Plains — Jimmy Carter walked in the front door, a topcoat draped over his arm, and feigned surprise at the frenetic scene inside.

"Is this my house?" he asked.

Bita Honarvar/AJC (ENLARGE)
Former President Jimmy Carter signs copies of his books while sitting with Southern cooking celebrity Paula Deen and his wife, Rosalynn, after taping a segment of 'Paula's Home Cooking' for the Food Network.
Bita Honarvar/AJC (ENLARGE)
Carter cooks in his kitchen for an episode of 'Paula's Home Cooking.'
Bita Honarvar/Staff (ENLARGE)
Food Network star Paula Deen and former President Jimmy Carter share a light moment during a taping break at his Plains home.
MOST POPULAR STORIES New arrests likely in Fla. adoptive couple slaying Toddler found wandering street alone Reed aims to rejuvenate Christian conservatives Motorist dies in drive over edge of Grand Canyon Three arrested for attempted robbery near Tech
EMAIL THIS PRINT THIS MOST POPULAR
[an error occurred while processing this directive] Related: • Audio of Carter and Deen • More on food and drink • Search ajc.com's recipes

His den and kitchen were crammed with lights and cameras and TV crew members. Paula Deen, the Savannah restaurateur and Food Network personality, had come to tape a show with "Mr. Jimmy," as she calls the former president in her buttery South Georgia accent, and Mr. Jimmy was already thinking about close-ups.

"Should I put on some powder, or do y'all have makeup?"

How Carter found time for some celebrity cooking was anyone's guess. Within the past few days, he had monitored the Palestinian elections, returned to Plains to teach Sunday school, flown to London to make a speech and then scrambled back home in time to stir a pot of grits on "Paula's Home Cooking."

The taping had been rescheduled twice, and Carter didn't want to bump it again. He had noticed how many visitors to Plains mentioned his first appearance on Deen's show three years ago. Ever the hometown booster, he invited her back for a second helping of publicity, this time with his wife, Rosalynn, joining in.

"I feel like the Paula Deen show put me on the map," Carter said, flashing that famous grin. "A has-been politician all of a sudden back in the limelight."

• • •

While the old pol freshened up, the crew made final preparations in the kitchen, which was getting roasty from the lights and the preheated oven.

Like the Carters themselves, it's an unpretentious kitchen — a smallish space with walls papered in a blue flowered print and the house's original 1961 cabinets repainted white. At the end of a U-shaped run of counters, a window over the sink looks out on an overgrown holly.

The appliances are sensibly Middle American: a Kenmore dishwasher, a Spacemaker microwave oven, a GE side-by-side refrigerator trimmed with magnets (one for peanut butter, naturally) and a couple of beer can openers so rusty they might date to the era of Billy Beer. Among the photos on the fridge are ones showing Rosalynn catching a fish and Jimmy building a house with Habitat for Humanity.

Deen, who just built a house herself in Savannah, figured "about 20" of the Carters' kitchens would fit inside hers. "It's ob-scene," she said, pouring syrup all over the last syllable.

Deen is so hot these days, she could probably afford a kitchen the size of Plains. Since she began her show on the Food Network in the fall of 2002 — about the time Carter was winning the Nobel Peace Prize — the proprietor of Savannah's popular Lady and Sons restaurant has become the queen of a small empire of country cooking.

She has her own magazine and four best-selling cookbooks and is starting work on a memoir about her rise from a divorced mother of two who once was so insecure she wouldn't leave the house.

She happily shares the spotlight with her family. A year or so ago, Deen opened a second restaurant in Savannah with her brother, Uncle Bubba's Oyster House. Her sons, Jamie and Bobby, who have worked with her all along and appear frequently on her show, are getting their own Food Network program this year, "Good to Go."

Cooking with the Carters was a family outing for the Deens. Brother Bubba and Aunt Peggy were there, as were Bobby and Jamie and his wife, Brooke, and Paula's new husband, Michael Groover, a ship's captain with a white Hemingway beard who brought a camera and snapped pictures for the scrapbook.

• • •

The 59-year-old Deen arrived on the set first, a neon presence from her silver hair and blue eyes to her turquoise top and the pink slippers that punctuated her look like a pair of exclamation points.

After a while, the 81-year-old Carter reappeared in more down-home duds — jeans, plaid flannel shirt, scuffed boots and a big silver belt buckle forming a horseshoe around the initials "J.C."

