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Guns, goulash among Deen boys’ favorites
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Before they signed books for fans at the Kroger on North Decatur Road in Decatur Tuesday night, Buzz had an opportunity to discuss spaghetti casserole, “homemade” haircuts and BB guns with Jamie and Bobby Deen.
The Savannah Lady and Sons restaurateurs and Food Network hosts were in town to introduce Atlantans to their brand new, down-home cookbook, “Y’all Come Eat” (Meredith Books, $24.95).
While the big yellow sign used for the book’s cover shoot was borrowed, the University of Georgia beer tub and bulldog belong to the brothers.
JOEY IVANSCO / AJC
Paula Deen’s sons, Bobby (left) and Jamie, have a new cookbook, “Y’all Come Eat,” on bookstore shelves. The brothers share recipes and childhood memories and photographs in the book.
Two years ago, Bobby surprised his older brother with Champ, a great-great-grandson of famed college mascot Uga VI owned by Savannah attorney Sonny Seiler.
Explained Bobby to Buzz: “You just can’t find a more memorable gift for your brother than a dog that can produce the worst gas in the world!”
Both Deen boys say the recipes in the book evoke many childhood memories for them. Before mama Paula Deen became a fixture on the Food Network, she was a single mom struggling to put food on the table.
“That goulash recipe is still what I ask for each April 28 for my birthday dinner,” Bobby says. The childhood pictures included in the book also jog memories.
Dishes Bobby: “Mama cut our hair with the same scissors she used to wrap Christmas presents with. That’s why our bangs are so uneven!”
The boys also included a hilariously-dated 1972 pic of Paula in a gravity-defying ‘do.
“You know our mama,” Bobby explained. “She has no shame. And she’s rockin’ that beehive, isn’t she?!”
Added Jamie: “I think she must have slept with her head in a Hefty bag. At 7 in the morning, it would look completely perfect.”
In addition to including his wife Brooke’s famed meatloaf recipe (“It’s so good I skip lunch, have a slice for dinner and then make a sandwich for dessert”), Jamie says one of his favorite photos in the book is from Christmas 1975. Eight-year-old Jamie is posing with a real bow and arrow while 5-year-old Bobby, clad in Atlanta Falcons PJs, is wielding a BB gun.
“You wouldn’t see a Christmas photo like that nowadays, would you?” Jamie concedes, laughing. “But hey, just so y’all know, I was always a responsible older brother. I always gave Bobby a headstart and I always aimed below the head!”
Somewhere in Savannah, we think we just heard their mama take a swig of Diet Coke, sneak a puff on a Virginia Slims 120s and cackle like crazy.
BACK FROM BEIJING
“China was absolutely fantastic,” says Ian Schwarber, frontman of Athens’ band Blue Flashing Light. He and his bandmates recently returned from a mini-tour of China, where they performed in Beijing and at the annual International Peach Blossom Festival in Chengdu from mid-to-late March.
The anthemic rock quintet was selected to perform at the festival by the Atlanta-based U.S.-China Cultural and Educational Foundation.
Schwarber was blown away by the response from the audiences. “I would come out and start clapping and they’d all start clapping with me,” he says. “We certainly had the experience of a lifetime.”
“It’s so humbling,” Schwarber says of the enthusiastic response the band received. “You might think your head could blow up over there, but in reality you know you’re returning to America where you have to work … to put people in seats, so you just enjoy it.”
In the village where the peach originated, Schwarber even received a peach blossom crown from the daughter of a local mayor. The crowning denoted that she would be amenable to a proposal of marriage. Schwarber graciously declined.
FRIED FIZZ!
For us, spring doesn’t arrive when we have to use a snow shovel to clear a pollen path to the BuzzMobile.
No, here at Buzz Central, spring has officially sprung when we get the Georgia Renaissance Festival menu in advance of the festival’s start this weekend off of Exit 61 on I-85 South. This year’s addition to a menu that already boasts turkey legs and macaroni and cheese on a stick?
Fried Coca-Cola.
Explains festival rep Sarah Petermann in an e-mail: “It’s Atlanta’s own Coca-Cola, delicately swirled in a secret pastry batter, then expertly fried to perfection. This mysterious concoction is topped off with whipped cream, cinnamon sugar, all dressed with a cherry on top.”
The delicacy debuted at the 2007 Texas State Fair.
Also new to the menu this season: The King’s Cod Piece.
Described thusly: “It’s a whale of a fish sandwich, served in a warm bun and topped with freshly chopped homemade cole slaw. It’s a foot-long serving of delicate and tasty fish that will take two hands to eat.” (Especially when you’re simultaneously juggling multiple servings of fried fizz like us …)
Info: 770-964-8575
CELEBRITY BIRTHDAYS
Playboy magazine founder Hugh Hefner is 82. Actress Cynthia Nixon (“Sex and the City”) is 42. Singer Gerard Way of My Chemical Romance is 31. Actress Keshia Knight Pulliam (“The Cosby Show”) is 29.
SICK BAY
Braxton ailment not disclosed
Part-time Alpharetta resident Toni Braxton (right) has been hospitalized in Las Vegas.
Flamingo Hotel-Casino spokeswoman Deanna Pettit says the 40-year-old singer has an undisclosed ailment that isn’t life-threatening. Braxton was taken to a hospital Monday night.
Braxton has an extended stint at the Flamingo hotel. Tuesday’s show was canceled.
Contributing: Shane Harrison and news services
If you have a tip, call 404-526-2749. Or fax 404-526-5509. Or e-mail: buzz@ajc.com.
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