I was a reluctant cook in my mother’s kitchen. Why should I learn to cook? My mom did a fine job. She turned out three square meals a day, with dinner set aside as a special time. The four of us, my mom, dad, brother and I, always ate dinner together. The TV was turned off. I set the table. Homework was put away. And we recounted our days over delicious meat-and-potatoes meals—pot roast, pork chops, meatloaf, sloppy joes. Usually mom had a dessert too—a homemade pie or, my favorite, butterscotch pudding from a box. The closest I got to regular cooking was occasionally helping Mom peel carrots or clean strawberries. I remember standing at the sink, peeler in hand, feeling, even then, that cooking could be satisfying. There was something rewarding about taking a carrot and—swoosh—peeling off the rough outer layer to create a smooth surface. The repetitious action of each pass over the carrot filled up the sink with curly orange strips and my mind would wander. But then I’d finish and I’d be off again, more interested in playing with my dog or shooting hoops with my little brother.
No doubt women’s lib explained in part why I didn’t embrace cooking. Growing up in the 70s I absorbed the messages from TV shows and popular culture that women didn’t need to slave away in the kitchen. They could have careers and full lives away from the home. My favorite show, The Brady Bunch, featured a mom who didn’t seem to cook much. The family had a housekeeper, Alice, who seemed to do most of the cooking. I’m not sure what Carol Brady did with her time, but it wasn’t cooking.
There was one exception to my cooking aversion and that was “special” foods. I got excited each February when my grandmother came to visit from South Dakota. Grandma made the best donuts and we bought all the ingredients before she arrived. The day she came we wouldn’t even let her put her suitcase away before coming to the kitchen and making donuts. My brother, Mom, Grandma and I worked on various stations. One would roll out the dough and use a special donut cutter to form the donut shapes. Another one of us would drop the cut-out dough into hot oil and gently turn the cooking donuts as they sizzled away. (It’s a wonder that none of us got seriously burned.) When the donuts had finished cooking they were placed on a paper towel to absorb the grease and one of us would dip the donuts in sugar before putting them in a huge Tupperware container. We ate as we worked and felt a bit sick by the end. But it was one of my favorite days of the year.
Another “special” food we made was blackberry jam. Each August Mom would monitor the blackberry bushes growing wild along the town bike path. When the berries had turned from red to black it was time to pick. We would head out to the path with a stepladder, bags and a few of Dad’s old dress shirts to protect us from the thorns. Picking those berries felt like mining for gold. We dropped the berries in our bags and some were so soft they oozed juice down our sleeves. We came home with our bags bulging and Mom’s equipment for cooking and jarring the berries all laid out. Like the donuts, we had our stations. For months afterwards we enjoyed blackberry jam on toast and blackberry jam on ice cream. I felt proud to have been on the “team.” I’m thankful Mom kept those traditions alive.
As it turns out, you can’t survive on donuts and jam alone. My husband and I got married young and neither of us had done much cooking. We ate poorly the first few years—lots of frozen pizzas, ramen and hot dogs. It took me time to finally learn to cook. We were both working and going to school, and I could see that my husband wasn’t interested in cooking. If I wanted to eat well, it would be up to me. Somehow my old women’s lib beliefs just evaporated. In fact, they not only evaporated but I felt drawn to cooking. On my breaks at work I would read recipes in the newspaper.
I still remember a few cooking mishaps in those early years. There was the time I invited an old friend and her husband to our house for dinner. I decided to make one of my mom’s favorite hors’doevres—a strip of white bread dabbed with cream of mushroom soup and then rolled up, with a piece of bacon around it. I’m still not sure what I did wrong, but the top of the bread burned and the dripping bacon fat smoked up the oven so that when I opened it, the whole room filled with smoke. Since the kitchen and living room were the same room, we couldn’t get away from the smoke. I decided never to make that recipe again.
Another time early in our marriage my husband and I invited my parents to come over for dinner. I decided to make chicken lasagna. I had never made lasagna before. I had no idea that it took so long. My mom was a skilled entertainer and always seemed to have things under control when guests came. She was able to finish her cooking and also engage with her guests. With the lasagna I was stuck in the kitchen, a tiny room not connected to the main room in our small cottage. I felt like a failure, spending what seemed like hours trying to finish the lasagna. I learned never to try a new recipe on guests—and subsequently when I’ve invited guests for lasagna (which I premake), all turns out successfully.
In the ensuing years, while raising two now-grown sons, I’ve become a much better cook. I have my standard rotation, which includes recipes for food I didn’t know about growing up—like red lentil ragout with roasted carrots, shakshuka, and chickpea curry with coconut and turmeric. Plus, I have some special dishes like paella. As it turns out I get a lot of satisfaction out of cooking and I also enjoy the sense of calm it often creates, the same calm I once sensed as a girl peeling carrots. Each time I try a new recipe and the family likes it, I am encouraged and believe just a little bit more, that I know how to cook. And yes, I still make donuts with my mom and whoever else is around once a year and it is magical.
