Spies like us

It’s funny how sometimes you are reminded of something that you haven’t thought about in forever, and then all of a sudden, it’s at the forefront of your mind again. I feel this way about Julia Child. As a little one I would catch snippets of her show on WGBH. I was not watching it per se, but rather enduring it while I waited for Sesame Street or Zoom to be aired. I couldn’t recount one recipe she made, as those details certainly were not germane at the time, but in my mind I can hear her distinctive voice. I remember her being impossibly tall, and that she always wore a skirt and a collared shirt with some kind of beaded necklace. But beyond that, I’ve got nothing.

I had not given her a thought in close to 30 years when my friend gave me the book, “Julia Child: My life in France”. This was a most appropriate gift because at the time a vacation to France was on the horizon, and I like to cook. The book was thoroughly enjoyable, as Julia Child was an incredibly likable character. I suppose her likability would have made her an adept spy, if indeed she was, since no one would suspect this towering, boisterous, American woman to be undercover. I found myself envying her gypsy spirit and irrepressible joie de vivre. The woman had an intimate understanding of what is important in life and worshipped the Holy Trinity: good food, good wine, and good company.

When I say that I like to cook, don’t be misled into believing my cooking prowess can rival that of Mrs. Child, the great. What I do is probably more accurately described as puttering. I treat the kitchen as a laboratory, using it to provide some kind of creative experimental release that one cannot get from being a desk jockey-scientist. I make very simple yet healthy fare, but I do spend a great deal of my time thinking about the texture of food and how specific flavors will complement one another to create a sublime-yet simple and healthy-gastronomic experience. Unfortunately, my creations often fall quite short of sublime, primarily because I don’t use butter. Of course, this means I will never master French cuisine, as butter is the hallmark of French cooking. Pardonnez moi, mais je ne peux pas! I just cannot let go and free myself, even in the midst of all the banging and clanging, and spilling things on the floor, and adding a bit of this and a dash of that. Despite my reluctance to let butter in, my experiments have resulted in the creation of some surprisingly good concoctions. I have the excel spreadsheets to prove it. Yes, there is both rhyme and reason here; a method to my madness, if you will. Ingredients cannot just be tweaked haphazardly and at random. We must be systematic, my friends.

First, we start with a hypothesis. For instance, I hypothesized that brownies do not need to be full of fat and sugar to be tasty. In fact, they can be nutritious and appropriate for a pre- or post-workout snack. The methods for testing this hypothesis included assembling several recipes for brownies and merging them. With a compilation of ingredients at hand (and listed neatly in the “version 1” column of the “brownies” worksheet of the “test kitchen” excel file), testing began. One batch was made. The results were tasted, and observations about its texture were made and recorded in the “notes” section: Was it cakey? Fudgey? Too dry? Undercooked? Next, the chocolate-y-ness was assessed. Then, given those factors, the nutritional bang for the buck was assessed: Was the protein content per brownie sufficient? Was the fat and/or sugar content low enough? After careful thought, slight modifications were made to adjust one factor at a time, over successive versions. Finally, version 10 struck pay dirt, and voila! We now have a recipe for a wheat-free, dairy-free, low-fat, low-sugar, high-protein brownie that is not only tasty, but nutritious and appropriate for a pre- or post-workout snack.

Julia Child spent a significant amount of time adjusting recipes. She described in excruciating detail preparatory techniques specific to the French chef, even going so far as to illustrate them for her books. While my approach certainly is not identical, I feel a kindred spirit with her, in a sense. Sans butter, of course. I can’t wait for my television show! I imagine it will focus on simple everyday recipes that use whole foods, but rather than emulating cooking with Julia precisely, it will be more of a cross between the Muppets’ Swedish chef and Dr. Bunsen Honeydew: I will wear a lab coat instead of an apron, and I will toss many foodstuffs over my shoulder while babbling incoherently. In sum, it will be excellent. WGBH, here I come!