Mo Rocca whips up grandmother's cooking special

Mo Rocca is an actor, writer and a CBS News correspondent. But cooking is not one of his many talents.

So he's asking America's grandparents for help, in a Cooking Channel special called "My Grandmother's Ravioli."

Mo Rocca on the Cooking Channel: "My Grandmother's Ravioli"

Mo Rocca's grandmother is now deceased, but he said he would go back to spend time with her to find out how -- and why -- she cooked.

"If I had a time machine I would go back 30 years and show up at my grandmother's apartment before the gargantuan meals she would serve and I would help her," he said. "... This is a woman who worked 40 hours a week at a downtown D.C. department store. ... On the weekends, though, she would make these meals. We couldn't get her not to do it. She wanted to do it. She'd be hurt if we didn't let her do it. And I'm doing the next best thing: I'm learning from the old masters, from the grandmothers and grandfathers across the country."

"My Grandmother's Ravioli" airs on the Cooking Channel on February 19, 2012 at 8/7c.

For more with Mo Rocca on his upcoming special and a discussion on the importance of passing down cooking know-how and tradition, watch the video in the player above.