5 Ingredients or Fewer

Even those who say “No!” to sauerkraut will love this specialty dish from family friend Betty Maxwell.

This is the main attraction of our traditional Easter meal, and we think those spiral-sliced prebasted hams take a backseat to our version. Ask your butcher to order a whole smoked water-added ham such as Gwaltney, Hamilton, or Smithfield, and have him remove and quarter the hock. This not only makes the ham fit more easily into your pan but also gives you the hock pieces to use another time and contribute unbeatable seasoning to soups and veggies. Serve with Potato Salad (page 53) and Baby Lima Beans (page 132).

This is one of those old-fashioned dishes that people either love or hate. I love creamed beef on toast. In fact, it’s what I have for breakfast on my birthday every year! In our house, this dish is affectionately known by another name I can’t print in this cookbook, but whatever you choose to call it, it’s yummy!

Sometimes it’s nice to make a meal that takes only a couple of steps to get into the oven, and then you can forget about it for an hour while it cooks. The beef broth gives the rice a great flavor. I serve this with Cooked-to-Death Green Beans (page 130).

Roast beef is all about Sunday afternoons after church for me. Mama would get up early and put the roast on to cook, then turn off the oven when we left for church and let it sit until we got home again. The memory of walking through the door and smelling that amazing aroma still makes my mouth water! The hardest part about this meal was waiting for the gravy to be made before you could sit down to eat it!

Garth has to claim this recipe because he modified my basic pasta salad to suit his tastes and changed it completely! He likes to eat it warm because he loves the way the cheese melts into the other ingredients, so he doesn’t wait for the pasta to cool down at all. He also says the secret to making the tomatoes taste so good is salting them separately. Who knew he was Gartha Stewart?

I keep this chicken salad in the refrigerator pretty much year round. It’s easy to make, and it keeps in the fridge for a week. Of course, at my house, it only lasts a few days! I serve this on toasted bread, or with wheat crackers as an appetizer.

I’m not a cooked spinach fan, but I do like spinach served fresh in a salad. (And I love any salad that has bacon as an ingredient!) I’m also not a mushroom gal, so I leave these out when I make it, but it’s good either way.

I’m the hick who always asks the uptown restaurant waiter if they have Thousand Island dressing. They usually give me that look (you know the one), then politely inform me it is not on the menu. I know there are lots of wonderful dressings out there, and I’ve sampled most of them, but I always come back to this one. I usually whip it up and pour it over a big iceberg lettuce wedge.

There are as many varieties of coleslaw as there are shades of pink, especially in the South! A lot of coleslaw recipes have sugar as an ingredient, but this one gets that bit of sweetness from sweet salad pickles, which don’t mask the fresh flavors of the cabbage and carrots. We serve this every Fourth of July with Barbecued Pork Ribs (page 84) and Easy Baked Beans (page 133).

When it comes to potato salad, you like what you like. This recipe is mayonnaise-based, but if you like a mustard-based potato salad, just experiment a little. Add some yellow mustard and leave out a little bit of the mayonnaise. Make these recipes your own by finding out what works for you. Our traditional potato salad uses peeled potatoes, but unpeeled work too, and the skins add some color to your dish.

My grandmother, Lizzie Paulk, was an amazing woman. She worked the fields in South Georgia with my grandfather Winnes, raised three children, and somehow still found time to put three home-cooked meals on the table every single day. She passed away when I was in junior high, but I have wonderful memories of her laughter and her love for her family. Mama had always complained she could never get her dumplings to come out as thin as her mom’s, but the first time she made them after Grandma died, she said it was as if Lizzie were guiding her. Maybe she finally decided it was okay for Mama to be able to make her dumplings! They’ve come out perfectly every time since.

I think making someone else’s recipes is a wonderful way to remember them when they’re no longer with us. Garth’s brother Jerry loved my cooking, and he was a good cook himself. He always made me feel he truly appreciated the meals I made for him, and I loved him for it. He had a wonderful smile and a great spirit. Jerry brought these pecans out to the house one day, and I only stopped eating them when they were gone! The butter and sugar make them crunchy, sweet, and rich.

Serve this punch with Cheese Straws (page 20). It’s a Yearwood family tradition—perfect to serve at Christmas parties, because it’s a beautiful bright green and makes a pretty punch bowl.

If you’ve ever driven through a small town in Georgia, you no doubt have seen signs for boiled peanuts along the roadside. I’ve found that they’re a love-hate thing; people are rarely undecided about boiled peanuts! I include the recipe here because I absolutely love them. When I make them at home in Oklahoma, it takes me back to our family vacation trips to Florida, when we’d stop on the roadside and eat the warm peanuts in the car. Yum!

A pimiento cheese sandwich made on very fresh white bread is a true southern staple. Nothing goes better with Gwen’s Fried Chicken (page 93). Mama slices the crusts off the sandwiches and cuts them in half for family reunions—very southern belle!

I’m sort of a snob when it comes to trying new recipes. I just seem to like my old tried and true ones best, and it takes a lot for something new to grab my attention. I had to have the recipe for this dip after I tried it on Super Bowl Sunday 2006. Garth is a die-hard Steelers fan, so it was an exciting day. Everybody always brings something for the party, and this was my friend Kim’s contribution. Being a good southern girl, I love anything with black-eyed peas in it, but for you folks who are right now turning up your noses at the idea of eating black-eyed peas, all I can say is just try it. In fact, maybe I should name it something else for those skeptics. How about Pea Dippy?

I’ve laughed a lot while writing this cookbook—and gotten very hungry! I laugh because most people consider these tasty meatballs the perfect small bite for a party or wedding reception, but I sometimes make them just to satisfy a craving! They are usually served cold, but when I make them at home, I serve them warm, right out of the oven, and they are awesome! So to answer the burning question, can you make an entire meal out of sausage ball appetizers? Yes!

I love cheese! I would eat a piece of Cheddar cheese over a piece of chocolate cake any day. That probably makes me a little weird, but if you love cheese like I do, you’ll love these cheese straws. My mom used to make them for baby showers and wedding receptions. In 1991, the year my career started to really take off, she made them for me to give as Christmas gifts to everyone who had been so supportive. We laughed about how these cheesy treats were baked in a small kitchen in Monticello, Georgia, and ended up on the desks of some of the biggest movers and shakers in Nashville.

It is hard to imagine how the flavor of fresh-picked Jewel strawberries could possibly be improved. But with traditional balsamic vinegar, the gorgeous, sweet-tart, syrupy vinegar made from local grapes in Modena, Italy, it is ridiculously easy to make the strawberry taste burst out in an incredible way. If you can, use Jewel strawberries.