I frequently wow my nephew as we compete to yell the answers to the questions (or rather the questions to the answers) on “Jeopardy” at the television set. My secret is that I have had way too much schooling and have read way too many books.

I was particularly adept at coming up with answers when I watched “Celebrity Jeopardy” last fall. Although I don’t think the producers of the program would admit this, the celebrity version of the game show is easier than the regular one and relies more on references to popular culture.

It has remarkably few geographical categories, which are always my bêtenoire. I have visited about 30 different countries, but I can never find them on a map. I’m just not visually oriented. I’m usually a pro at “Celebrity Jeopardy,” however.

But I would not have won the tournament last fall. I fell down on the Final Jeopardy category, “Literary Clichés,” although I thought I had the answer in the bag.

Host Ken Jennings intoned, “Many mystery fans blame ‘The Door,’ a 1930 Mary Roberts Rinehart novel in which a servant kills a nurse, for this four-word cliché.”

I have taught detective fiction to college students. I even taught a novel or two by Mary Roberts Rinehart. She was famous for inventing the “Had I But Known” school of detective fiction, in which the narrator utters that phrase to prolong the plot of the mystery novel. My guess, then, was, “Had I But Known.”

I was outsmarted by the comedienne/actress Lisa Ann Walter, who channeled her mother, a teacher and a mystery fan. Walter took the time to look at the clue and interpreted the servant’s killing of the nurse to mean that “the butler did it.”

She was correct. Her answer brought her the championship. I was a little annoyed at myself — but not at all vexed with Lisa Ann Walter.

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For one thing, she was right. For another, she donated her $1 million prize to a charity I support, the Entertainment Community Fund.

Formerly known as the Actor’s Fund, this group helps not just actors but individuals throughout the film, TV, and theater world who have fallen on hard times. Last year, it received myriad calls for help as strikes kept many in the industry from bringing home paychecks.

It’s also hard to dislike Lisa Ann Walter. I have seen her on and off as an actress — in the films “Eddie” and “The Parent Trap” (the Lindsay Lohan version), as well as on the popular television show “Abbott Elementary.”

I have also read her 2011 memoir, “The Best Thing About My Ass Is That It’s Behind Me.” In the book, Walter humorously explores many of the contradictions of American womanhood.

She talks about being presented as a child with two beloved toys that pulled her in different directions. Her Easy Bake Oven taught her to produce (and consume) delicious, highly caloric treats. Her Barbie doll taught her that women should be slender. She has been caught between the two all her life.

Walter sounds as though she would be a fun girlfriend. She talks of introducing actress and talk-show host Sherri Shepherd to one of my favorite emporia, Costco. Walter doesn’t seem to have good luck with her husbands, but she always has time for her pals and her children.

She also cooks with and for her friends. Later on the night her winning episode of “Jeopardy” was broadcast, she showed up with a couple of dishes inspired by her Italian grandmother on “Jimmy Kimmel Live.”

Both Kimmel and his sidekick, Guillermo Rodriguez, seemed to enjoy the meal thoroughly. I felt impelled to write to Lisa Ann Walter’s representatives to ask for the recipe.

They obliged by sending me the recipe for her braciole, a beef roll-up made with flank steak, and reminding me that the recipe for her basic tomato sauce and meatballs could be found in her memoir.

My local general store was out of flank steak so I stuck with the tomato sauce and meatballs. I was preparing for a large party so it was a perfect offering; it stretches nicely.

Walter usually adds the cooked meatballs to her sauce and simmers the combination for an hour or so longer. I expected vegetarians so I kept most of the sauce separate, just adding a little of it to the meatballs as I reheated them before serving.

I also adapted the recipe slightly. If one cooks the sauce with the meatballs, salt and pepper are unnecessary. I added them because the vegetarians would need a little flavor enhancement.

When I tasted my sauce, it was a bit bitter. Perhaps I burned it just a tad. Perhaps I used the wrong tomatoes (although I did go for high-end San Marzano plum tomatoes).

At first, I wasn’t sure how to fix the sauce. I have read that baking soda can tone down the acid in tomatoes, but I didn’t feel happy adding what is basically a chemical to my lovely sauce.

Luckily, I remembered that the great Italian-American chef, Marcella Hazan, used to add butter to her tomato sauce. I stirred butter into the sauce, a little at a time, until I achieved the perfect flavor. You may not have to (depending on your tomatoes), but if you do, don’t be shy. The butter gives the sauce a velvety taste. If someone asks why your sauce contains butter, you can always say, “The butler did it!”

By the way, I was supposed to appear tomorrow evening at the Athol Public Library. Because of the iffy weather, this appearance will now take place next Thursday, April 11, at 6 p.m. Please join us as I talk about (and serve nibbles from) my most recent cookbook, “Pot Luck.”

This program is sponsored by the Friends of the Athol Public Library and is free and open to the public. Registration is required, however. To register, go to https://tinyurl.com/yyms8y5c or call 978-249-9515.

Ingredients:

for the sauce:

a splash of good-quality olive oil (“Good-quality means whatever is imported from Italy at Costco,” says Walter.)

6 cloves garlic, mashed

1 small can (6 ounces) tomato paste

4 cans (28 ounces each) plum tomatoes, squished with your clean hands while adding:

lots of dried basil

salt and pepper to taste

butter to taste

Romano cheese as needed

for the meatballs:

1 pound ground beef and 1 pound ground pork

(or 2 pounds bulk Italian sausage; I mixed sweet and hot)

3 eggs

1 bunch washed parsley, chopped

2 cups Progresso Italian breadcrumbs

“a s–tload of powdered garlic” (not garlic salt)

Instructions:

Begin by making the sauce. In a heavy-bottom pot, heat the olive oil. Add the garlic, using a wooden spoon (no metal, says Walter), and cook until it is fragrant but not brown.

Stir in the tomato paste and then a little water, followed by the tomatoes.

Sprinkle dried basil across the top of the sauce. Simmer for an hour, stirring every 15 minutes and breaking up any additional large pieces of tomato.

At the end of the hour, taste the sauce. Add salt, pepper and butter to taste.

Walter tosses a generous handful of Romano right into the sauce; I chose to serve it on the side of my spaghetti and meatballs.

To prepare the meatballs, preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Combine the meatball ingredients, and roll them into balls. (My meatballs weren’t very well rounded so they looked like rocks, but they ended up tasting delicious.)

Walter places a broiler rack on top of a cookie sheet and bakes the meatballs for 30 minutes. The fat separates out onto the cookie sheet.

My broiler rack was looking sad so I just lined cookie sheets with foil and baked the meatballs/rocks on them. Much of the fat still ended up on the foil. I turned the meatballs over after 15 minutes to keep them from sticking to the foil.

Serve with good-quality spaghetti and Romano cheese. Serves a crowd.

Tinky Weisblat is an award-winning cookbook author and singer known as the Diva of Deliciousness. Visit her website, TinkyCooks.com.