It felt like quite a coming home party last Saturday night at “Movies & Music Under The Stars”—an event recently held at the Fort Lee Community Center which featured The Party Dolls belting out pop hits from the ‘60s to today—plus a showing of “Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs” on their giant outdoor big screen.

I was an invited guest, and I brought my family to “meat & greet” the huge crowd. It was me, Mommy Meatballs, Big Brother Meatballs and Baby Meatballs—oh, and about 500 of my meatballs which I served up complimentary. I felt right at home for several reasons.

Movies and music are probably two of my favorite things in life, and being with family and friends—and food of course—all tie in to that. The other tie-in was the fact that the film had meatballs in the title! I got up on stage and introduced it and loved every minute of it. It also felt like home because I grew up just a few blocks away from the community center in nearby Palisades Park. My corner house on Thirteenth Street was actually right on the border of Fort Lee. When the ball rolled down the hill when me and my cousins were playing, by the time we retrieved it, we were in Fort Lee.

We also always played at Inwood Terrace Park in Fort Lee all the time, and the site of the new, state-of-the-art community center was the former home of Shop-Rite and Genovese drug store right across the lot—two stores I always shopped in with my mom and grandmother. Genovese burned down (it later became an Eckerd and now is a Rite-Aid), and Shop-Rite was demolished when a new one was built in Pal Park by the town pool. So it felt quite fitting to be up on that stage, probably in the same footprints I stood as a kid with my mother on the checkout line paying for meatball ingredients.

And it was a joy to see the expressions on the faces of everyone when they tasted my meatballs. Everybody and their mother (and lots of mothers and grandmothers were there) seemed to truly love them, and that kind of satisfaction is why I do what I do. I may not have better meatballs than someone’s nonna, but if mine can at least be as good, I have done my job.

See, bringing back the old-school Italian-American Sunday dinner experience is what Johnny’s Meatballs are all about. It’s something that resonates in the hearts of North Jersey paisans. Stirring up those feelings and emotions with every bite is my genuine goal. On this Saturday evening in Fort Lee, I think I brought back that experience.

I’d like to offer special thanks to the Fort Lee Film Commission and the Bergen County Mom To Mom organization—especially Tom Meyers, Louis Azzollini, Ann Meyers Piccirillo and Donna Brennan for their gracious invitation to this fantastic evening of fun! And of course, to my family and all those families out there who came out to enjoy the festivities. I definitely hope to be back again in the future!

PS- This Sunday I will be tying the knot with my beautiful fiancé, Megin at The Landmark in East Rutherford, so all of my future writings will come from the perspective of a married man. I hope you’ve all been enjoying my stories, poems, celebrity interviews, reviews and recommendations, (and of course, my recipes) as much as I enjoyed sharing them. This Cugine Corner marks blog #25. I’m eager to continue bringing all things “Cugine” in the world of food and entertainment to i-Italy every Tuesday. Expect big things this fall!