About Kitchen Parade

Kitchen Parade is the food and recipe column written by Alanna Kellogg, a second-generation food writer and a home cook in a home kitchen in suburban St. Louis. Kitchen Parade features fresh seasonal recipes for everyday healthful eating and occasional indulgences. Alanna also writes A Veggie Venture, the food blog about vegetables.

But Of Course, There's More to the Story

A Mother's Legacy

My mother started Kitchen Parade in 1959 for the weekly newspaper serving my hometown, a Minnesota-Ontario border town of just 1600 people. Mom was a young wife and a new mother then, also a home economist and city girl finding her place in a small town.

For twelve years, she wrote the column week in and week out and only stopped when our family moved away.

When my parents returned twenty years later, Mom was tickled when local cooks would stop on the street to welcome her home and add, “I got my favorite recipe for such-‘n’-such from your column.”

Decades after Mom's column ended, people still shared, "I made your mother's such-n-such just last week."

That's Kitchen Parade's column heading between 1959 and 1971, when my mother wrote the column.

That man with his nose in the newspaper? That's my father. Those two "boys"? Ooops, they represent my sister and me. The dog? She looks pretty much like our sweet border collie named Rusty.

But how my mom is depicted with such an unstylish kerchief is incomprehensible for she had a genuine flair for fashion.

How Kitchen Parade Became Mine

Now my father, my sister Adanna and I all remember that during Mom's Kitchen Parade years, meals could be, errr, interesting at our house.

But I believe it was the rich mosaic of Mom’s cooking that instilled my appreciation for simple food prepared well.

After my mother’s death in 2002, I read her columns for the first time and discovered that she was a woman ahead of her time, counseling teenage nutrition and advocating fresh food years before the topics became common.

Moved by both grief and admiration, I felt called to resurrect her column in my own style under the Kitchen Parade banner.

And as mothers and daughters and life come full circle, now people stop me on the street and in the grocery store and leave comments online to say, "I made your such-n-such this week!"

The Oldest Food Blog on the Internet?

• In 2009, I marked the 50th anniversary of my mom's first column by collecting her recipes in one place in Kitchen Parade by Shirley.
• In 2019, Kitchen Parade celebrated its 60th anniversary.
• By 2022, I'd written Kitchen Parade for twenty years!

No wonder I sometimes joke that Kitchen Parade is the oldest food blog on the entire internet!

Where You've Seen My Writing

• Since 2002, right here at KitchenParade.com
• Since 2005, at A Veggie Venture, my food blog about vegetables
• A weekly column for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch
• A weekly column for the Webster-Kirkwood Times & the South County Times
• Occasional contributions to St. Louis' monthly food magazine Sauce
• A weekly contributor to BlogHer
• A bi-weekly column for small-town newspapers across Missouri
• A weekly column for the Baudette Region, my hometown newspaper

I ♥ Food Blogs

I also write A Veggie Venture, the month-long project that took on its own life back in 2005, one of the very first food blogs. For an entire year, I cooked a vegetable in a new way every single day and along the way was dubbed the veggie evangelist!

Now A Veggie Venture is the award-winning home of 1000+ free vegetable recipes, including the famous Alphabet of Vegetables, vegetable recipes for every course and Weight Watchers recipes.

From Asparagus to Zucchini, seasonal to staples, savory to sweet, salads to sides, soups to supper, simple to special, A Veggie Venture is my food playground, a true "food blog". All these years later, I remain 100% excited by vegetables!

Not only do I write my own food blog, I also read many hundreds of other food blogs from all across the world. Such creativity! Such passion! Such skills!

All These Years Later? The Real Credit Goes to YOU

You Are My Inspiration

The online audience for Kitchen Parade has grown many-many-many fold. Thank you, readers!

It thrills me that so many cooks are inspired by simple recipes made from whole and wholesome ingredients. Your notes, your e-mails, your comments, your pins, your shares, your likes, they truly inspire me.

I wake up every morning thinking about what you might want to cook today, tonight, this weekend.

With Kitchen Parade, my goal is to inspire both new and experienced cooks, even as I learn more about food and explore new recipes, ingredients and techniques. Here's what to expect from Kitchen Parade.

• A familiar, over-the-kitchen-table writing style
• Recipes made from easy-to-find and "whole" ingredients
• Long-time favorite recipes from family and readers
• Tried-and-true recipes, often with an unexpected or unusual touch!
• Recipes tied to the seasons, holidays and family festivities
• Kitchen tips for busy cooks, or cooks new to the kitchen
• Nutrition information and Weight Watchers points
• Product and cookbook recommendations only when I really love them myself
• A super-organized Recipe Box, so that it's quick-quick to find just the right recipe

Here you may count on: fresh and seasonal ingredients; classic recipes, though often with a twist and often simplified; real ingredients, especially pantry ingredients; an emphasis on getting supper on the table; plus recipes for special occasions.

So, Welcome ...

Poke around the Recipe Box, see what looks good for a Quick Supper or look for ideas on what to make with some leftover buttermilk, say, or an abundance of sweet potatoes, say, or decide what to make for a Scandinavian feast, say, or what to make for a vegan houseguest, say.

If you like what you see, come back for new recipes about once a week plus a newsletter on Sundays.

Or better yet, sign up for a free e-mail subscription so you'll never miss a single recipe.

For more information, check the FAQs.

... And Many Thanks

Many thanks for visiting, for reading. I hope you'll come back often.

And if you have a favorite recipe Kitchen Parade's readers might like, just drop me an e-mail, you'll find my current email address in the FAQs. I do love hearing from readers! Often, your comments and messages make my day!

~ Alanna 1/1/24

---

© Copyright Kitchen Parade
2002 – 2024