Vardaman Elementary Principal DeDee Lee said her cooking skills came from her mother Linda McGreger and grandmothers Geraldine McGreger and Martha Vanlandingham. “I started cooking in junior high with my mother,” Lee said. “Whoever cooked didn’t have to clean the kitchen.”

Garlic and grilling are two things that go together when L.T. Spearman cooks. He uses garlic in almost everything, and always uses a charcoal grill.

Regina (Tink) Massey’s 2008 Calhoun County Fair Grand Champion winning Coconut Pecan Pie recipe is now being featured on the Bass Pecan website, www.basspecan.com. At the encouragement of her sister, Rose Diamond, she has had entries in the county fair for the last few years, but was a first time entrant this year in the Sweet Cooking Contest in Vardaman.

Peggy Whiteside, of Water Valley, was the winner in last week's Recipe Contest at the 35th Annual Sweet Potato Festival. Her winning dish was called Sweet Potato Caramel Delight.

Nancy Funderburg of Pleasant Hill community had never cooked until she got married in 1952. She learned on her own and has loved to cook ever since. Ervin started helping Nancy cook when she started working 27 years ago, and he just picked it right up, according to Nancy.

Lisa Schmitz of Pittsboro says she learned to cook by experimenting, and by sometimes giving a call to her grandmother, the late Julia Brummett, and her mother, Kathy Brummett.

Margaret Janci of Bruce, and formerly of New Jersey and Pennsylvania, has two passions--cooking and crocheting--and sometimes does both at once--when she crochets while listening to television cooking shows Emeril or Rachel Ray.

Wanda “Bootsie” Longest of Bruce learned to cook from her Home Ec teacher Bert Johnson and from her husband Tom’s mother, Bertha Longest.

Reba “Mama Reba” Hawkins has been working with a girls’ group home in Bruce for 21 years and part of what she does is help them learn to cook.

Roger Webb said he’s always been around people cooking, from his grandmothers Maxine Webb and Grace Coston and his aunt Maxine Massey.

Anita “Katie” Ezell, of Calhoun City, learned to cook by watching her mother Nora Harper and trying for herself.