Patty Wentworth
Claim to fame: Over the past 40 years, she’s won 300-plus ribbons at the South Carolina State Fair for her baking and crafts.
Day job: She works in the South Carolina Office of the Inspector General handling complaints via the hotline. The agency investigates fraud, waste, abuse, mismanagement and misconduct in the executive branch of state government.
Hometown: Columbia.
Essential ingredient: “Butter makes everything better,” says Wentworth, who swears by cooking with fresh ingredients.
Secret weapon: A good stand mixer. She’s had her KitchenAid mixer for 30 years.
Ask Patty Wentworth how she came to win so many first-place ribbons at the South Carolina State Fair, and she’ll tell you the story of her parents, Robert and Margaret Moon Wright.
A self-described visual learner, Wentworth often thinks of when she’s in her kitchen or at her crafts table. She grew up watching her father craft his own fishing lures. She took mental notes as she watched her mother design and make the latest fashions for her and her sisters, and cook, well, just about everything.
“My mother made the very best candied yams. And she never used a recipe that I saw. She was just a wonderful cook who could make good food out of whatever,” Wentworth says. “I was fortunate to have family around me to learn from and also learn that you can do a lot of things yourself.”
For the past 40 years, Wentworth has been entering and winning food and craft competitions at the South Carolina State Fair. And as far as anyone can tell, nobody can top her haul of more than 300 red and blue ribbons. At the 2022 fair, she added seven more to the total.
In addition to cooking and baking, she likes working with miniatures, creating entire Christmas villages out of handmade items. She’s used clay to make Halloween figures, adding moss and sticks from her backyard. She’s painted gourds and rocks and won numerous ribbons for Christmas ornaments and door decorations.
“When you get lost in what you’re doing, it’s a wonderful thing,” Wentworth says.
Having set the example, she’s thrilled to see her three children, seven grandchildren and two great-grandchildren also competing in State Fair competitions.
“A little bit of my creativity has been passed down,” she says. “It’s a great thing when your children have inherited your love of art.”
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