Fridays After 5 Featuring Kim Celenza

(With Recipes!)

SDA’s member spotlight Fridays After 5 showcases the varied creative, fun, adventurous, or interesting achievements our members accomplish after business hours.

For this installment, we peek into the kitchen of our foodie and SDA National Vice President Kim Celenza. Kim is an Associate and Marketing Manager at Perkins Eastman in New York, New York. She also chairs the SDA National Membership Committee and is an active member of the SDA Marketing and Communications committee. 

Today is the feast of St. Joseph which is widely commemorated all over Italy to honor the relief St. Joseph provided during a famine in Sicily. The tradition includes parades, special recipes, and often the construction of what is known as a St. Joseph’s Altar. The tradition traveled to the US with the Italian immigrants and continues to this day from New York and New Orleans. 

As a child, Kim remembers her grandmother celebrated the day by making the traditional Zeppole di San Giuseppe. Zeppola is a fried pastry, with a center filled with flavored creams or sweetened ricotta. Kim also credits her “Grammy” for igniting her passion for food.

What do you love about cooking?

So many things. I honestly find it extremely therapeutic. I suffer from anxiety and I can say with 100% certainty it has helped tremendously, it's the process, the focus, the love- it comforts me.

I also love cooking for people and sharing something that I love so much with them.  

It feels like I am giving a part of myself when I do.  Also, I LOVE FOOD!

Who do you love to cook for?

My family, my friends.  I also love sharing recipes with my Mom, Dad, my sister Jackie, and friends near and far.

Would you be willing to share a recipe?

Sure! Here’s a favorite I’d love to share: chicken soup with pastina.  Simple, and oh so comforting.  In my family, it is called "Italian Penicillin".

When did the passion start?

Definitely started with my grandmother when I was a child.  Sunday dinners were her "thing". She would get up at 5 am and start making the "gravy" and meatballs.  

That would be followed by roast beef and potatoes and salad.

Making her "gravy" and meatballs will never fail to make me feel close to her again.  

Buon appetito e buona giornata!

The recipe for Kim’s Italian Penicillin is below. If you have trouble locating pastina or bucatini pasta, it is available through Amazon at http://bit.ly/SDAPastinaLink. This is an affiliate link and SDA National could receive a portion of your purchase price.

Bonus Recipe: