Sandra Lee recalls 'soul crushing' childhood poverty as she opens up about her mother's tragic addiction and mental health struggles

Former Food Network star Sandra Lee has opened up about the 'soul crushing' poverty she experienced as a child, and the embarrassment she felt when using food stamps to feed her family.

Lee, 58, who is the eldest of five children, shared more about her challenging childhood; which included raising her brothers and sisters due to her mother's struggle with mental health issues and an addiction to prescription medication. 

'She just would not come out of the bedroom or not get out of bed,' Lee recalled in an exclusive interview with the DailyMail.com.

'At the time, my stepfather didn't even live in the state,' the star continued. 'We were on welfare and food stamps and I remember going out to the mailbox and getting that check.'

The TV chef was only two years old when she and her younger sister, Cindy, were sent to live with their paternal grandmother, Lorraine Waldroop.

Her mom, Vicky Svitak, who gave birth to her as a teenager, went on to have three more children with a man who later became Lee's stepfather. 

However, when the couple split when Lee was only 11, she found herself taking on a parenting role for the three younger children, even managing to feed the family, who lived in Sumner, Washington, using food stamps.

The chef shared a particularly harrowing experience when she was at school and had to pay with food stamps in front of popular girl from her school that left her wanting to 'die' inside.

'I remember standing in line at the grocery store with the food stamps and it was mortifying for me, because the girl - she was like the popular girl in school - [and] her parents were the rich family [and] they owned the dairy,' she recalled.

Lee said she pulled out the book of food stamps, which 'came like Monopoly money.'

'These days it's a credit card so it's not so soul crushing, but that's the only way I can say it: soul crushing,' she added.

'When you have to pull out that little booklet of food stamps and pay for it in front of the most popular and the most wealthy girl in school [and] to have to do all that in front of this family, I just wanted to die. I just died inside.'

Lee, who recently admitted that Ozempic 'didn't work' for her, also spoke about her love of cooking for her siblings, crediting her grandmother for sparking her interest at a young age, after she and her sister lived with her.

'My grandmother was a great cake baker and was fantastic with icings, and that was kind of her gift to everybody at her church. She would do the wedding cakes and she would do the baby shower cakes and she would do all the special birthday cakes, and she wouldn't allow anybody to pay her for this,' Lee explained.

'It was her pleasure to do it and she would just sit there and cake decorate and I just remember watching her, so when I wanted to play with things, the cheapest thing wasn't toys, it was actually some icing and a pastry bag with some tips.' 

Of course, Lee gets to share her love of baking with fans in her new Netflix show, Blue Ribbon Baking Championship, which landed on Netflix on August 9.

The concept of the series is to find the best bakers from state fairs across the US and have them compete for the ultimate blue ribbon, and $100,000. 

Lee credits nostalgia as to why the series has been so successful so far.  

'The reason why the fairs are so revered and so beloved is because you go to them from the time that you're tiny and you build memories at them and you have your favorite foods,' she says fondly.

'And those are your childhood things that you love, whether it's elephant ears or funnel cakes or whatever it is that you love, and then there's new ones added every year that you have to try.

'When 45 per cent of the population of a nation attends something annually, whether it's a state, a county or a local fair, there's no way that it's not going to work if you bring it to life on television.'

Lee then revealed: 'By the way, I presented the Blue Ribbon Baking Championship to Food Network all those years ago and they didn't buy it and I was like, "Are you kidding me?"

'It was crazy, and I was like the hottest thing on that network at the time, and I just couldn't believe it!' 

As well as finally getting to bring her TV show to life on the small screen, Lee is also an ambassador of QVC’s Age of Possibility platform, in which she champions women over the age of 50 alongside the likes of Queen Latifah, Rita Wilson, and Martha Stewart.

Speaking about getting older, she said: 'I think what happens when you turn 50 is that you realize - if you're lucky - you're halfway through, if not more. Your body is changing and you have to pay attention to all those things.' 

Asked if she feels pressure to look a certain way because she's on TV, the glamorous blonde - who turned 58 in July - said: 'There's a reason why we all like wash our face and put lotion on and put makeup on.

'I don't think any of us are going down without a fight. I'm in the Cher camp - whatever makes you feel hot, do it!' she urged.