How'd your penchant for cooking evolve?

[Jenise]

Fun question.

I seemed to have been born with a vital interest in the food in front of me, and I was curious and questioning about duplicating the great food we ate in restaurants (I was a lucky kid) at home. That was the food I wanted to eat all the time, and I started reading my mom's cookbooks very early in an attempt to figure out how to bridge the gap. As I was really tiny, only 7 or 8, I couldn't get very far for the wealth of things I didn't understand, but like adult behavior and a lot of other mysteries, I persisted in the belief that with time things would fall into place as they had a way of doing. By the time I was 10 I could blind-identify all the herbs and spices in my mother's collection and make a great all-day spaghetti sauce from scratch, and by the time I was 12 Mom would stand back and let me make an entire dinner. Good thing, when I was 13 she became ill and in a few years passed away, and I took over cooking for the family. Which I loved.

But I still have my first cookbook! It was one of Mom's, of course, and it was called The Family Circle Meat Cookbook. An old book published in 1954, Mom kept it around for the diagrams of meat parts and the roasting tables, I played with it even before I could read and it was the first book I turned to when I started cooking--it was an old friend, and I'd been drooling over the pictures for years. Looking back on those now, well, some of these recipes are very strange and the suggested menu combinations even stranger (veal and mushroom congealed into tomato juice gelatin served with parslied new potatoes and creamed corn? Ew!), but even in the 70's Timbales and Rice Rings were the height of ambition for home cooks, so I was entranced.

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Growing up, home-cooked food was always the norm, and I suppose that's where it all began. I have always been a city dwelling country dweller wannabe - and thoughts of having a garden, if only to supplement my diet, and in recent years, of adding a small vineyard, are strongly tied in to my rural aspirations.

In my family, "ready food" as we would call it (e.g. TV dinners, canned soup, frozen burgers, etc.) has never been popular and was rightly seen as suspect for all its flavourings, colourings, preservatives and what not. When I was in university, there would be times when I would have little choice but to grab some kind of fast food on the way, but I always much preferred those days when I could come home early and cook something myself - often a simple dish, such as paprika-coated chicken thighs on a bed of leeks, potatoes and carrots would offer a tasty meal, and it was really easy to prepare.

Today what keeps me cooking is pretty much the same philosophy: Preparing food should be a joy, not a chore; it should be done in such a way that you actually look forward to it at the end of the day. Food is not just any old fuel for the body; it is to be nourishing for the spirit and, when possible, a catalyst for fellowship.

Really had to think about this one. I guess I learned to cook because I love to eat!

Strange progression went something like this: Boones Farm + Beer (mixed!) to Cribari/Inglenook kinda wine to Mateus to California varietals to food with the wine to GOOD food with better wine.

Then I had to learn how to make really good food because I sure couldn't afford to eat very often at the kind of restaurants that served the kind of food I love to eat. My very best friend of the last 20 years+ and his wife are also foodies and wine junkies and love to cook. My wife's a fantastic cook... her parents came over from Italy.

Bottom line, I've always said if you love to eat really good food - you need to learn to cook! Besides, it's fun!

[Jenise]

Paul said

I have always been a city dwelling country dweller wannabe

So Paul, why don't you change this and move out of the city?

The bee looks impressed. Hey, I would be, too.

Stuart, I worry about you. That is clearly a space man next to the Rocket Salad, not a bee. This was the 1950s after all.

(Maybe being from New Mexico, I just recognize space aliens better than the average person.....)

The rocket salad looks a bit - risque.

That Rocket Salad looks like a big penis; John Holmes-ish kind of penis. Good God, food was strange in the 50's.

When I was in 9th grade we had to do projects for my English class, which was studying the medieval era. One of the choices was to research the food of the time and prepare a medieval feast. One wild turkey, two cornish hens en croute, piles of fruit, and horrible table manners later (I had found somewhere that most food was hacked at with knives and eaten out of hand) I found one of two clear paths in my life. The rest, as they say, is HIS STORY.

rwj

The Emperor's New Clothes comes to mind.

