Ina Garten recalls her dad dragging her around by her hair as a child in Hoda Kotb interview: 'Terrified he was going to kill me'

Ina Garten has opened up about the time her father grabbed her by her hair and dragged her around a room as a child, and has admitted she was 'terrified' that he was going to kill her.

In an eye-opening interview with Today host Hoda Kotb, the 76-year-old beloved celebrity cook described her younger years as 'cold' and 'lonely,' and said she was 'so restricted' as a child by her parents, Charles and Florence Rosenberg.

When Hoda, 60, asked Ina what would happen if she 'scraped her knee' as a child, the author - who was promoting her new memoir Be Ready When the Luck Happens - replied: 'No hugs and kisses in my family, it was a very cold, lonely existence,' before admitting she's 'not sure' that she even knew if her mother loved her.

'I don't know that she was capable. I was really so restricted as a child. I was always told, whatever I wanted to do wasn't a good idea, so I wasn't myself,' Ina explained, as Hoda touched upon the physical abuse inflicted by her father.

'I think I was terrified that he was going to kill me, and what I realize now is it astonishes me that I didn't have the courage as a child to fight back,' she said, before sharing that he told her: 'No one is ever going to love you.' 

'Isn't that stunning? He was mad about something, I have no idea what. He said, "Nobody will ever love you." Do you know what I love? I love walking up Madison Avenue and someone leans in and says, "I love you." It is this great cosmic joke to me, it's like, "Oops, I guess he was wrong."'

Ina went on to confirm that her father did apologize to her much later in life, as she recalled: 'He just turned to me and said, "I don't know what I was thinking." And I thought, "Wow he's been torturing himself all this time." It meant he said, "I'm sorry." I thought that was an incredibly difficult thing for a father to say.'

However, she never had such a conversation with her mother, Florence, and said she's not even sure that she 'acknowledged' her career.

Referring to how her father appreciated her work, she said: 'I think he used to watch the shows that I was doing, and I think he knew about the books. I think my mother really never understood any of it, but it was her loss.'

Talking about the death of her parents, she then added: 'I think I separated from them so much that it didn't have an enormous impact on me. I was sadder about my father than I expected to be. My mother and I never had anything. I did what I needed to do, but I didn't really lose much.'

Ina also revealed that she thought the reason she chose to never have children with her husband, Jeffrey, was partly to do with her own unhappy childhood.

Opening up about why she finally decided to share her story in her new memoir, Ina said: 'I didn't tell the story of my parents because I had such a terrible childhood. A lot of people have bad childhoods, and it certainly wasn't the worst.

'I wanted people to know that the story of your childhood doesn't have to be the story of your life, that you can decide with an enormous determination, "I'm going to do it differently."'

In a recent interview with People magazine, Ina said that despite calling her childhood bedroom a 'safe haven,' she was not able to make the color what she wanted - which was purple - and was made to have it peach as her mom told her it would 'turn out badly'.

Ina added: 'It was something she said to me a lot. I wouldn't be surprised if she was diagnosed with Asperger's [Syndrome].

'She really didn't know how to have a relationship, which is why I think, as I've gotten older, having relationships is so important to me.'