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  As you can tell, I’m more than just a little passionate about my pans. (High-heel pumps have the same effect on me but that’s a different story for a different book.) But it’s not a fetish, at least not the way my thing for shoes is. I won’t lie: I love the pumps just for the pumps. But my pan passion is different. My pan passion is a by-product of my passion for cooking. I love it—the shopping and the searching for just the right ingredients, the mixing and the blending of them in just the right amounts, the nothing-like-it-in-the-world thrill of a dish coming out just right.

  When I wrote LaBelle Cuisine, my first cookbook, I realized for the first time that my cooking passion, like my pan passion, is a by-product, too. The result of one of my favorite parenting lessons: that cooking isn’t just about filling people’s stomachs—although, don’t get me wrong, that is crucially important—but it’s also about filling people’s spirits. It’s about bringing folks together around a table for love and laughter and camaraderie and companionship. It’s about creating the roots and rhythms of our lives. There’s soul food (think: grits and greens) and there’s soul food (think: friendship and fellowship). I learned that lesson as a little kid. As an adult, I’ve been to enough fancy schmancy restaurants where snobby chefs thought cooking was about showing off. They couldn’t be more wrong. Cooking is about showing love.

  Cooking is the way everyone in my family showed love. When I was growing up, for example, every Sunday after church Chubby prepared a feast and invited the whole neighborhood. It was always an all-you-can-eat buffet. And, unlike at her Saturday night card parties, on Sundays, not only was everyone invited to the house, everything you ate was on the house. And though I know it was hard for her, after she and my father separated, Chubby let Daddy come over every weekend to make breakfast for my sisters and me. No prior arrangement necessary. No questions asked.

  My father loved to cook almost as much as my mother. And, thanks to his mother, Daddy was just as good at it. My grandmother Tempie was known all over Georgia for her phenomenal cooking. Her garden was almost as famous. My aunts Hattie Mae and Joshia Mae said she grew everything in it—collards, okra, tomatoes, corn—and she’d fix baskets of her garden goodies for all her neighbors. Before she died of leukemia at the age of thirty-three, Grandmother Tempie taught Daddy all of her secret recipes. Looking back, I think that’s why he loved to cook so much. I’m sure it’s why he, too, subscribed to the food = love school of thought. Before he got sick, Daddy bought two restaurants and, next to his family, they were the love of his life. If you were a regular customer at either and Daddy knew your money was funny, he let you eat for free until your fortunes improved. Until Alzheimer’s disease stole his mind, Daddy loved nothing better than spending all day in his restaurant cooking for his customers.

  Then there are my aunts Hattie Mae and Joshia Mae. Now, I’ve known some people who knew their way around a kitchen, but at eightysomething, these two could teach Julia Child a thing or three about the art of fine food. Aunt Hattie and Aunt Josh invented the food = love school of thought. They put the “comfort” in comfort food. If a friend or neighbor gets sick, they go into hyper cooking made. Between the two of them, they will feed your family, your friends, and their family and friends for a month. I could go on and on but you get the point.

  So why am I telling you all of this? Especially since, if you read my first cookbook, you’ve heard some of it before. So you can understand how central, how significant, how special a role food has always played in my life. It’s this history, this lifelong love affair with food, that sent me into denial—and then into depression—when I learned I had diabetes. I just couldn’t handle it, at least not at first. When I found out I had diabetes, I felt like part of my world—one of the best parts—was ending. And I wasn’t even close to being ready to let it go. “The torch of love is lit in the kitchen,” Aunt Naomi used to say. When I learned I had diabetes, I thought I would never be able to light it again.

  And there was something else that made the news so hard to take. When it came to diabetes, I was carrying around some heavy emotional baggage. Diabetes killed Chubby. Diabetes took my mother away from this world before her time. But first it took a heartbreaking toll on her—and on me. Several years before Chubby died, I had to do something beyond disturbing, beyond disheartening, beyond difficult. Something that still haunts me. I had to give Chubby’s doctors permission to amputate both her legs. It was, they said, the only way to save her. And while I know they were right, I also know this: when they took Chubby’s legs, they took part of her. Her strength. Her spunk. Her spirit.

