Meghan Markle has faced online ridicule after sharing hosting advice that encouraged people to prepare as much food as possible before guests arrive.
The Duchess of Sussex posted the guidance on Instagram through her As Ever brand account. The update is the latest in a series of lifestyle-focused ventures, following her two Netflix series centered on home cooking and products associated with her brand.
The post was titled “Meghan’s Hosting Notes” and included a short list of recommendations for entertaining at home.
“Have as much prepped as possible before guests arrive, then save one simple task for the end,” the advice stated.
“Something you can finish in the kitchen while everyone settles in. A little preparation goes a long way toward making hosting feel effortless.”
However, many viewers reacted with sarcasm, accusing Meghan of presenting basic entertaining tips as though they were a major revelation.
Nancy Sidley, a prolific commentator on X, wrote: “I love it when Meghan trolls us with the most obvious hosting tips on the planet.”
She added: “Today’s revelation: prepare things before your guests arrive. Next week: put food on plates.”
Meghan Markle’s As Ever Instagram account shared an update featuring her “Hosting Notes.”
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex are pictured during their trip to Australia in April this year.
Other tongue-in-cheek replies included: “Next week will be ‘Turn lights on before event!’”; “Make sure to open your door as the guests arrive”; and “Put on apron beforehand as if meal was cooked by you.”
Meghan and Prince Harry moved back to the UK in August with their children, seven-year-old Prince Archie and five-year-old Princess Lilibet.
The couple had previously left Britain and stepped away from official frontline royal duties in 2020, a move widely dubbed “Megxit.”
Since then, they have developed separate projects, including Harry’s 2023 memoir Spare, which contained criticism of his brother, Prince William, his father, King Charles, and his mother-in-law, Camilla.
The Sussexes also appeared in a 2023 CBS interview with Oprah Winfrey, discussing tensions within the royal family and making allegations of racism.
Meghan’s Netflix programming highlighted her cooking and lifestyle interests, while As Ever sells products including $12 (£8.80) jars of fruit spread, along with items such as Raspberry & Lavender Honey Yogurt Parfait and Blackberry Spread.
After leaving for the United States, Meghan and Harry made their home in Montecito, California. They also own a holiday property in Portugal.
Following their return to Britain, the couple are believed to have been staying at a private, non-royal residence in the Cotswolds.
King Charles was reportedly taken aback after learning of their plans to return in August, having not been informed when the Sussexes visited him in the UK the previous month.
Sources said at the time that the terms of the “Megxit” agreement would remain unchanged, meaning Meghan and Harry would continue not to be working royals.
The Sussexes’ status remains the same, with the couple not being offered a ‘half in, half out’ option when it comes to their roles.
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Harry and ex-Suits star Meghan, who wed at St George’s Chapel, Windsor Castle, in May 2018, were once dubbed part of the ‘Fab Four’ with the then-Duke and Duchess of Cambridge – now the Prince and Princess of Wales – William and Catherine.
But in March 2019, Buckingham Palace announced Harry and Meghan would set up their own household, breaking from the joint operation they had with William and Kate, amid reports of rifts between the two couples.
In January 2020, the Duke and Duchess announced they intended to step back as ‘senior’ members of the Royal Family, become financially independent, still support Elizabeth II, but split their time between the UK and North America.
By March that year they had set up a permanent home in California, officially stepped down as senior royals and stopped using their HRH styles.
The fallout worsened after accusations Harry publicly levelled at members of the Royal Family including his brother in his memoir Spare and his Netflix documentary.
In his autobiography, released just months after Queen Elizabeth II died, Harry accused William of physically attacking him and pushing him into a dog bowl in a row over Meghan.
He also alleged it was William and Kate who encouraged him to wear a Nazi uniform to a fancy dress party in 2005 and ‘howled’ with laughter when they saw it.
Harry and Meghan, in their Netflix series two months after the Queen’s death, claimed Kensington Palace lied to protect William when it issued a statement denying a story he had bullied Harry out of the Royal Family.
Harry also wrote of how Charles pleaded with his two sons during a tense meeting at Windsor just after the funeral of Prince Philip, the late Duke of Edinburgh, saying: ‘Please, boys. Don’t make my final years a misery.’
Meghan was able to travel to the UK in July with Archie and Lilibet to join Harry when he came to the end of a week-long series of events promoting next year’s Invictus Games.
During the visit, the Duke and Duchess took their children to see the King for the first time in four years at his Highgrove home, but are not thought to have raised the prospect of a return to the UK at that meeting.
The Invictus Games take place from July 10 to 17 next year, with Birmingham expected to welcome about 550 wounded, injured and sick service personnel and veterans, and their families, from 25 nations.
Meghan launched her lifestyle brand As Ever last February and has been adding recent updates online promoting its products.
There have also been reports she will ‘pick up with a lot of people’ and step up charity work now back in the UK.
Plans are understood to include Smart Works, a charity supporting unemployed, vulnerable women looking for jobs.
She held four patronages after she wed Harry in 2018, but Smart Works was the only one she continued to support after she stopped working as a royal.
The Sunday Times earlier this month quoted a source as saying: ‘She is thinking about plans for how she can get more involved and support the causes she was supporting and was passionate about again, and new causes too.’
Meghan’s first eight-episode Netflix series – called With Love, Meghan – was released on the streaming giant’s services in February, following a series of teaser previews she had shared with her 2.2million Instagram followers.
In trailers, Meghan was seen cooking, baking, cocktail making, flower arranging and party planning using its kitchen’s £15,000 cooker, £600 pans, £60 chopping boards and hosting friends across the property’s stunning rooms, garden and orchards.
Meghan announced on February 18 the renaming of her venture As Ever from previous title American Riviera Orchard, which she said had limited her to locally-produced goods.
