Thomas Rhett And Lauren Akins On The Power Of A Southern Grandmother’s Home Cooking

If you know, you know.

Thomas Rhett and Lauren Akins might root for rival college football teams, but when it comes to cooking, they agree that Southern grandmas can’t be beat.

In the newest episode of Southern Living’s Biscuits & Jam podcast, the longtime couple discuss everything from tailgating traditions to their charitable work in Uganda, as well as the grandmas whose home cooking they will cherish all their lives.

When asked who the best cook in her family is, Lauren said she considers both of her grandmothers—Mimi and Kitty-Kate—to be the standouts. The Nashville native recalled the food-centric gatherings of her childhood and how her grandmothers’ houses would smell “like they just cooked a full spread” every time you walked in with fondness. She said that she and Thomas have attempted to recreate that feeling in their own home.

“The home that we live in now is just designed around our kitchen,” Lauren told editor-in-chief Sid Evans. “I feel like it truly is the heart of the house, and we even designed [it] after our grandmothers. They have played such a huge role in our life… as important people, but especially when making a home a home. I think food just goes hand in hand with that, and my grandmothers, both of them, were so good at loving people well through their cooking and bringing families together and nobody makes it like your grandmother does.”

Thomas had a similar response to the question of “best cook,” telling Evans that his two grandmothers are also the standout cooks in his family.

In fact, the crooner described the gumbo his Mamaw from North Louisiana makes as “the benchmark” he measures all gumbos against.

“I've been on the road several times, even down in Louisiana and catering's making gumbo and if it doesn't taste like Mamaw's, it ain't happening,” he said.

On his dad’s side, Thomas considers the dressing his Mami makes on Thanksgiving and Christmas and her chicken and dumplings to be “benchmarks as well.”

“But some of my most vivid childhood memories are my grandparents as a whole just cooking for holidays or my Mami down in South Georgia would make us tomato sandwiches for lunch,” Thomas recalled. “Bunny white bread ... homegrown tomatoes with too much salt and pepper and mayonnaise… that's kind of what I go back to as a kid. But Southern grandmommy and granddaddy cooking is kind of where I go in my head.”

Download and listen to this episode of Biscuits & Jam with Thomas Rhett and Lauren Akins on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or everywhere podcasts are available.

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Read the original article on Southern Living.