Tag

Kim SOMETHING TO SAY tagged me with the MEME, The cook next door so I invite you to answer these questions if you read this and go to the cook next door!
I am tagging this food blog I found a while back
undiscussablerealms

What is your first memory of baking/cooking on your own?

Truth be told, I was about 4. We had two kitchens in the house where I lived in PA. I lived with my Mother, Aunt and Grandparents and brother, and all my relatives lived with a few block radius. My cousin Karen was over to play, and she and I concocted dressing, I guess. I must have seen it being prepared in by Grandma. We mixed bread crumbs, with eggs, milk and lots of garlic powder, and baked it in the oven. It smelled to high heaven, most horrible smell I ever met, and Karen still remembers it, too! Some smells never go away!

Who had the most influence on your cooking?

That would be difficult to say one person, It was grandma who introduced me to all kinds of foods, and baked a lot. She never force fed, and had a technique that really worked to get us to try foods without any forcing. We could always eat bread and jelly rather than our meal, couldn’t complain about food, and were given a spot of everything to eat, and if we ate it all, we could have more of what we loved (Mac & cheese, homemade of course). As a result I learned to try everything. We had a farm in West VA, and I ate everything the people in the hills there ate, including boiled chicken feet and hogs head porridge (on pancakes, yum!)
My stepfather was a great cook, and I learned a lot from him and then there was Billye Currid my friend from Mitsubishi when I did aircraft interiors. She was a great baker.
Last of all, The Gourmet cook book taught me the most. I planned meals and bought al I needed for those meals, I learned about seasonings that way. I always had everything I needed to make up whatever I wanted to make, and not a lot of stuff sitting around in cupboards. I followed their instructions to make elegant aftermaths instead of leftovers.

Do you have an old photo as “evidence” of an early exposure to the culinary world and would you like to share it?
Well I don’t have that photo, and I am glad I don’t. The one I am thinking of, I was a young wife, and I made a Boston cream Pie, I doubled the recipe, and made a mess. My husband photographed me holding the spatula above a crumbling cake and titled it, “Winner of the VA, Beach baking contest”

Mageiricophobia - do you suffer from any cooking phobia, a dish that makes your palms sweat?
That would be cutting up liver, I just can’t eat liver I cook!


What would be your most valued or used kitchen gadgets and/or what was the biggest letdown?
My kitchen Aid with all it’s attachments (wheat grinder) is best… And Cuisinart. And I agree with Dianne about the bread machine as a let down.

Name some funny or weird food combinations/dishes you really like - and probably no one else!
Hogs head porridge on pancakes!

What are the three eatables or dishes you simply don’t want to live without?
Good bread, good bread and good bread!