"Learn to cook it the way you like it," he wrote in a column in 1987 for The Times. "Don't depend too heavily on presentation. The best looking, most expensive table setting in the world will never make up for mediocre food."
When the decor is fussy, he cautioned, "I get a sneaky suspicion there is too much going on at the table and not enough in the kitchen."
Many of Bailey's books are menu cookbooks. He traveled extensively to collect regional recipes but had a special rapport with the American South. "Lee Bailey's Southern Food and Plantation Houses" includes photographs of historic homes in Natchez, Miss., along with local recipes.
His "Lee Bailey's New Orleans: Good Food and Glorious Homes" was a joint effort with Ella Brennan of the family-owned Commander's Palace restaurant in New Orleans. A number of the recipes came from the Commander's kitchen.
"Even before I knew he was from the South, I thought he had to be from there," said Rose, who has most of Bailey's books in her personal library. "He had a Southern graciousness about the way he cooked and entertained."