  As painful as those memories are, in their own way, they have also been a blessing. Because remembering the toll diabetes took on my mother made me get real about taking care of myself. After several difficult months, months in which I threw myself what my sister-friend, Cassie, refers to as “the Patti pity party,” I stopped crying about what I didn’t have and started thinking about what I did. And what I had was a pretty terrific life. What I had was more time in this world than any of my three sisters ever got. Not one of them lived to see her forty-fourth birthday. Not Vivian. Not Barbara. Not Jackie. Cancer took them away when they were young and beautiful and in the prime of their lives.

  Then there was Llona Gullette. Llona was my homegirl. She doesn’t know it, but she helped me get over my depression over having diabetes, too. Llona and I went all the way back to junior high school together. The two of us practically grew up in each other’s houses and I knew there was nothing in this world she wouldn’t do for me. Llona had such a special place in my heart because she was my friend when I was Patsy Holte. That’s who she loved—not Patti LaBelle. Like my sisters, Llona fought as long as she could but I lost her to cancer two years ago, at the age of fifty-seven.

  It’s the passing of so many people I loved so much, so many people who would have given anything for a diagnosis like mine, that snapped me out of the Patti pity party. Thinking about what they went through made me stop focusing on the bad news (diabetes is a chronic condition that has no cure) and start focusing on the good news (while no one can cure it, I could manage it—and lead a full and active life in the process).

  That’s when I decided LaBelle Cuisine deserved a sequel. Because that’s when I decided to take the first—and most important step—in controlling my diabetes: changing the way I ate. And that meant changing the way I cooked. Not just because of the ingredients I was accustomed to using (butter, sugar, cream) and the quantities in which I used them (loads, lots, loads more). That was only half of the reason. The other half was that I cannot stomach boring, bland, bad-tasting food. When it comes to taste, I’m a rice pudding, not a rice cake, kind of girl.

  Given that fact, I knew that if I wanted to eat healthier, at least in any serious, long-term way, I had to come up with recipes that were as good to me as they were good for me. And so I started talking to health and nutrition experts about healthier cooking. Why it was important. How to go about it. Who needed to do it. It was what they told me about who needed to do it that knocked me for a loop. Without dispute, without disagreement, without exception, they all agree: the way we eat is central to the health and well-being of every single one of us. Not just diabetics. Not just overweight people. Everybody. That’s because what we eat determines what we weigh. And what we weigh determines our risk for all kinds of serious, potentially deadly, diseases. High blood pressure, heart disease, diabetes, strokes—these and other serious diseases are linked directly to obesity. And millions of people in this country are obese. Millions more are overweight. And experts say if we keep putting on weight at the current rate, almost everyone in the country is going to be overweight by 2030. That is just so deep.

  That’s why this is not a diabetic cookbook. Nor is it a diet cookbook. I spent far too many years of my life going on all kinds of crazy fad diets so I could look like one of those skinny little nineteen-year-olds they put on magazine covers. I was a grown woman in my forties before I realized that
, when it comes to beauty, one saze fits all. So while it’s important to be fit (read: a healthy weight for your age and size), it’s equally important to remember that Barbie is a doll, not a goal.

  I know what you’re thinking: if it’s not a diabetic cookbook and it’s not a diet cookbook, what kind of cookbook is it? A cookbook for people who, like me, want to eat healthier food that tastes great. A cookbook that offers lighter versions of the kind of food we all love to eat. A cookbook that I hope reflects the wise advice I heard as a kid but didn’t appreciate until I was an adult: treat your body like a temple, not an amusement park.

