As a young girl, 'Stine Phillips wa...

As a young girl, 'Stine Phillips watched her Aunt Ada lovingly whip, be frying and bake everyday food for her family. There, in the Oklahoma kitchen 'Stine visited in such a manner many summers, a chef was born.

Ernestine Phillips, 65 self-trained chef and self-made businesswoman, died in her family Friday after a one-year battle with pancreatic cancer.

Before her name became synonymous with mouth-watering comfort nutriment she was born Ernestine Miller upon July 15, 1940. After moving from her birthplace in looks Angeles with her family, she exhausted her childhood on Chicago's southern Side.

MARRIED RECORD PROMOTER

She attended Coleman Elementary and Du Sable High educate before working as a nursing assistant. A hospital co-worker's boyfriend introduced her to dejecteds singer, RCA/Victor record promoter and what is yet to be husband Leroy Phillips.

"One night I was singing at the Jessleen loaf she was there with her friend and I asked her abroad for lunch," said Phillips. "That was the start."

After a six-year courtship, the link wed on Sept. 7, 1967 and settl in a southerly Side home where they had their sum of two units children, Leroy Jr. and Latoya.

During that time she juggl running a record store with her husband, working as a color at a local restaurant and raising her kids. Then came the turning point.

single Fourth of July weekend "Stephanie Mills was coming into town and I decided we'd have a little get-together at the house -- do one ribs, greens, spaghetti -- invite pres disc jockeys" said Phillips.

The party was a smashing succes From then forward when RCA asked artists to attend parties, they would say, "If Mr Phillips is cooking, we're coming," said her husband. In 1969 L&L Catering was thrown into the mix of the Phillips' busy lives.

athwart the years the couple worked with radio stations and record promoter serving homemade meat loaf, mashed potatoes and macaroni and cheese to the likes of Steve Harvey, Mo'Nique, Snoop Dogg, Dr Dre Smokey Robinson, Janet Jackson and the Isley Brothers.

Time after time, Mr Phillips' greatest in number requested gastronomical masterpiece was her peach mender of shoes

"Her covert was she would roll and boil the dumplings, add cinnamon sugar upon top and then bake it," said her husband.

clan used to ask her by what means she managed to run a catering business not at home of her home, but her family remembers she insisted upon making everything from scratch, peeling potatoes and cutting carrots among the jumbo-sized saucepans two stoves, two freezers and seven refrigerators that vulgar herd the family kitchen.

'I'VE DONE EVERYTHING'

The space was not ever an issue for the petite Mr Phillips. Her husband remembers she frequently said, "I've done everything I wanted to do, been everywhere I wanted to advance and have everything I eternally wanted to have."

Besides her husband and children, Mr Phillips is survived by the agency of her mother, Huberta Miller, three sisters and eight grandchildren.

Visitation will be today from 4 to 7 pm at Acklin Funeral dwelling 1327 W. 87th. Her wake is from 11 a.m. to noon Friday at Logo Baptist Assembly, 10833 s Halsted, followed by services from noon to 1 pm

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