It’s summertime and churchgoers around the country will be gathering for potluck picnics. They will come in droves, arms laden with macaroni, pasta and potato salads. Picnic tables will be shoved together end to end to receive their offerings. Those who have the gift of baking will proudly displaycarefully arranged platters of homemade brownies and fancy, hard-to-serve cakes. Those who have had a harried week will discretely deposit a box of store-bought cookies.

Kids playing, men grilling and a long line of hungry fellowshipers collating plates of a little of this and a bit of that. Except me.

I hate to sound like a food snob, but when I attend potluck picnics, I tend to stick with the food I brought. Especially when it comes to pasta salad. And not just because I know all of the ingredients in mine are organic. It’s mostly because I love a good pasta salad and, disappointingly, most of the pretty pastas calling to me from the buffet line are just bland impostors that look much better than they taste. Not mine. The lucky brethren who pile my pasta onto their plates hit a jackpot of flavor.

What’s my secret? More accurately, who’s my secret? Pam Anderson.

If you, too, make a great pasta salad, then please share. Potluck picnickers everywhere will thank you. Potluck picnickers. Say it out loud.

But if no one is asking who made your pasta salad, then take a lesson from Pam. Your church will thank you.

Have a happy, delicious 4th of July.  And God bless America.