Welcome to Cooking with Virginia!
Here you will find delicious and doable, seasonal, chef-driven recipes for home cooks along with tips, techniques, and stories. And, given Virginia’s health journey and 65# weight loss, the recipes are not only good — they are good for you, too!
Each post features mouth-watering food photography, easy-to-follow instructions, and helpful hints for well-tested recipes from Southern chef, Food Network Kitchen Instructor, and James Beard award-winning cookbook author Virginia Willis.
You’ll also find Virginia’s signature stories chronicling formational childhood experiences gained baking in her grandmother’s and mother’s kitchen, her extensive professional experience from working in patisserie in a Michelin-starred restaurant, to the hot lights of food television, and her culinary centric far-flung travels. The recipes build on this practical knowledge and are written so that the reader feels that Virginia is by their side in the kitchen, as she walks the reader through surefire recipes that work every time. The recipes are rigorously tested and are essential, foolproof dishes you actually want to make and eat!
Bon Appétit, Y’all!
Virginia Willis
Weeknight Cooking: Creole Shrimp Nachos with Creamy Queso
Nachos are a go-to weeknight dinner in our home when the day has been a bit more crazy than usual. What’s not to like?
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Holiday Entertaining Tips: Smoky Cheese Straws
Holiday Entertaining should be relaxed, comfortable, and enjoyable for both the hosts and the guests – and that comes with organization and planning ahead, from
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Peanut-Crusted Chicken Wings for Game Day
Are you a flat or a drum? I am a flat — I love the two-bone piece of wing. Whole chicken wings are composed of
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More Taste, Less Waste with The James Beard Foundation
As part of the “More Taste, Less Waste” campaign, the James Beard Foundation recently initiated a recipe contest and asked chefs and culinary professionals to
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Get Your Game On with Tailgating Recipes
We’re about a month into college football season and things are just getting started. All the early supposedly easy games are over and we’re getting
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9/11 and the War of Terror
In 2010 when I initially wrote this post, I hadn’t written a word about my experiences on 9/11 and hardly ever spoke of it. I couldn’t
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What’s in Season: Cucumber Fruit Salad
Cool as a Cucumber Did you know that cucumbers are more than 90% water AND the phrase “cool as a cucumber” is a scientific fact! The
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What’s in Season: Cantaloupe Creamsicle
Summer Melon Cantaloupe responds well to hot summer heat and is currently in high season across much of the US. Generally, this time of year
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What’s in Season: Summer Tomato Recipes
Fresh from the Garden A garden-ripe, fresh tomato is the absolute ultimate in summer produce. Out of season tomatoes are flavorless rock-hard orbs shipped from
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What’s in Season: Grilled Corn Tabouleh
Sweet Corn Recipes for Summer Corn is one of the premier vegetables of summer all across the United States. Long hot Southern summers produce delicious