  While we all need to heed that advice, if there’s one thing I’ve learned while writing this book it’s this: unlike beauty, when it comes to nutritional needs and calorie requirements there’s no such thing as one size fits all. Which means that every recipe is not going to fit every reader’s needs. Every recipe does, however, include nutritional analysis, diabetic exchanges, and carbohydrate choices. With this information, information calculated by a team of nutrition experts at the American Dietetic Association, each person can “make responsible eating choices that serve their body temple.” (I heard a registered dietician say that; don’t you just love it?) Let’s say, for example, that you’re trying to shake the salt habit. You can omit it from the recipe or vary the amount to suit your needs. Or let’s say you’re counting carbohydrates. If you plan to have dessert at dinner, you’re going to have to pass on the pasta and the potatoes.

  According to the American Dietetic Association, the nation’s largest organization of food and nutrition professionals, a healthy daily meal plan includes at least:

  • 3 servings of vegetables

  • 2 servings of fruit

  • 6 servings of grains, beans, and starchy vegetables

  • 2 servings of low-fat or fat-free milk

  • about 6 ounces of meat or meat substitute

  • small amounts of fat and sugar

  The actual amounts will depend on the number of calories you need, which in turn depends on your size, age, and activity level. You should consult a registered dietician or your physician to determine your personal nutrition needs.

  On a similar note, I need to say a quick word about how the nutritional analysis was calculated. When a choice of ingredients is given, the first ingredient listed is the one calculated in the analysis. Only the amount of marinade that is absorbed during preparation is calculated. And options are not included in the per serving information or the nutritional analysis.

  Now that we’ve gotten all that straight, it’s time to do some cooking new millennium Patti-style.

  Stunningly Delicious

  Salads, Soups, and Sandwiches

  Out-of-This-World Watercress Salad with Balsamic Vinaigrette Dressing

  Thanks to bagged watercress, putting this salad together doesn’t get any easier. When you’re preparing it, remember that watercress is very perishable, so try and buy it the same day you’re planning to serve this salad.

  Makes 12 servings

  BALSAMIC VINAIGRETTE

  ½ cup extra-virgin olive oil

  ¼ cup balsamic vinegar

  2 tablespoons chopped fresh basil

  2 tablespoons chopped fresh chives

  1 tablespoon minced shallots

  1 teaspoon Dijon mustard

  1 garlic clove, minced

  ¼ teaspoon salt

  ⅛ teaspoon white or black pepper

  WATERCRESS SALAD

  1 pound watercress, tough stems trimmed

  2 large red tomatoes, cut into bite-size wedges

  1 large yellow tomato, cut into bite-size wedges

  1 sweet onion, such as Vidalia, thinly sliced

  1 large cucumber, peeled, quartered lengthwise, and sliced

  1 red bell pepper, seeded and cut into short strips

  1 cup radishes, cut into bite-size pieces

  ½ cup fresh mushrooms, quartered

  ½ cup hearts of palm, cut into bite-size pieces

  To make the vinaigrette: Combine the oil, vinegar, basil, chives, shallots, mustard, garlic, salt, and pepper in a container with a tightly sealed top (a small canning jar works well). Cover tightly and shake well, until dressing is well blended. Use immediately or refrigerate, covered, until ready to use. Shake well before serving.

  To make the watercress salad: In a large bowl, toss the watercress, red tomatoes, yellow tomato, onion, cucumber, bell pepper, radishes, mushrooms, and hearts of palm. Drizzle with the vinaigrette and toss to coat.

  Patti’s Pointers: I like to buy bagged watercress because it’s triple-washed and nearly ready to serve. Look for it near the herbs or lettuces in most supermarkets. I like to eat watercress because it has a delicate peppery taste—a refreshing change from plain ol’ iceberg lettuce. To trim, tear off (or cut off) any thick, tough stems. But leave the smaller stems intact. They add crunch to the salad. Look for hearts of palm in the canned vegetable aisle of the supermarket. They are the tender “heart” of the tropical cabbage palm tree and taste a bit like an artichoke heart. If you can’t find hearts of palm, you can use chopped artichoke hearts instead.

