My mother of course, an excellent deep south southern cook, taught me. As you all know in the south if you put mayonnaise in it it's a salad. All of us southern girls have to learn to cook early because the best way to snag a man is to be a good cook. I always thought that the quickest way to a man's heart was through his chest.

We make a lot of fried items, fish, chicken, taters, hamburgers and don't forget the gravies. You have to have gravy whether it's for breakfast or supper and you can only make the best gravy from fried meat. Gee, no wonder we are the major test market for cholesterol.

I love to cook, especially around the holidays. I have started my own tradition that is now in it's 3rd year. I have a walk-in buffet. Nothing fancy I just get to cook a lot of desserts and old favorites and some new items. I set it up on folding table in the dining room of the single wide, load it down, use disposable plates, cups & silverware. I then invite everybody, family & friends over. They all come at different times on Christmas Day fix a plate, visit awhile and them leave. Several of our friends don't have kids so they don't do alot of cooking and alot of them have visited family so much that they are ready for a break. It's works out great and I haven't had a single complaint.

As for a cooking faux pas: As a young bride I decide to make homemade pumpkin pies, from scratch, including the pumpkin. Something I have never had instruction in before. So I took my halloween pumpkins, scraped the inside and put it in the freezer for Thanksgiving. Well I took it out of the freezer and decided to follow directions to cook it down. However it looked strange, it was then that my now ex-husband came in and said "I don't think the strings & the seeds are what they are talking about." I had no idea it was the meat of the pumpkin. I have never, ever, ever told anyone about this so now the secret is out.