From Michelle Obama to Matthew McConaughey: Celebrities Share Their Go-to Recipes

Your Mama’s Kitchen

Step into the kitchen with some of today’s most influential figures across the world as they share cherished recipes and heartwarming stories of their childhood in the Audible Original podcast ‘Your Mama’s Kitchen.’ From former First Lady Michelle Obama’s childhood favourites to Hollywood power couple Matthew McConaughey and Camila Alves McConaughey’s family traditions, this podcast serves up a delectable blend of nostalgia, culture, and culinary delights. Here, we take you through the cherished moments of their lives as we explore the recipes derived from their personal experiences and memories!

Michelle Obama | Recipe for Red Rice

Michelle Obama shares her family’s cherished recipe for red rice, a dish rooted in her South Carolina heritage. Reflecting on how she was influenced by all the things that she saw and experienced in that little old kitchen, she says, “The conversations around my household about fairness and honesty and how to be a person in this world, how to treat others, the compassion that all happened around the table, either by spoken word or story or just watching my father pay the bills every week at that table. The humour that I have, my ability to tell stories and laugh at myself and laugh at the world, it happened at that table, those stories happen there in that little bitty kitchen.”

Ingredients:

1 cup of long-grain white rice
1 chopped white onion
1 ½ cup of tomato juice
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1 teaspoon pepper
1 dash of Tabasco
1 cup crumbled bacon
¼ tablespoon bacon drippings
500 gm chopped shrimp
500 gm sausage roll

Method:

Cook the bacon until crispy, then set it aside and save the drippings.
Cook the shrimp separately, either by steaming or sautéing, and set them aside.
Crumble and crisp up the sausage, drain the grease, and set it aside as well.
Sauté the chopped onion in the reserved bacon drippings until golden brown, then set it aside.

In a large saucepan, combine the uncooked rice, tomato juice, salt, pepper, and Tabasco sauce according to package instructions.

Once the rice is cooked, mix in the cooked shrimp, crumbled bacon, and sausage.

Stir everything together well and enjoy your delicious dish!

Andy Garcia | Recipe for Fricase de Pollo

Andy Garcia enjoys cooking, making it a full-day event filled with music, dancing, and plenty of garlic. His crowd-pleasing recipe requires starting the night before to ensure tender and flavorful meat, but the effort is worth it for the delicious outcome. Talking about the profound connection between food and cherished memories, Andy shares “A curious thing about food is that it brings back very particular memories. Taste, smell… induces this kind of nostalgic times in your life that hopefully are positive, you know?”

Ingredients:

2 to 3 kilograms of chicken thighs
10 garlic cloves
1 cup of lime juice and 1 cup of orange juice combined
3 large onions, sliced
3 sliced peppers (green, red, and yellow), one of each for colour
2 small cans of tomato paste
Salt to taste
1 can of green peas
¼ cup of olive oil
1 cup of raisins
½ cup of pitted green olives
2 teaspoons of capers
½ teaspoon of black pepper
1 cup of Spanish dry sherry wine (or substitute apple cider vinegar if needed)
500 grams of potatoes, cut into pieces

Method:

The night before, marinate the chicken in a glass container with chopped garlic, onions, green peppers, salt, black pepper, and a mix of lime and orange juice. Cover and refrigerate overnight.

When cooking, heat oil and brown the chicken, then set it aside.

In the same casserole, sauté onions, peppers, and garlic from the marinade. Add sherry wine to deglaze the pan.
Stir in tomato paste, raisins, olives, capers, salt, and pepper.

Add the chicken to the casserole and mix well.

Add enough water to barely cover the chicken and cook over medium-low heat until the chicken is tender.
In the last 30 to 45 minutes of cooking, add the potatoes to cook.

Serve the fricassee with sliced ripe plantains (cooking bananas) fried in vegetable oil and white rice.

Matthew McConaughey & Camila Alves McConaughey | Recipe for Brazilian Chicken Stroganoff

Matthew McConaughey and Camila Alves McConaughey discuss how their childhood kitchens influenced their identities and relationships, revealing their approach to resolving conflicts with tea and tequila. Matthew recounts, “But the kitchen is where everything went down. The kitchen is where we cried when our heart was broken from a girlfriend breaking up. The kitchen’s where my brother Pat got in trouble for getting caught with the bag of weed. Then the kitchen is where we said our gratitude and prayers around the lazy Susan. The kitchen’s where we told stories, where I learned as a youngster in my family, if you want to get a story, you better hit the gap because a gap is not going to be there in the conversation long.”

Ingredients:

3 tablespoons avocado oil
6 cloves of garlic, smashed or grated
1 teaspoon salt
1 medium-sized diced white onion
1 tablespoon achiote annatto powder (orange-red condiment for food colouring)
1 medium-sized quartered fresh tomato
3 bone-in split chicken breasts with skin
¼ red bell pepper, cut into thin strips
4 cups of water (divided in half)
¼ cup of chopped cilantro
1-2 bay leaves
2 tablespoons of media crema (table cream); no liquid chill the entire can in the refrigerator, cream will rise to the top
1 cup of canned corn
⅓ cup of sliced pitted green olives

For serving:

Shoestring potato sticks
Cooked rice

Method:

In a large soup pot over medium heat, add avocado oil, smashed garlic, and salt. Stir until the garlic is fragrant.
Add diced onions and cook until translucent. Then, add quartered tomatoes and cook until soft and mushy.

Push ingredients to the side and add annatto powder to the middle of the pot. Let it cook briefly, then mix with other ingredients to form a paste.

Place chicken skin side down in the pot to brown. After a few minutes, push the ingredients aside and add bell peppers.
Pour enough water to cover the chicken (about 4 cups). Add cilantro and bay leaves.

Cover the pot, bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer for 2-3 hours until chicken is tender and can be easily shredded.
Remove chicken from the pot, let it cool, then shred meat, discarding bones and skin. Reserve broth for other recipes.

In a large skillet over medium heat, add shredded chicken and 2 tablespoons of media crema (table cream), mixing until well combined.

Stir in canned corn and sliced green olives, heating until warmed through. Add reserved broth if needed for the required consistency.

Serve your Brazilian Chicken Stroganoff over rice, topped with potato sticks.