Why I Cook - Geneva and Julia

I cook. I do not call myself "chef" because the only people, in my opinion who have earned that honor are those who have been the "chief" (en Français = chef) of a kitchen, in the French brigade tradition. I have not. There are many I know who also have not, but have no problem wearing the term "chef" loudly and proudly, anyway. But that's not me. I'm a cook. I have not earned the "chef" moniker.

Two women most influenced my decision to cook - Helen Geneva Wright Thomas and Julia Carolyn McWilliams Child. The former was my paternal grandmother, and the latter, the most famous chef in the world.

When I was a teenager, we kids would be shipped off to "the farm" with Geneva and Ray Thomas - my grandmother and her husband. The farm was really a house in a remote area of St. Clair County, Missouri, a few miles east of Lowry City. There was a barn, a small lake, a huge garden and woods. It was adjacent to the south of my great aunt & uncle, Faye & Roy Vinyard's dairy farm.

I learned to garden, to cook, to smoke meats and to can foods from my grandmother, Geneva. Mostly because I prefered her company to her crusty, grumpy old Marine husband, Ray. He was cantankerous and surly. She was joyous and kind. She had a record player on an old wooden chair in the corner of the kitchen. She didn't cook without a stack of records on the record player. From big band jazz to old time country, her music was the sound track of my earliest memories in the kitchen. And to this day, I can't cook without music.

Then came Julia. I was a newbie cook, playing around with recipes in my 20's, in the 1980's when I discovered a public television show called "The French Chef", starring a 6'2", lumbering woman with a raspy voice, who defined what I had learned, and put wheels under it.  I learned later that she was the wife of a spy, and all kinds of other amazing things that made her my hero. But at that time, I only knew that she mesmerized me. She wasn't afraid to screw up. She took everything in stride. She made cooking look fun, and yet stressed discipline and structure. She taught me the importance of mis en place. She taught me the value of knife skills. She was the most remarkable, enthusiastic and intelligent person I'd ever seen work a stove. She inspired me to take what I had learned at my grandmother's apron, and improve it - push it - learn more, do more.

So today I cook. Some say pretty well. But I would have never cooked without the inspiration, knowledge and enthusiasm of two brilliant women - Geneva and Julia. I will be forever in the debt of you both - may you both rest in peace.
DD