LaBelle Cuisine: Recipes to Sing About [Hardcover]

Patti Labelle (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 6, 1999

"From the time I was a little girl, I knew there were two things in this world I was born to do: sing and cook. I've spent my life developing my voice and my recipes, and to tell you the truth, I'm hard pressed to say where I'm happiest--in concert or in the kitchen, making music or making meals."

For Patti, cooking is about love. Taught by the great Southern cooks in her family--her mother, father, and aunts Hattie Mae and Joshia Mae--Patti LaBelle has kept these family heirlooms close to her heart. But now, she invites you into her kitchen and serves up more than 100 of her favorite recipes, from treasured down-home favorites--Say-My-Name Smothered Chicken and Gravy, Fierce Fried Corn, and Aunt Hattie's Scrumptious Sweet Tater Bread--to good-enough-for-dinner-parties dishes--Shrimp Etouffée, Roast Leg of Lamb with Rosemary-Lemon Rub, and Aunt Mary's Philadelphia Buttercake.

Wherever Patti goes, so do her electric frying pans and bottles of hot sauce. After her raise-the-roof shows, she often goes back to her hotel room and whips up a meal for her band or celebrity visitors. When she's home--at holiday time and at family gatherings--or just after one of her sold-out concert tours, Patti likes nothing more than to head for her kitchen and cook her Geechee Geechee Ya Ya Gumbo, Pass-It-On Pot Roast, or Burnin' Babyback Ribs. And like her bestselling memoir, Don't Block the Blessings, her accompanying personal reminiscences will fill your heart just as her recipes will fill your stomach.

Patti LaBelle's LaBelle Cuisine has the recipes you'll want to cook, eat, and share with friends. Filled with the legendary diva's favorite dishes and step-by-step instructions on how to prepare them, LaBelle Cuisine makes you feel like Patti's in the kitchen with you, demonstrating the recipes and techniques that can turn anybody into a fabulous cook.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

"From the time I was a little girl, I knew there were two things in this world I wanted to do: sing and cook." So says singer-diva Patti LaBelle, whose first cookbook, LaBelle Cuisine, confirms her passion for good food and her skill at producing it. A truly devoted cook (she travels with pans and hot-sauce stashes), LaBelle offers more than 100 recipes in the great Southern soul-food tradition--homey dishes such as Say-My-Name Smothered Chicken and Aunt Hattie's Scrumptious Sweet Potato Bread. LaBelle fans and those seeking simple yet savory fare for everyday and casual entertaining will relish the book.

In chapters including "Sensational Salads," "Soups and Sandwiches," "Perfect Poultry," and "To-Die-For Desserts and Bread," LaBelle weaves easy-to-do recipes with warm food reminiscences. Whether describing a backstage barbecue resulting in a building-wide fire alert, her undying love of canned sardines, or the soulful Sunday dinners of her youth, LaBelle's voice is, as ever, memorably her own. The recipes, many of which include tips called Patti's Pointers, represent not only a personal culinary heritage, but also a kind of cooking in danger of dissolution. LaBelle's Over-the-Rainbow Macaroni and Cheese, among other recipes, should remind readers that that heritage is alive, well, and in very good hands. --Arthur Boehm

From Publishers Weekly

"From the time I was a little girl," says LaBelle, "I knew there were two things in this world I was born to do: sing and cook." Admirers of LaBelle's Grammy-winning vocal style are sure to find her Southern dishes just as dynamic. Starting with such chapters as Sensational Salads, Soups, and Sandwiches, she cooks and talks her way through Meat, Poultry and Seafood entr?es, Fabulous Fixin's and To-Die-For Desserts and Breads. Her famous jalape?o-spiked Potato Salad, Pass-It-On Pot Roast, Screamin' Mean Greens and Wicked Peach Cobbler make colorful appearances, along with practical cooking tips and plenty of exuberant attitude. This is high-style down-home cooking, sophisticated, flavorful, mostly calorie-laden and generally irresistible; the fact that Patti has fixed her Luscious Liver and Onions and Over the Rainbow Macaroni and Cheese for the likes of Mick Jagger, Oprah and Elton John just adds to the fun. LaBelle (author of the bestselling autobiography Don't Block the Blessings) believes in cooking for pleasure and therapy: as she says, "Usually when people are stressed out they want a pill, but honey, give me a pot!" Readers will want one, too, by the end of this book, for LaBelle's enthusiasm is infectious. 15-city author tour.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 240 pages
• Publisher: Clarkson Potter; 1 edition (April 6, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0767903145
• ISBN-13: 978-0767903141
• Product Dimensions: 7.6 x 1 x 9.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (91 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #50,350 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

91 of 92 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars THIS IS THE BOOK TO BUY!, February 18, 2000

By 

"peacefulsprit_2000" - See all my reviews

This review is from: LaBelle Cuisine: Recipes to Sing About (Hardcover)

I was taught how to cook by numerous relatives(from Georgia, Virginia and New Jersey) and I have had people to tell me that I could throw down with some cooking; but after trying some of Patti's recipes, people were telling me that I need to be a professional caterer! I own tons of recipe books, but this one lives up to Ms. Labelles' reputation as an excellent cook. I cooked for 18 people this christmas; not only did every one on her recipes I tried score a hit: (String beans a labelle, good and cheap pot roast, peach cobbler, over the rainbow macaroni and cheese); Patti enhanced my cooking, just by suggesting everyday ingredients rather than buying some outrageously exotic spices and seasonings. One word of caution, use only some of these recipes for special occasions, cause if you eat this on the regular, you will be on this website looking for a Tae-Bo tape afterwards (cause I'm looking for one now). Here's to REAL SOUL FOOD! THANKS PATTI! :)

34 of 37 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Sing With Patti In The Kitchen!, December 11, 2000

By 

J Keistler "[e-mail]" (Lake Jackson, Texas USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: LaBelle Cuisine: Recipes to Sing About (Hardcover)

I bought this book off of Amazon, never having seen it in the stores. What a pleasant surprise! I'd expected another book of soul-food, Southern cooking (which is what I was looking for). Ms. LaBelle's book has plenty of down-home-type recipies familiar to those of us in the South, such as her pot roast and her Southern fried chicken, but also has recipes that reflect a wider, more modern cooking trend, such as Caribbean fish steaks and shrimp fried rice. Her Macaroni and Cheese recipe is to die for!

Unlike so many other 'celebrity' cookbooks, the recipes here are well-written and easy to follow. I've cooked a couple of dozen recipes here, and all have worked as published.

This cookbook can be a terrific introduction to Southern cooking as well as an illustrated biography of its author. I've been a fan of LaBelle for many years and was delighted to read her autobiographical segments. This book is a great blend of cookbook and memoirs, and can be enjoyable even if only for reading!

25 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Recipes and Stories from a Great Diva!!, May 5, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: LaBelle Cuisine: Recipes to Sing About (Hardcover)

I bought the book because I'm a fan of Patti LaBelle's music and her life stories (from her autobiography. Now, I'm a fan of her food!

For an Irish-American woman in Michigan like me to be able to make Macaroni and Cheese and Smothered Chicken alone was worth ten times the price of this book. My Italian husband who grew up in New York eating out-of-this-world soul food from neighborhood restaurants and cooks was amazed. He was asking for thirds!

I can't wait to try out more recipes. Be warned, many of these recipes are traditional soul-food recipes, i.e., high in fat/cholesterol/calories. You can, however, use substitute ingredients to lower the sin quotient. You only live once, so as long as you don't eat like this everyday, try the recipes in their original form - you'll love the food!!