  Per Serving: 110 calories, 2 g protein, 5 g carbohydrate, 10 g fat, 1.5 g saturated fat, 0 mg cholesterol, 1 g dietary fiber, 105 mg sodium

  Diet Exchanges: 1 vegetable, 2 fats, or 0 carbohydrate choices

  Sensational Salad Niçoise

  This recipe is full of so many great ingredients it’s not a side salad, Sugar, it’s a meal. When serving Salad Niçoise, I know most people like to arrange all the different ingredients in separate little piles. Me? I like to put mine in a big bowl and toss them all together. If you’re a spicy food lover like me, here’s a great trick to try: swap the Niçoise olives for one 2.25-ounce can of well-drained sliced black olives—with jalapeño. Yum!

  Makes 6 servings

  DRESSING

  ¼ cup chopped shallots

  ⅓ cup low-sodium chicken broth

  2 tablespoons olive oil

  2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

  1 tablespoon white wine vinegar

  1 teaspoon Dijon mustard

  1 tablespoon fresh chopped basil or ½ teaspoon dried

  1 tablespoon fresh chopped oregano or ½ teaspoon dried

  ¼ teaspoon salt

  ¼ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

  ¼ teaspoon hot pepper sauce

  ⅛ teaspoon red pepper flakes

  SALAD

  6 ounces thin French green beans (haricots verts) or regular green beans, trimmed

  8 ounces small red potatoes, thinly sliced, skin left on

  One 12-ounce can reduced-sodium white tuna packed in water, drained and

  flaked

  ½ small red onion, halved and thinly sliced

  1 cucumber, peeled, seeded, and chopped

  1 pint cherry tomatoes, halved, or 1 pint grape tomatoes, left whole

  ½ cup Niçoise olives

  1 head romaine lettuce, torn into leaves

  2 large hard-cooked eggs, each peeled and cut into quarters

  To make the dressing: Mix the shallots, broth, oil, lemon juice, vinegar, mustard, basil, oregano, salt, black pepper, hot pepper sauce, and red pepper flakes in a 2-cup jar or bowl. Cover and shake or whisk (if using a bowl) until well mixed. Refrigerate until the salad is ready.

  Bring two pots of water to a boil. In one, cook the green beans until crisp-tender, about 5 minutes. In the other, cook the potatoes, covered, until tender, 8 to 10 minutes. Drain the beans and potatoes and run under cold water until cooled. Transfer to a large bowl.

  Add the tuna, onion, cucumber, tomatoes, and olives to the bowl. Drizzle the dressing evenly over the salad. Using your hands or two large spoons, gently toss the salad to coat. Refrigerate for 1 hour.

  Before serving, bring to room temperature and serve over lettuce leaves garnished with the egg quarters.

  Patti’s Pointers: If your market carries seedless English cucumbers, buy that instead of a
regular cucumber. No seeding required! And English cucumbers tend to be less bitter than regular cucumbers. You’ll need 1½ to 2 cups chopped.

  Also: To trim the green beans quickly, line up all the ends on a cutting board (as many as will fit on your board!) then make a single cut across the ends with a large knife. And last but not least, to make perfect hard-cooked eggs, place the eggs in a single layer in a small saucepan and cover with cold water by 1 inch. Bring to a boil over high heat. Just when the water boils, remove the pan from the heat, cover, and let sit for 15 minutes. Drain and run cold water over the eggs until cooled. Let sit in cold water until completely cooled.

  Per Serving: 240 calories, 19 g protein, 17 g carbohydrate, 11 g fat, 2 g saturated fat, 95 mg cholesterol, 4 g dietary fiber, 640 mg sodium

  Diet Exchanges: 3 meats, 2 fats, 1 starch, or 1 carbohydrate choice

  Cajun Chicken Caesar Salad