Jennifer Garner Took Her Mom Pat on Today to Make a Cobbler Together: ‘I Take It to Every Potluck,’ Says Pat

Jennifer Garner and her mother are bringing her “Pretend Cooking Show” to Today.

On Monday, June 24, Hoda Kotb and Savannah Guthrie welcomed the actress, 52, and her mom, Patricia Ann "Pat" Garner, to bring their casual recipes from Instagram to the small screen.

The 13 Going on 30 star has been on the morning show “a million times,” but this was Pat's Today debut.

“It’s the best to be here with my mom!” Jennifer exclaimed. “It’s just the sweetest. I’m so proud of her and so happy that we’re here together.”

Kotb asked Pat, 86, if she taught Jennifer “everything she knows about cooking?”

“Oh goodness no,” she replied. “She’s a much better cook than I am.”

The Alias alum adamantly disagreed, telling the hosts that Pat cooked for her every day when she was growing up.

“Did you love cooking? Or did you just have to do it?” Guthrie asked.

“I thought I loved it but I don’t cook anymore and I love that too,” she joked.

The two women opened up about the death of Jennifer’s father and Pat’s husband, William, before they made their way to the kitchen to demonstrate a beloved dessert recipe. ("I miss him. And I so wanted to tell him I was going to be on the Today show," Pat said of her late husband.)

With some help from Carson Daly, they prepared "Barbara’s Blackberry Cobbler" for Kotb, Guthrie, Craig Melvin and Al Roker. The Garners explained that Barbara, Jennifer's childhood best friend’s mother, had shared the recipe with Pat many years ago and it's still in her rotation.

“I made it three times [last week],” Pat said. “Because I take it to every potluck.”

She quickly realized that sharing the favorite recipe might disrupt that plan. “Now they’re going to see the recipe, and what else am I going to bring to the potluck?” Pat joked.

The first step is to buy the blackberries, according to Pat, who said that she used to pick them from her garden until the briars “reached out and scratched my husband and then he poisoned them all.”

Jennifer then greased the pan with butter while Pat showed Daly how much flour, sugar (1 cup each) and salt (1 teaspoon) to add to the bowl. The blackberries were added to the greased pan and covered with lemon juice and ¼ teaspoon almond extract. 

The mother-daughter duo butt heads at one point when Jennifer tried to correct Pat on the order of operations. Pat explained that one egg is added to the flour-sugar mixture but Jennifer thought it was meant to be the butter.

“No, no, no, no, no, Jennifer Anne!” Pat told her, making the studio erupt in laughter.

“Jennifer, go to your room!” Daly joked. “Stop picking a fight with your mother.”

Jennifer whipped up some cream for the topping while Pat and Daly formed the crumble and sprinkled it on top of the berries. The last step is to pour 6 ounces of melted butter on top of the dessert before popping it in the oven “until it’s done,” Pat said simply.

“It’s so easy and it is always eaten. I never have to take any of it home,” Pat explained. “I recently had a potluck on my back deck and I looked over and people were getting their cobbler first.”

Earlier this month, the dynamic duo shared another potluck-friendly dish on Instagram. They demonstrated how to make a creamed corn recipe lovingly dubbed “Grandmom Corn” by Jennifer’s kids Violet, 18, Seraphina, 15, and Samuel, 12, whom she shares with ex Ben Affleck.

The video, posted on June 2, is complete with sweet banter and footage of Pat throwing corn cobs into her West Virginia backyard "for the bears." She has never actually seen a bear eat one but she wishes she had.