The entrance to the private road where the home of celebrity chef Rachael Ray burned on Sunday, Aug. 9, 2020.
Wendy Liberatore / Times Union
The entrance to the private road where the home of celebrity chef Rachael Ray burned on Sunday, Aug. 9, 2020.
Wendy Liberatore / Times Union
Rachael Ray got her start working at Price Chopper!
Celebrity chef Rachael Ray and her family escaped a fire that damaged her home on a private drive in Lake Luzerne.
The fire at her Chuckwagon Trail home was reported at about 5:29 p.m. Sunday. Ray, her husband, John Cusimano and her mother, Elsa Scuderi, were not injured. Their dog, Bella, got out too.
The fire began in the roof of the home – though authorities are not yet sure what ignited it – and spread into the second story.
Authorities said that portion of the home was badly damaged but the first floor was mostly spared. The kitchen, where she has filmed her Food Network show “Ray Rachel Show,” was not damaged.
In a statement on Twitter, Ray thanked the “local first responders for being kind and gracious and saving what they could of our home.”
“Grateful that my mom, my husband, my dog … we’re all okay,” Ray said. “These are the days we all have to be grateful for what we have, not what we’ve lost.”
Ray also tweeted that she lost her phone in the fire.
“Thank you for all the well wishes, concern and outreach, but can’t return texts and calls at the moment,” she tweeted.
Fire companies from Warren County and neighboring Saratoga County remained at the scene throughout the night. Warren County Fire Coordinator Brian LaFlure said that about 60 to 70 firefighters were on scene with 14 volunteer department assisting Luzerne-Hadley Fire Department. They extinguished the fire in less than two hours. The fire, he said, was not suspicious, however, it will take a week or two before state fire inspectors can determine the cause.
During the coronavirus pandemic, Ray had been recording her cooking show in Lake Luzerne. The show was on hiatus.
Ray and her family are staying with neighbors. Through local officials, they asked that the public respect their privacy while they deal with the fallout from the fire.
“This is a very, very difficult time for them. And I would appreciate it (if) you don’t need to come look at it. You can’t get to it easily any how. We would just prefer let them deal with it,” LaFlure said.
The firefight was complicated by a lack of fire hydrants, but LaFlure said “it went quite well, as good as can be expected.”
Several tanker trucks were used to draw water from a nearby pond. LaFlure said that it could have been much worse, noting the fire department is about 15 minutes away.
Ray, 51, grew up in the southern Adirondacks, graduated from Lake George High School and has maintained a home in Lake Luzerne for years.
Ray comes from a family of chefs and restaurateurs — her mother managed the Howard Johnson’s in Lake George for a time — and she started in the food business in New York City.
She moved back to Lake George just as she was turning 30 and started managing the pub at the Sagamore Resort. She later worked as a food buyer and chef for the now-defunct Cowan & Lobel gourmet food market in Albany. It was there she came up with the concept behind “30-Minute Meals,” which propelled her to stardom on the Food Channel
Local and state fire investigators were trying to determine the cause of the fire.
“We will treat this case as we would any fire,” said William McGovern, of the state Office of Fire Prevention and Control. “There is a methodical process we have to go through. Examine the scene, interview witnesses and identify where the fire started and look at potential causes.”