Deen added another accessory when the cameras started to roll, a custom-made apron that read "Hail to the Chef!!!"

"You are so handsome I can't stand it," she told him, laying it on thick.

Deen had heard that the Carters like fowl, so she built a menu around a South Georgia classic — smothered quail over grits — with green beans on the side ("from a shiny can," she said). The finale: miniature tarts called Pecan Toffee Tassies, the sort of rich dessert Deen remembers fondly from her childhood down the road in Albany.

As they started a pot of grits, Deen mentioned that she had eaten lunch at Mom's, a local meat-and-three that Carter enjoys. "It was pork chop day."

"I had lunch on the plane coming back from London," he said. "It was what they called chicken salad, but it wasn't like the chicken salad I'm used to."

As they got the quail ready to fry, Carter regaled Deen with stories about how his family ate when he was growing up on the farm during the Depression. They had grits twice a day, he said, using the congealed leftovers to make fried grits at breakfast. ("Like polenta," Deen interjected.) And sometimes they had buttermilk and corn bread for dessert — still one of his favorites.

Carter looked like he was getting hungry just talking about it.

During a break, he kept his eyes on the task at hand: fixing dinner. He was in the middle of a conversation when he noticed a crew member walking toward the kitchen. "Could you stir those grits and make sure they don't stick?" he instructed. "You might have to add some water."

Among the onlookers was a quiet woman in a blue windbreaker, Mary Prince, the Carters' housekeeper and cook for 35 years.

Her employers are healthy eaters, she said, and love all kinds of fruit, vegetables, fish and game. She makes big batches of collard greens and corn bread for them and usually prepares a light lunch of soup and sandwich. The Carters cook for themselves at night and on Sunday mornings, when they make pancakes — a ritual that has held for the almost 60 years of their marriage.

"Mrs. Carter is a great cook," Prince said.

As for Deen, she had never seen her on TV that she could remember.

"I work during the day," she explained.

• • •

After the break, Deen poured the green beans into a saucepan and asked Carter if he liked salty food.

"Yes," he replied, a hint of sadness coming over his face, "but I don't get enough."

"Miss Rosalynn looks after you," Deen consoled him, "and we're glad for that."

The former first lady is indeed a watchful nutritionist. As she joined her husband and Deen for the next segment in the breakfast room, her copy of the Tufts University Health & Nutrition Letter stared down from a bulletin board like a posting of the Ten Commandments. Deen, who is proudly plus-sized, welcomed the petite lady of the house with a sassy observation.

"She's such a tiny thing," she said.

After they made the tassies, the three repaired to the den for the final scene. Deen sat between her hosts on the sofa with serving trays in front of them on the coffee table, as if they were watching TV.

As they began to eat, she asked the Carters whether they had ever entertained any visiting heads of state with unusual dietary requests.

"The most peculiar diet we ever ran across was the prime minister of India," Carter said. "He ate no meat, nothing that came from an animal. He ate nuts and some types of fruit."

Mrs. Carter crinkled her nose. "Those nuts smelled bad."

"And that's all he would eat," Carter continued. Then he hesitated. "I don't know if we can say it on your program, but he drank his own urine."

"You get out!" Deen exclaimed. "Why would he do that?"

"For health purposes."

Deen's producer, Gordon Elliott, couldn't resist adding a punch line in his booming Australian accent: "What wine goes with that?"

Deen wanted to know whether Carter liked the grits.

He nodded enthusiastically.

"I think they need more butter," she said, repeating her culinary mantra.

Mrs. Carter begged to differ. "Mine have plenty of butter."

It was time for dessert. After sampling the tassies, Deen still wasn't done with the sugar.

She took the Carters by their hands and looked at each of them. "Y'all are so sweet and special to me," she began.

Her gaze shifted to the camera lens. "I've had the privilege of sitting here with some of the most wonderful people in America. They never forgot from where they came. And they do everything in their power to be their brothers' keeper. I'm truly sitting right next to the greatest humanitarian walking the face of the Earth today."

With that, she kissed the Carters' hands and delivered her sign-off — "best dishes from our house to yours" — as a houseful of kin and crew applauded.

But Deen wasn't quite finished.

"Jamie, Bobby, Bubba," she called out after the cameras stopped, "do y'all have something for Mr. Jimmy to sign?"