The Sweet Reason Kelly Clarkson Learned to Cook

Oct. 29, 2013 -- Kelly Clarkson is now the stepmother to husband Brandon Blackstock's two kids from his first marriage, and she's really embraced her new role.

"I hired someone to teach me how to cook recently, because my fiancé has two kids," Clarkson, 30, told FOOD & WINE magazine for its December issue before she married Blackstock earlier this month. "We cook a lot at our home near Nashville. We make a gluten-free pasta primavera with vegetables from our greenhouse that the kids love, which is amazing. Any time you get a kid to eat vegetables, you're like, 'I win!'"

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Her own upbringing involved more unhealthy fare. Because her mother was a single working parent, Clarkson often went to a friend's home for dinner, because her mother was a "great Southern cook."

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"Loaded sweet tea and country-fried steak, everything made from scratch," recalled Clarkson. "Did you ever see that Stove Top commercial with the kid who always shows up at dinnertime? That was totally me."

Later in life, she expanded her palette.

"I grew up in Texas: I didn't even know sushi existed," she told the magazine, which hits newsstands Nov. 15. "Now I love sushi, I love Indian, I love Thai. I'm all about trying new foods, but that took a while. When I got into this industry in my early twenties, I was like, "Where the hell can I get a good meal?"