Duff Goldman Gushes Over Wife Johnna and Their Life 'Out in the Woods': 'We Are Insanely in Love'

"We're crazy about each other," says Duff Goldman, whose new Food Network show Ace of Taste premieres on Sunday

Photo: COURTESY THE FOOD NETWORK

Duff Goldman is recreating the life for his family that he cherished so much growing up.

Before he was the master baker behind Charm City Cakes and a beloved TV host, Duff — whose new Food Network show Ace of Taste premieres on Sunday — was partly raised in the rural area of Sandwich on Cape Cod, Massachusetts. Now a parent himself to daughter Josephine, 15 months, with wife Johnna, Duff is emulating that small-town feel for his daughter "way out in the woods" in Topanga, Calif.

"We have three stoplights in Sandwich. It's a small, pretty rural place. It's just where I'm the most comfortable," Duff tells PEOPLE over Zoom of his hometown. "There were a lot of things when Josephine was born, like growing up amongst nature, that I just wanted to make sure that she grew up with."

Duff, 47, and Johnna, 28, celebrated three years of marriage in January, and the new dad says he's "definitely settled into domesticity" at their home in the Santa Monica Mountains. Though Topanga is still part of Los Angeles, "you would not know it," he says. "There's no noise at night. There are stars. There's no light pollution. Like we are out here."

That serenity has allowed the couple, who tied the knot at the Museum of Natural History in Los Angeles after nearly three years of dating, to form an unbreakable bond.

"My wife and I are just insanely in love. We're crazy about each other. We're always together. Even before the pandemic, we were just always together," says Duff. "We didn't fight. The whole pandemic it seemed like some people were like, 'Oh, my god, I just can't be in this house with you anymore.' But the two of us are, I don't know, I think because we make everything a game. We try to make everything really fun, that it works. We're really goofy with each other, and now the baby's really goofy, too."

COURTESY THE FOOD NETWORK

They wake up with the sun around 5 a.m. and are in bed by 9 p.m. Date nights for the pair are more like day dates during what they call "outdoor family time."

"I have a gym behind my house. We got this little playpen that now is part of the gym. It's really cute, so the baby goes in the playpen. Then there's a table that's under a tree that gets a lot of shade. My wife writes and she does crossword puzzles, and I lift, and we listen to music and hang out. So, every day we have a little outside family time. It's kind of nice."

Work for the baker is also family time. Johnna and Josephine will hit the road with Duff when he starts shooting Food Network's Baking Championship shows in Knoxville, Tenn. And Ace of Taste, which is Duff's first primetime show where he'll make savory dishes in addition to sweet, was filmed at the Topanga Community Center close to home. His girls will make appearances on the family-oriented program, like for Josephine's first tea party, and are largely Duff's inspiration for taking his TV career in this direction.

"I'm finding that a lot of my training as a professional chef has really made me good at running the kitchen in my house," he says. "Because with the baby, and the wife, and all the stuff we have going on, I'm cooking all of our meals. The kitchen is really just the center of your house, it's the center of your life. Keeping it organized and being able to produce meals, it's something I just wanted to share with everybody because it's a very surprising thing that came out of fatherhood for me."

Duff: Ace of Taste premieres on Sunday, April 24 at 12 p.m. ET/PT on Food Network.