I was born in Philadelphia, PA and my family moved to California when I was 1 year old. My grandparents raised me and my 2 sisters. My grandmother was from down south and she was an excellent cook. All of my cooking skills are credited to my grandmother. My favorite things to cook are meatloaf, chicken, pasta's, cakes, pies, my grandmother's beef stew, chicken and dumplings, and my grandmother's chicken & dressing Sunday meal. Also, spaghetti and hot wings. My favorite family cooking tradition is coming together with the whole family during the holidays and we prepare the meal together. We pray together, eat together and laugh together. It doesn't get any better than that. My cooking triumph for me is when moved from home into a 1 bedroom apartment. Mind you, when we cook at home, we prepare a lot of food. Well, I lived alone and I cooked my first chicken & dressing, Thanksgiving meal all by myself- for myself- for over 50 people. I had so much food, I made plates and put them in my car and went to the liquor store in my neighborhood and passed them out to the people that were not fortunate to be with family for the holidays. That has been over 16 years ago and I still take a few plates to that corner to the some of the same people. The only cooking tragedy that I have experienced is when we baked my grandmother's famous lemon cake for my uncle's fish market. We had to make 10 cakes right away. When all of the cakes were done, we called my uncle to come and pick them up. Right when he rang the doorbell the puppy ran through the house. When I opened the door and we went into the kitchen, the puppy had jumped on the table and ran through all of the cakes. He decided to stand in the last one and wag his tell. My uncle left without his cakes for his fish market and waiting customers. I, on the other hand, locked the puppy outside and made 10 more cakes.