On March 4, Netflix released Meghan Markle’s — Meghan Sussex’s — cooking and lifestyle show, With Love, Meghan. Initially slated for a January release, the show was delayed for nearly two months due to the Eaton and Palisades wildfires. Following its premiere, one thing is clear: the Duchess of Sussex has placed her California roots on full display.
The series, in fact, is a love letter to Los Angeles, even if it was filmed up north in Montecito, California, where the duchess lives with her family. Of course, there’s a stunning (and rented for the show’s shoot) Central Coast home as her backdrop, pricey ingredients, designer clothing, expensive jewelry, and a garden that rivals the Huntington. Production-wise, With Love is directed by Michael Steed, an Emmy Award-winning producer for Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown. Unsurprisingly, famous faces can be found throughout the show, with appearances from actor Mindy Kaling and LA-raised chef Roy Choi. But no matter who appears, the discussions regularly flow back to Los Angeles’s ultra-prismatic, near-undefinable culture.
With Love, Meghan, hasn’t lived without its critics, with some of the harshest coming even before the show was released. Since stepping away from their royal duties in 2020, Meghan and Prince Harry, along with their two children, Archie and Lili, have settled into civilian life in Montecito and quietly begun to build a full life here away from the stifling imperial gaze of the British monarchy and the tabloid press that abets it. Fittingly, Eater LA has decided to approach the show with a Los Angeles-centric lens. Here are five Southern California-filled moments from With Love, Meghan that show the duchess is still, at heart, an LA girl through and through.
Meghan’s childhood fast-food memories are intricately tied to California
In Episode 2, as Meghan prepares finger sandwiches and arched rainbow fruit salads for an idyllic kids’ tea party set-up with actor and producer Mindy Kaling, she discusses her experiences as a latchkey kid in Los Angeles — a cohort of children who came home from school to empty houses as their parents finished their workdays. That included Hungry-Man Dinners, as well as fast-food meals from California-born chains like Taco Bell (she used to eat the chain’s Mexican Pizza with extra Fire sauce) and Jack in the Box (her mother, Doria, loved the tacos there, she tells Kaling). She cites some nostalgia around El Pollo Loco, which was founded in Sinaloa, Mexico, but whose U.S. operations are now planted in Costa Mesa in Orange County. (We also know that she and Prince Harry are fans of California icon In-N-Out.) If anything, the scene demonstrates (whether intentionally or not) how normal of an LA childhood Meghan had — drive-thru visits and television dinners firmly ingrained in her memories.
She’s clearly proud of her Angeleno upbringing
Early in the series’ third episode, Meghan says, “So many people have an idea of what Angelenos are like, but they don’t know people who are actually from here.” Aptly titled “Two Kids From LA,” Choi and Meghan spoke about their love of roadside fruit stands, easily identifiable by their rainbow beach umbrellas, where slices of fruits and vegetables of choice — think watermelon, pineapple, mango, jicama, and more — are served with lime juice, Chamoy, and Tajín seasoning. Choi and Meghan prepare a watermelon kimchi inspired by these Los Angeles fruteros and Korean-style fried chicken served three ways: with a Thai-influenced sweet sauce, a Korean-Thai crying tiger sauce mashup, and a dry rub with salt, MSG, cayenne, ancho powder, cumin, and bouillon.
In Los Angeles, doughnuts are royalty. Meghan knows this.
In a city where cotton candy-colored pink boxes only mean one thing, Randy’s Donuts and Yum Yum Donuts get name-dropped as two of Choi and Meghan’s favorite shops. (Meghan correctly guesses where when Choi tells her he stopped for doughnuts before the airport earlier that week.) Meghan, who grew up near Fountain and Highland Avenues, shares that Yum Yum on Highland and Melrose was a regular stop on her way to school at Immaculate Heart High School and Middle School near the Griffith Park Observatory; Choi (whose cousins attended Loyola High School) admits to attending dances at Meghan’s high school. Meghan prepares baked doughnuts for Choi before his arrival, saying, as she mixes the batter, “Doughnuts, in general, just remind me of my childhood” — she says she even worked at a doughnut shop briefly growing up.
The duchess has a lot of love for Koreatown
Meghan and Choi reminisce about the Koreatown of their youth, including, for Meghan, trips with her mother to Koreatown’s plentiful Korean spas and restaurants. “That’s a really powerful thing as a young girl to see culturally,” says Meghan. “Multi-generations all enjoying this [spa] experience.” Choi chimes in about dining after a Korean spa visit, “They all have amazing restaurants and you sit down and eat.” As Choi later reflects on his past as an LA dance crew member, Meghan shares musings on her past nightlife escapades. “The best thing about Koreatown was that you could go to all ages clubs and karaoke bars,” she says.
Meghan feels deeply connected to the communities where she grew up
Korean is the third most widely spoken language in Los Angeles, while over 50 percent of the city’s population speaks Spanish. Meghan is fluent in Spanish, which she demonstrates while preparing focaccia with Delfina Blaquier, the wife of the polo player Nacho Figuera in Episode 4, “Love Is in the Details.” In Episode 6, while slicing plantains to fry into chips, she declares, emphatically, “I love Mexican food, I’m from LA. It’s part of our culture.” At one point, she even references “an Asada at our house” — meaning a carne asada backyard gathering, which are powerful Mexican American community anchors. She can also speak a phrase or two in Korean, which she tells Choi in Episode 3. “To grow up with so many Korean friends and then outside of hearing ‘anyang haseo,’ what did I hear more from their moms? ‘Hajima!’” The former translates from Korean to “hello” in English, while the latter means “stop it” or “don’t do it.”
There’s no question that Los Angeles, and, more broadly, California are indelibly part of who Meghan is and has become: “When I lived in Argentina, I think the reason I loved it so much is it reminded me of California in a lot of ways,” she tells Delfina. “Where you have the mountains, you have the joy of life.”
