I remember the first time I saw Paula Deen on television doing the show Ready…Set…Cook! on The Food Network.  She was just so hilarious, and she looked like my aunt and had the personality of my college roommate.  It was like a (crazy) member of my family was right there on the t.v.

Soon afterward, she began starring in her own show, frying chicken and baking cakes and cooking up all kinds of good Southern food.  I was so glad to see the food I grew up with being given the attention it deserved, in a time when, as Paula states, “health-food diet mania” was consuming America.

The rest is history, and Paula Deen is now a household name.  In her autobiography, It Ain’t All About the Cookin’, however, Paula proves that everybody seems normal until you get to know them.  I guess I just assumed that she was always a success, but she reveals in her book how she spent many years of her life just struggling to make it through the day.

Growing up in Georgia, Paula says she had an idyllic childhood, with her family, grandparents, aunts and uncles all close together running a resort.  Her teen years were spent being cute, having fun, and cheering.  But at eighteen she met a boy she couldn’t resist, and wanted nothing more than to get married and be a wife and mother.

Unfortunately, it didn’t take long for Paula to realize that marriage wasn’t all smooth sailing all the time, and she began struggling with the fact that she couldn’t make it all better.  As is often the case, I think, being sheltered and loved by her family, and possessing the gift of “Southern charm”, that niceness that girls in the South are brought up with, caused an inner struggle for Paula.  She felt that “if being protected and cherished by my parents was being spoiled, then I guess I was.”

Then as a result of tragically loosing both her parents within four years of each other, while Paula was still in her early twenties she really began to struggle to keep her sanity.  Suffering from panic attacks and agoraphobia while raising two small children tested her every day, until she finally discovered what exactly she suffered from and began to slowly overcome it,  and eventually end her marriage.

As a single mother Paula returned to what she knew best, good Southern food.  Beginning with a catering company and expanding to a full restaurant, she kept up the traditions of the South.  She knew that “the South is all about tradition, and most of those traditions have their origins in the cooking pots and the recipes we pass down from generation to generation” and that “Southern cooking is nothing but Southern – we don’t fly in our ingredients or menus from distant parts of the world. What’s in our pots and on our plates is all home-grown.”  And keeping true to this philosophy has meant nothing but success for Paula Deen.

This book is full of Southern charm and wit, and had me laughing one minute and crying the next.  If you are from the South, you’ll find yourself nodding along with it, and if you aren’t, you’ll hopefully learn a little about what drives a Southern woman.  As Paula says, “Some people call Southern women steel magnolias to show our unfailing survival instinct. Well, if we got dimples of steel, so what. Things have to be right.”

I whipped up this Ham Salad recipe found in Paula’s autobiography, and it turned out to be just right, too.

My Best Ham Salad (Sandwich)

adapted from It Ain’t All About the Cookin’ by Paula Deen

Ingredients

• 2 cups leftover ham, chopped in a food processor
• 1 cup celery, finely diced
• 1/4 cup sweet onion, finely minced
• 1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
• 2 hard-boiled eggs, diced
• 1/4 cup hot pickle relish, drained
• 1/2 cup mayonnaise

Directions

1. Mix all the ingredients until well blended.
2. Spread on white bread to make a sandwich, or serve with crackers.

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Happy New Year!  Is your resolution to have a sweet 2010?  You know we all need a little sweet in our lives to make us happy.

Make sure to add a little sweet to your new year with this heavenly, fluffy, nutty Pecan-Honey Butter.  Use it on your breads, biscuits, french toast, or pancakes – your imagination is the limit.

Pecan-Honey Butter

adapted from Southern Living Magazine (Nov. 2009)

makes 1 cup

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup butter, softened
• 1/2 cup pecans, toasted and finely chopped
• 2 tbs. honey

Directions

1. To toast pecans, preheat oven to 300 degrees and bake on a tray for 10-15 minutes until fragrant. Let cool and chop.
2. Stir together butter, pecans, and honey until thoroughly mixed. Store in refrigerator or freeze.

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I was inspired to make my own mayonnaise this weekend.  Let me tell you, it was TOUGH ON THE FOREARM.  You have to whisk, whisk, whisk, the whole time you are S-L-O-W-L-Y adding the oil.  A cup and a half of oil didn’t seem like a lot to whisk at first, but I think it multiplied while I was working!  The kitchen got a little shower of oil when I found out I’m not quite as coordinated with my left hand.  It makes me wonder whether you could make it work in the ol’ Kitchenaid.  I’m trying that next time.

We don’t really use much mayonnaise in my house, actually, I’m the only one who eats it and not that often.  The husband has sworn it off, along with Chinese fast food and pretty much lunch altogether (it’s a lot like this).  I don’t tell him it’s in the pimento cheese.

But I thought it sounded like a good idea, making homemade mayo, so I gave it a shot.  I had to see how it compared to store-bought, and I do think it’s better – much richer, fresher, and more flavorful.  And I could make it for the times I need it, and maybe build up my arm muscles as a bonus.

So what does one do with her jar of hard won mayonnaise?  Why make some homemade chicken salad, of course.  I simmered a whole chicken for about two hours in a pot covered with water, a quartered onion, a couple stalks of celery, and a little salt.  Then I took the chicken out, strained the stock and refrigerated it, and removed the meat from the chicken.  I used about half of the meat for this Cashew Curry Chicken Salad recipe.  The curry is subtle, you can add more if you like, and the chives give a nice onion flavor without having to crunch on raw onions.  I’m a huge fan of nuts in my chicken salad, and the cashews taste terrific.

You can most definitely make this with store-bought mayonnaise, but if you feel like working out your arm muscles you’ll end up with some great mayo afterward and some super tasty chicken salad!

Cashew Curry Chicken Salad

serves 2

Ingredients

• 2 cups cooked chicken, chopped
• 1/3 cup homemade mayonnaise (recipe below), or store bought
• 1/4 teaspoon curry powder
• 1/3 cup celery, chopped
• 2 tablespoons cashews, chopped
• 1 tablespoon chives, finely chopped
• 1 tablespoon parsley, finely chopped
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon pepper

Directions

1. Combine all ingredients and stir until well blended.
2. Taste for seasoning and adjust, if needed.

Homemade Mayonnaise

from The Gift of Southern Cooking, Edna Lewis and Scott Peacock

makes about 1 3/4 cups

Ingredients

• 1 tablespoon cider vinegar
• 1 tablespoon freshly squeezed lemon juice
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon dry mustard
• 2 egg yolks
• 1 1/2 cups vegetable oil, light olive oil, or a combination
• 1 tablespoon hot water

Directions

1. Put the vinegar, lemon juice, salt, and mustard into a bowl, and whisk or stir until the salt and mustard are dissolved.
2. Add the egg yolks, and beat until smooth.
3. Add the oil drop by drop at first, and then in a slow, steady stream, whisking or stirring constantly until all of the oil has been incorporated and you have a very thick emulsion.
4. Stir in the hot water until smooth.
5. Refrigerated, homemade mayonnaise will keep for up to 1 week.