptions that she would cook after work, take on domestic responsibilities, and fill the “wife” space as society defined it at the time. Garten said she quickly realized she did not want to live inside those roles.

“I didn’t want the girl role, and he didn’t really want the boy role,” she said. “So we threw the whole thing away and started again, deciding what actually made sense for us, not for tradition.”

It was a process of rebuilding their marriage around equality and intention rather than inherited expectations. It also pushed them to evolve as partners. Their dynamic today, Garten said, is far from the one they had when they married: “We’ve grown, and we’ve grown together. That’s the difference.”

One moment from the interview that resonated widely was her recounting of a conversation Jeffrey once had about what makes a truly compatible partner. The criteria were startlingly simple: Are they a good person? Do they want to take care of you? And, the one that struck Garten the most, do they actually want to be with you?

“So many people want a partner, but they want to go off and do their own thing and come back when it’s convenient,” she said. “But Jeffrey genuinely wants to be with me. That changes everything.”

Their closeness stands out in a celebrity landscape where relationships often crumble under the weight of busy careers and high public scrutiny. They have no children—a choice Garten has discussed openly—and instead built a life structured around shared time, mutual admiration, and an unusual degree of intentional decision-making.

Their philosophy echoes comments from other long-standing Hollywood marriages. Rob Lowe has spoken about attending couples therapy regularly “even when we don’t need it,” while Jay Shetty has emphasized protecting personal time from work conversations, even in shared business ventures. Yet Garten’s principle stands apart in its simplicity. It reframes marriage not as compromise or sacrifice but as continuous alignment.

In a world where relationships often fracture under pressure, Garten’s rule feels almost countercultural. It is not built on self-sacrifice or domination but on equity, curiosity, and a shared desire to keep choosing each other, decade after decade.

Each decision, big or small, becomes an opportunity to reinforce the foundation.

That, Garten suggests, is how love survives nearly sixty years—not through intensity or perfection, but through steadiness, respect, and the commitment to ensure that every step forward is taken together.

That, Garten suggests, is how love survives nearly sixty years—not through intensity or perfection, but through steadiness, respect, and the commitment to ensure that every step forward is taken together.