Cooking with Julia

Like so many others, I have spent a great deal of time the last three months cooking at home. I think I’ve cooked more dinners in the last three months than in the last 20 years. As a public school teacher, I was probably putting in about 60 hours a week working, so I never felt inclined to stand on my feet another couple of hours cooking and cleaning up. My other half did nearly all the cooking for the last 30 years.

However, that has all changed. I fell in love with cooking after falling in love with eating on a trip to France in 2015. Naturally, any American who wants to learn to cook French cuisine is going to turn to Julia Child.

All I knew of Child was from the film “Julie and Julia,” so not much. I received “Mastering the Art of French Cooking” for Christmas that year. Child and her co-authors wrote the cookbook specifically for American home cooks who know nothing about French cooking. However, it is not for kitchen novices. Most of the recipes have many ingredients and many steps.

For instance, coq au vin (one of my favorite dishes) requires 16 ingredients and 11 steps, including pouring in cognac, “averting your face,” and igniting it. Very intimidating.

The next year I received “Julia’s Kitchen Wisdom,” which has become my cookbook of choice. This is the one I consult first when planning a menu or looking for a particular recipe. In a mere 135 pages, this book offers a full range of recipes from soup to dessert.

In the introduction, Child explains that this book began as her “loose-leaf kitchen reference…corrected as I’ve cooked my way through the years,” emphasizing technique. It doesn’t replace the gargantuan detailed, all-purpose cookbook like “Mastering.” Rather, it is a “mini aide-memoire for general home cookery.”

Because it is such a thin volume, the information is very dense. Child presents instructions for steaming, boiling, and sautéing vegetables in a series of charts. As in “Mastering,” recipes are grouped with the master recipe listed first, and then the variations.

Happily, many of the recipes are simplified. Coq au vin and beef bourguignon are grouped together because they are essentially the same recipe with different proteins. The recipe is shorter with slightly fewer ingredients than the ones in “Mastering.” And the coq au vin/beef bourguignon recipe doesn’t require igniting anything.

Another Child cookbook that I love looks like a coffee table book: it’s huge, thick, has glossy pages and stunning photography. However, don’t be fooled. The recipes and techniques in “Julia and Jacques Cooking at Home” produce delicious dishes.

Child collaborated for decades with Jacques Pepin. Reading the recipes and the commentary from each chef, one can easily imagine these two good friends in a kitchen, cooking and laughing (and drinking wine).

Many recipes are presented side by side, with Julia’s version and commentary on the left page and Jacques’ on the right page. And this is the book for both the serious, experienced cook and the beginner. The authors fill 11 pages just on artichokes, but also provide several sections on technique, including photos for each step.

Each chef provides a great deal of commentary on each section and each recipe. Julia prefers white pepper and Jacques prefers black, and they both prefer kosher salt because it is easier to pick up with the fingers. The size and weight of the book notwithstanding, this is an excellent book to curl up with and read in addition to being a useful tool in the kitchen.

With so much time these last months, I’ve been able to explore new recipes that have been successful enough that my other half takes seconds or requests a particular dish. I haven’t dined in a restaurant since March, but we have been eating well. And that helps make staying at home bearable.