Martha Stewart Slams Rachael Ray

USMagazine, Wednesday, November 18, 2009, 10:36am (PST)

Martha Stewart says Rachael Ray can't hold a candle to her in the kitchen.

In her first television interview since serving five months in prison in 2004 for lying to investigators about a well-timed stock trade, Stewart, 68, talks to ABC News' Nightline about rebuilding her brand -- and slams Ray, 41, one of her TV competitors.

"Well, to me, she professed that she could -- cannot bake," Stewart says of Ray in the interview, airing Thursday. "She -- just did a new cookbook which is just a re-edit of a lot of her old recipes. She -- and that's not good enough for me."

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When it comes to writing a book, Stewart says she want to publish something that "is a unique and lasting thing. Something that will really fulfill a need in someone's library." Ray, she says, "is different."

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Stewart says Ray is "more of an entertainer ... with her bubbly personality, than she is a teacher, like me. That's not what she's professing to be."

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Do Stewart's remarks make Ray mad?

"Why would it make me mad?" Ray asks. "Her skill set is far beyond mine. That's simply the reality of it."

Ray adds that "that doesn't mean that what I do isn't important too... I don't consider it needling. I really just think she's being honest. She does have a better skill set than I do when it comes to producing a beautiful, perfect, high-quality meal." Says Ray, "I'd rather eat Martha's than mine, too."