He led VisitColumbusGA. Now, retired Peter Bowden shares recipes in new cooking blog
For 21 years, Peter Bowden worked to make Columbus a destination for millions of visitors as president and CEO of VisitColumbusGA, retiring at the end of 2024.
A year later, Bowden has found a new path in life, centered around sharing his family recipes and writing.
When he began his retirement, Bowden wanted to stay busy. One evening, he came across a cookbook written by Stephen Colbert and his wife, Evie McGee Colbert, entitled “Does This Taste Funny?”
Bowden enjoyed the humor in the book and found inspiration.
“Well,” he thought, “I can do that.”
In his home, Bowden had a drawer full of cookbooks from his mom and rare handwritten notes from his grandfather’s recipes.
Bowden decided to try writing a blog called “Time Saving Country Cookin’” to share his recipes, which can best be accessed through his Facebook page.
Creativity born out of need
Bowden’s first wife, Valerie, died from cancer about three years ago. He wanted to learn how to make more than simple meals, like sandwiches, in his kitchen.
This venture didn’t begin with a passion for cooking, Bowden said, but the passion grew out of necessity and a desire to expand his culinary abilities.
Between losing his wife and retiring, Bowden said, his life converged for a new chapter.
“All of those sort of things came together at one time,” he said. “This (blog) would be a great way for me to stay busy and expand my creativity in another way to sort of carry on an unofficial tradition of family cooking.”
Bowden’s mom, Helen, wasn’t necessarily a great cook, he said. But as the oldest of six siblings, he understood the economics involved in Helen trying to feed six kids, herself and his father. And she had a lot of cookbooks.
One of her cookbooks that he found was published in the mid-1950s. It was about Southern-style cuisine.
This book helped create the basis for some of the archived recipes Bowden blogged about.
“You’ll see some of those recipes are very, very basic, but still very nutritious and certainly filling,” he said.
From those basics, Bowden began exploring more in the kitchen and doing research.
Standing in his kitchen and wearing an apron, Bowden gestured to the cookbooks stacked all around him atop cabinets and on the kitchen counters. Now married to Sheri, Bowden has more input in the creation of new recipes to share.
“My wife, today, has her recipes that we’re blending into the family,” he said. “So there’s a lot of experimentation with how to keep ourselves busy with good food.”
A Christmas Chili
Considering this time of year, Bowden decided to share a hearty recipe unlike the traditional Christmas ham or turkey.
He’s making a Christmas Chili.
“It’s actually something I just made up because we’re in between the holidays,” Bowden said.
While his mom had a multitude of cookbooks, his father had a family-favorite chili recipe. But his dad never wrote down the recipe, Bowden said, so he experimented with different ingredients and styles of chili to replicate the childhood memory.
And he concocted a simple recipe for one or two meals that could be frozen or portioned for other meals.
The recipe’s base contains ground beef, chile pepper, oregano, beans, onion, garlic, green garlic and green peppers. He also suggests enhancing the dish with sour cream, cheese or scallions.
“You get the basic ingredients and then sort of add and take away those things you feel will enhance it,” Bowden said. “Some people may not want a chili that has beans in it, and this particular recipe does.”
His target audience for his recipes are busy people who need to create a simple meal for their family or want to do meal prep for the week, Bowden said.
“I try to make these meals where it’s like, at most, 30-minute prep,” he said. “If you’ve got all of your ingredients, you can put it together.”
Bowden stays away from using a microwave, he said, but he does share recipes that use an air fryer. He also likes stovetop recipes and has featured casseroles during the Thanksgiving season.
Cooking is becoming a lost art, Bowden said, despite all the celebrity cooking shows.
“You get back to the nuclear family, a lot of people don’t know how to cook,” he said. “And it sort of gets back to me. I knew basically how to cook, but I’ve had to teach myself how to cook, beyond just cooking a hamburger or making macaroni and cheese, and do something that’s not just out of the box.”
Finding satisfaction in retirement
Creating his cooking posts is like work in a way, Bowden said. He must dedicate time to cooking a main protein, complementary vegetable and, often, a dessert.
Bowden researches and experiments before he writes the recipe on paper. Then he works on getting it published online so supportive followers can see it.
“It’s another type of work commitment where I’m responsible for, in my mind, a readership, however large it is or small, that might be looking for what’s next in the recipe,” he said. “So, I have to force myself, in some cases, because it becomes working, in a sense. But there is satisfaction once it’s done.”
Bowden enjoys when family members reminisce to him about old recipes and other readers reach out to share that they tried his Creole hamburger recipe.
“That’s kind of fun to realize that I’ve been successful in a sense that I have reinvented a part of me, or brought out a part of me, that I, frankly, didn’t know existed,” he said.
His advice for other people approaching retirement: Don’t wait.
“Be thinking about what to do prior (to retirement) to focus on the things that you have a passion for,” Bowden said. “Whether it’s cooking or photography or writing or hiking or whatever it is. Then do some research about how you go about doing it.”
It’s important to mentally challenge yourself and create goals, Bowden said. After marrying Sheri in October, he is looking forward to the next part of their lives.
But first, Bowden hopes to share some creative leftover ideas for Christmas. He encourages people to follow him on Facebook to see his latest updates.
“If you’re busy, now coming up on the holidays, (cooking) can still be simple and delicious and fun,” he said. “Get everyone in the kitchen doing a little bit of something, and, if nothing else, just having conversation.”
