Aarti Sequeira

Aarti Sequeira


This charming Indian born (but with an English accent) cooking star won The Next Food Network Star in season 6, and has been running full steam ahead ever since. Aarti introduces easy to prepare and often unique food items for parties or groups, and they can be prepared by home cooks. She loves a touch of Indian spice or recipe in her meals -- and her favorite spice is garam masala. This is sometimes made ad hoc but can be bought in a jar, and it has coriander, black pepper, cumin, cardamom, and cinnamon in it.

Her new show is Aarti Party and it usually airs Sunday morning, giving home cooks plenty of time to make a great weekend party dinner. She was educated as a journalist but has been a foodie all her life. Besides her show, she also has a food blog so she can pass along a few great tips and tricks. Some of our favorite recipes of hers that we have tried are Tikka Masala, Jalepeno Pop 'Ems & Mango Pulled Pork.

Aarti's goal is to expand palates and bring a few exotic tastes into American cuisine. Aarti was born in Bombay (now Mumbai) and then grew up in Dubai. Her love and appreciation for food is lifelong and she got inspiration from her mum, her faith, many food experiments, and her cultural background. She grew up in an Indian Catholic family, and so on Fridays, she ate fish.

She remembers going with her dad to the fish market, along with cooking with her mum. She would also pretend to host her own cooking show! After finishing school in Dubai, Aarti went to Northwestern Medill School of Journalism in 2000, where she earned a Bachelor's. She learned media experience from the school's TV and radio station. She also covered D.C. for a local TV station in Fargo N.D.

When she graduated, Aarti worked at CNN for a year and then moved to NYC. She married a couple of years later then the couple went to Los Angeles. During the decade of the 2000s, Aarti did a few gigs in the entertainment industry. After this, she went to The New School of Cooking, which is in Culver City, California. Here, she got her professional cooking certificate and then launched her online cooking & variety show Aarti Paarti, and her blog as well.

Aarti loves many things, including music, dance from the Middle East, improv theatre, and browsing through art galleries. While she and her husband live in Los Angeles, her parents and younger sister live in Bangalore, India, and another sister lives in Phoenix, Arizona.

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