stevenpiziks (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
stevenpiziks) wrote2010-12-27 12:14 am
stevenpiziks) wrote2010-12-27 12:14 am
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Cooking: An Affirmation Through Diane Davidson and Julia Child
I have a confession. For years I've been hiding my inner chef.
Cooking was something I . . . not quite shied away from, but it was something I just did. I wasn't supposed to enjoy it much, so I didn't. My mother worked full time and was also the full time cook in our house, and I don't think she really enjoyed cooking. It was just something that needed to be done. Occasionally cooking might be fun, but mostly it was a chore, like vacuuming or laundry or grocery shopping. My grandmother actively disliked cooking. I don't ever remember her making treats in the kitchen for her grandkids. (She did many other neat grandma things, I hasten to add, but cooking wasn't on the list. I think if she'd been born in more modern times she would have been a doctor and happily hired a housekeeper.)
This dislike of cooking is, I think, part of modern American thinking. Women have been trapped in the kitchen for centuries, chained to the stove, and they've always hated it. Fortunately, the modern era has freed them from slavery. Convenience foods, pre-cooked meals, the frozen section, delivery, and take-out have wiped away the dreadful drudgery. Cooking shows emphasize meals in twenty minutes or less. Slap that food on a plate and get the hell away from your stove because, man, everyone hates cooking! I sucked up this line of thought like a baby sucking up milk.
Anyway, when I left home, I made the same sort of food I'd grown up eating. Cooking was something I alternated with Kala on, and it was something that had to be done at the end of a day's work, and it needed to be done with minimal fuss.
Then, a few years ago, I came across Diane Davidson's books. Her Goldy Schultz mystery novels caught me off-guard. The premise is genius--a caterer who solves mysteries. The mysteries weren't all that memorable, but other parts . . .
Goldy, of course, loves cooking and loves food. Davidson sprinkles high-end recipes throughout the books, and these recipes figure into the plot. Goldy usually cooks to settle herself or make herself think. I could identify. I can't think on my own. I need to be doing something.
For the hell of it, I tried some of her recipes. And since many of the techniques were new to me, I followed them exactly. (I knew from experience that when you try a recipe for the first time, you do what the recipe says, letter for letter, and you don't substitute ingredients.) It turned out fun! The results were way cool, and I found I liked doing more in the kitchen than slap something together. The key was that I had to be making stuff I really liked.
Or something that was challenging.
See, I'm a person who needs challenge. If I don't have challenges, I create them. My teaching was going stagnant, so I created the media literacy class as a challenge. Years later, things were stagnating again, so I volunteered to teach the new English 12 class. I wrote a series of science fiction novels, and then a bunch of media novels, and now I'm writing steampunk. Next on my list: screenplays. See?
In the kitchen, things were always dull. The regular cookies, breads, one-skillet dinners, snore snore snore. And the cookbooks on my shelf were all written for newbies, beginners with no experience or real interest in the kitchen. No wonder I didn't like to cook.
Ah, but it can be fun again! Davidson's books showed me a protagonist (and, by extension, an author) who created new recipes to challenge herself, and ones that challenged me. See, I'm not a beginner anymore, and I've outgrown my boring old cookbooks. Rachel Rae became my arch nemesis. I started my own collection of recipes snagged here and there, mostly on-line, sometimes from friends or blogs.
Then I came across Julia Child and her big blue cookbook. Ah ha! Here was what I needed. Her book assumes that, yes, you have some talent and/or interest in cooking and yes, you do know your way around a kitchen, but you don't know much about advanced cooking. It's advanced cooking for beginners! Yes!
And her introduction makes a wonderful point--cooking is fucking awesome! The process is as much fun--perhaps better than--the results. You are allowed to enjoy it. It doesn't have to be a chore. You can say, "Yay! I get to cook dinner!"
Sure, some days you're just damn tired and can't face anything more complicated than hamburgers. But why should those days be the exception rather than the rule?
I saying here and now: I love to cook. I love finding new recipes. I love to watch raw ingredients move under my chef's knife and change into a delicious meal.
