- All right, everybody, welcome back.
All hour we're celebrating food, glorious food.
Now I wanted to take a break from my kitchen classes
to introduce you to an awesome girl, making her mark
in the culinary world.
She just put out a cookbook,
but instead of making money from it,
she's giving all the proceeds
to help keep people fed,
which is such a beautiful thing.
Good heart.
She's exactly the kind of overachiever
our friends at Pilot makers of the G2 jelly pen,
the go-to pin of the Kelly Clarkson show,
like to help us celebrate.
So let's welcome the author of "Bake Away,"
18 year old Sahana.
(crowd cheering)
- Hi.
So, 18 years old.
You're so young.
This is such a huge accomplishment
for someone so young
and then to have such a great heart
at giving back, like,
has this always been a dream
to do a book like this?
- Yeah, thank you so much.
Yeah, ever since I was four or five.
My parents are avid cooks, so I've been in the kitchen.
I grew up around it,
and I've always been inspired to bake.
We had a cookbook shelf in our home
and had recipes all over the world,
Thai food, Mexican food, Indian food.
My family is Indian.
So we cooked a lot of Indian food,
and yeah, my favorite cookbook is by Curtis Stone,
and so I did his fish tacos,
and his apple pie really got me into baking.
- [Kelly] Oh, girl, I love apple pie.
- [Sahana] Yeah.
- Apple pie is so good, y'all,
especially when it's done so nicely.
My mouth is watering.
So you've also been dedicated
to tackling food insecurity,
and it says for your whole life.
You're so young though
to have this big of an issue
in your head and your heart,
to be tackling is such a cool thing.
So why is this so important to you?
- Yeah, thank you.
So growing up,
around the same age I started baking,
around four or five,
I volunteered at a local women's and children's shelter
with my mom, and we baked and served,
and ate the enchiladas we made
with the women there,
and that's really what got me exposed
to the food insecurity problem
in the area I grew up in,
and then in high school,
I worked with UNICEF and I lobbied Congress
with a group of other UNICEF members
where we advocated for the Global Child Thrive Act
and thankfully it got passed,
and now-- (crowd cheering)
Now a lot of children across the world
have increased access to nutrition programs,
water, and vaccines,
and then now in college,
I work at the FRESH Basic Needs Hub at UC Irvine
where we stock produce and groceries for college students,
and for residents of Irvine.
(crowd cheering)
- I mean, you're 18 years old.
Like, I feel like I was just a horrible person.
I feel like, "Oh my God,
"if we all were you, like how much the world would be better
"if we tackled all these things that
you're already tackling,
it's amazing. - Thank you so much.
- And it's amazing that it was...
It's just been set on your heart
and you've ran with it.
Imagine all the people you've helped
and you're so young.
So tell us about your cookbook.
Tell us about this, "Bake Away."
- My freshman year of high school,
I really got into writing
and it became another passion of mine alongside baking,
and so I wanted to combine both of them into a cookbook
and I ended up immediately drafting the recipes
and taking photographs of the recipes I made
in my kitchen in my dining room,
and I finally completed a manuscript,
like a a draft of the manuscript,
and then I reached out to a publisher.
I worked with them
with the editing and publishing process,
and after that I decided I felt a duty
to donate to No Kid Hungry,
and I started working with them,
and right now we're really, really close
to reaching our goal which is $50,000
and 500,000 meals for kids.
- Wow.
- You're such a remarkable human.
I feel like we can all be better humans in this moment.
So we love what you're doing,
but we're hardly the only ones.
In fact, we've got someone here
who wants to congratulate you
on all you've accomplished already.
So let's bring him out.
Chef Curtis Stone.
(crowd cheering)
- Oh my God. - Oh my God.
- You're amazing. - Oh my God,
thank you so much.
Thank you so much.
- You're incredible.
- Thank you. - Have a seat, have a seat.
- Oh my God, thank you so much.
- There's people all over this country right now
that are going over there,
and if you're not, you should be.
You should be going onto your laptop
and ordering your book.
- Thank you so much. - Because what you are doing
is a beautiful, beautiful thing.
- Thank you.
- No, it's amazing. - And at such a young age,
like, you know what I'm saying?
I feel like we weren't doing stuff like that
for people at 18.
I mean, I hope I was doing something,
but I...
Wow, like what do you wanna say to Sahana?
- I wanna say congratulations.
- Thank you so much. - What you've done is
absolutely incredible,
and I've got a couple more friends
to meet you too.
- Okay. - All of my fellow Iron Chefs.
Come on out, guys!
- Come on out!
(crowd cheering)
Everybody, it's Iron Chefs--
(crowd cheering)
- Thank you.
- Wow. - Oh my God,
thank you so much.
- You're so amazing. - Oh my gosh.
I was like, "What?" - Congratulations.
- Thank you so much. - What a decent human.
- Thank you.
- Oh my gosh.
- Oh my God, thank you so much.
- Everybody, our partners at Pilot,
makers of the G2 jelly pen want to honor you
as the overachiever you are.
So they are donating $5,000
in your name to No Kid Hungry. - Thank you so much.
- Oh my God.
Thank you so much, Sahana, truly.
It's so funny, everybody always says
you can't learn from the young.
We can learn so much from the young.
You're such a pure heart. - Thank you so much.
- And you're doing so much good for so many people.
Thank you so much for sharing this with us.
- Thank you so much
for having me. - Yeah!