I had the very same cookbook...Loved that pear/bunny salad...wonder if I could still find it on my mom's shelves. I think there was also a recipe for drop biscuits that I though was divine...

I was talking the other day about my first big dinner for the family...I was probably about 12. I decided I wanted to make chicken kiev. So I did. Another chef friend of mine recalls the first thing she made, too.

My mom was a good cook but not adventurous...she was always saying something looked to hard to make...then I would make it anyway. I made pumpkin pie from a carving pumpkin while I was in junior high or high school, too. Of course, no one knew from sugar pumpkins or pie pumpkins back then...It was a while before I learned the diff, too, but I plowed through making it...and truth be told, I remember the process a lot more than the final product...

b

One of the choices was to research the food of the time and prepare a medieval feast. One wild turkey, two cornish hens en croute, piles of fruit, and horrible table manners later (I had found somewhere that most food was hacked at with knives and eaten out of hand)

Remnants of this still exist today. I knew an educated fellow who nevertheless had retained some medieval table manners (is that an oxymoron?) - held the fork in the right hand, knife in the left; would lick sauce off the knife; would eat barbecued chicken with this fingers and lick them while having a discussion with you across the table, no sense of embarrassment or impropriety. Fortunately he had a brilliant mind for debating, which made the visual distraction worthwhile ...

For me my mother went to work full time when I was 12. She was a waitress so she worked nights. I asked her who was going to cook and she threw the Betty Crocker cookbook at me. Since, like most 12 years old, I was very fond of my stomach I learned how to make some of the better dishes in the book.

I latter developed a fondness for sweets later on while in the dating stage. A chocolate cake is much better than booze for impressing a lady.

Jim

I was talking the other day about my first big dinner for the family...I was probably about 12. I decided I wanted to make chicken kiev. So I did. Another chef friend of mine recalls the first thing she made, too.

b

The first meal I cooked to impress was Duck a l'orange when I was 15. I had no idea that duck was so fatty (and apparently neither did the adults in my life, since we couldn't really afford duck. I saved for quite a few months to put this meal on the table.) As the thin oil from the duck began to exude, I kept basting it with the "juices", until it was done. I stirred the fat into the rice pilaf to give it flavor. Funny, I don't remember much making the orange sauce. But, I do remember serving the duck with the runny, undercooked rice. Everybody ate it (or so it appeared). My baby sister got very ill (she was only 3) and doesn't go near duck to this day. I've learned a lot since then.

IThe first meal I cooked to impress was Duck a l'orange ...

It was my first Thanksgiving overseas in a dorm. All the Germans had gone home for something or other. Only my expatriot friend, Dan, and I were left in an otherwise deserted student village. We decided to celebrate Thanksgiving. Since there were no turkeys, we bought a duck. Since we didn't have a real oven, we used a toaster oven to prepare the duck. The result? Vulcanized water fowl of which Messrs. Goodyear, Firestone and Bridgestone would have been proud. The moral? Even if it walks like a duck, squawks like a duck, and swims like a duck, it might not taste like duck if not properly prepared.

This is a great question! I can't say I was particularly interested in food as a child, since I was one of those active skinny kids who would much rather be outside playing than in the kitchen. Having to sit down and eat was a form of torture for me. However it was clear from early on that my mother was a wonderful cook. She was trained at an old fashioned "finishing school" in Germany, where I was born, and she knew how to make puff pastry, croissants from scratch, veloute, beef bourguignon and all sorts of exotic things that weren't featured in my grandparents home, where homemade sausage and pork roasts ruled. One thing was certain, no matter whether I was hungry or not, I was expected to be part of the family dinner we had every night, participate in conversation and try to eat my portions, which seemed immensely and unfairly large at the time. I had no interest in cooking when I was a teenager, nor when I was in college. Then, amazingly, as soon as I got married, some sort of innate cooking instinct kicked in and I was immediately ambitious (often overly so, with disastrous results) and became an insatiable reader of cookbooks. My husband and I traveled around the world on a sailboat during the first five years of our marriage, and being exposed to many wonderful cuisines motivated me even more. When I got to Tahiti I wanted to learn how to make that dish I had the first night we were there, Sole Veronique, so delicious. Blanquette de veau soon followed. In Fiji I had to learn how to make Rotis and all sorts of curries, in Indonesia I wanted to learn how to make Nasi Goreng, and so on. In Greece I had to learn how to cook octopus and make souvlaki. In Ethiopia I had to know how to make injeera and wat. Bottom line is I love ethnic foods from all over the world and cook those kinds of foods more often than not. In our house as well as my parents and grandparents, dinner time is sacred. We sit at table and have conversations. No TV, no books allowed. And when I'm sitting there now, with my family and friends, I'm usually thinking of the next meal I'm going to prepare.