So now I'm going to become friends in spirit with Julia Child and see where she leads me. New challenges and fantastic food await!
Cooking was something I . . . not quite shied away from, but it was something I just did. I wasn't supposed to enjoy it much, so I didn't. My mother worked full time and was also the full time cook in our house, and I don't think she really enjoyed cooking. It was just something that needed to be done. Occasionally cooking might be fun, but mostly it was a chore, like vacuuming or laundry or grocery shopping. My grandmother actively disliked cooking. I don't ever remember her making treats in the kitchen for her grandkids. (She did many other neat grandma things, I hasten to add, but cooking wasn't on the list. I think if she'd been born in more modern times she would have been a doctor and happily hired a housekeeper.)
This dislike of cooking is, I think, part of modern American thinking. Women have been trapped in the kitchen for centuries, chained to the stove, and they've always hated it. Fortunately, the modern era has freed them from slavery. Convenience foods, pre-cooked meals, the frozen section, delivery, and take-out have wiped away the dreadful drudgery. Cooking shows emphasize meals in twenty minutes or less. Slap that food on a plate and get the hell away from your stove because, man, everyone hates cooking! I sucked up this line of thought like a baby sucking up milk.
Anyway, when I left home, I made the same sort of food I'd grown up eating. Cooking was something I alternated with Kala on, and it was something that had to be done at the end of a day's work, and it needed to be done with minimal fuss.
Then, a few years ago, I came across Diane Davidson's books. Her Goldy Schultz mystery novels caught me off-guard. The premise is genius--a caterer who solves mysteries. The mysteries weren't all that memorable, but other parts . . .
Goldy, of course, loves cooking and loves food. Davidson sprinkles high-end recipes throughout the books, and these recipes figure into the plot. Goldy usually cooks to settle herself or make herself think. I could identify. I can't think on my own. I need to be doing something.
For the hell of it, I tried some of her recipes. And since many of the techniques were new to me, I followed them exactly. (I knew from experience that when you try a recipe for the first time, you do what the recipe says, letter for letter, and you don't substitute ingredients.) It turned out fun! The results were way cool, and I found I liked doing more in the kitchen than slap something together. The key was that I had to be making stuff I really liked.
Or something that was challenging.
See, I'm a person who needs challenge. If I don't have challenges, I create them. My teaching was going stagnant, so I created the media literacy class as a challenge. Years later, things were stagnating again, so I volunteered to teach the new English 12 class. I wrote a series of science fiction novels, and then a bunch of media novels, and now I'm writing steampunk. Next on my list: screenplays. See?
In the kitchen, things were always dull. The regular cookies, breads, one-skillet dinners, snore snore snore. And the cookbooks on my shelf were all written for newbies, beginners with no experience or real interest in the kitchen. No wonder I didn't like to cook.
Ah, but it can be fun again! Davidson's books showed me a protagonist (and, by extension, an author) who created new recipes to challenge herself, and ones that challenged me. See, I'm not a beginner anymore, and I've outgrown my boring old cookbooks. Rachel Rae became my arch nemesis. I started my own collection of recipes snagged here and there, mostly on-line, sometimes from friends or blogs.
Then I came across Julia Child and her big blue cookbook. Ah ha! Here was what I needed. Her book assumes that, yes, you have some talent and/or interest in cooking and yes, you do know your way around a kitchen, but you don't know much about advanced cooking. It's advanced cooking for beginners! Yes!
And her introduction makes a wonderful point--cooking is fucking awesome! The process is as much fun--perhaps better than--the results. You are allowed to enjoy it. It doesn't have to be a chore. You can say, "Yay! I get to cook dinner!"
Sure, some days you're just damn tired and can't face anything more complicated than hamburgers. But why should those days be the exception rather than the rule?
I saying here and now: I love to cook. I love finding new recipes. I love to watch raw ingredients move under my chef's knife and change into a delicious meal.
So now I'm going to become friends in spirit with Julia Child and see where she leads me. New challenges and fantastic food await!