What a fabulous culinary journey you've had, Ines. I am totally envious.

would eat barbecued chicken with this fingers and lick them while having a discussion with you across the table, no sense of embarrassment or impropriety.

You mean there's ANOTHER way to eat barbecued chicken?? FWIW, I have often laughed at non-Southerners who would use a knife and fork to eat Southern fried chicken. Come on, people, that is a food that is made for fingers, leave the silverware for beefsteaks and such. Same goes for barbecue chicken, ribs, etc.

[Jenise]

Paul said:

would eat barbecued chicken with this fingers and lick them while having a discussion with you across the table, no sense of embarrassment or impropriety.

Paul, licking one's fingers at table is never a good idea, but most US Americans consider it both normal and natural to eat barbecued chicken (or fried, as Robert pointed out) and ribs with their hands. It is not improper except in white tablecloth situations, but there I would consider it an impropriety on the part of the host to serve the kind of meats that do not lend themselves well to eating with a knife and fork. I realize that none of that's kosher in Euroopean circles, but it's definitely true here, and in fact I might suggest we enjoy it all the more for this barbaric (to you) style of dining, for holding the meat under our noses increases the amount of aroma we enjoy before taking each bite--much like sniffing wine before sipping.

[Robin Garr]

I realize that none of that's kosher in European circles

I'm not even sure I buy that! I have a vivid (and delightful) memory of a bunch of executive-type Portuguese guys in very fancy suits (and me) tucking into a hands-on seafood dinner of that raw bar style that they do so well in Portugal, slurping up crab legs and langoustines in the shell and tiny barnacles, all goodies that can only be eaten from the shell, juices running down your arms.

The Armani jackets came off in a hurry, but the feasting went on.

and in fact I might suggest we enjoy it all the more for this barbaric (to you) style of dining,

Not barbaric ... if one uses a napkin! I just think that having fingers orange with barbecue sauce and licking them one by one while looking your tablemate in the eye is a bit much.

[Jenise]

I just think that having fingers orange with barbecue sauce and licking them one by one while looking your tablemate in the eye is a bit much.

Actually, it could be quite sexy. But that's another topic.

Tom Jones?

[Jenise]

Absolutely.

Actually, it could be quite sexy. But that's another topic.

Now that never entered into my imagination ...

Keep in mind that it might not be so, if said tablemate is engaged in a fierce intellectual debate, eyes aflame while arguing their point, and all you see is sauce-laden fingers and a manic look across the table I guess I forgot to add that part at the beginning ...

My mother was a great cook and baker, but I never did much while growing up. After I got out of the military I moved into an appartment for a few years while working nights and going to school days. I think I lived on Kraft Mac & Cheese, hot dogs and eggs, along with whatever I obtained from vending machines. After getting married, I somehow took over cooking the meat, while my wife did everything else. When we got "The Hows and Whys of French Cooking" by Alma Lach, that changed and I learned to make French bread, Coq au Vin, cream of asparagas soup, etc. My mother and mother-in-law each gave me several of their recipes, such as baked beans and potato salad. I think the best things I do are soups.

I think the best things I do are soups.

Howie, I can certainly vouch for the fact that Beans 'n Greens is a legendary soup! It always tastes fantastic.