Kitchen School
The Oregonian
April 27, 2004
It took one final round of "What's for dinner? That again?" and the idea hit: I was finished planning and cooking every night. I gathered my loved ones and broke the news. "The gig is up. I am no longer chief cook around here."
Planning a weekly menu and grocery list for a family of seven -- two adults and five kids ages 4 to 19 -- is an Olympic feat. Toss in everyone's food issues (one's mostly vegetarian, one's lactose intolerant, two don't eat fish, two want only beige food) and you have a gold-medal challenge.
It was time to build character and learn tasks.
I explained that everyone (over age 4) would take one night a week, plan the menu and shopping list. They could either cook with me or on their own. They may not cook the same thing every week. We would not eat pasta every night.
Everyone's food issues would be addressed. Those were the rules.
To my surprise, they replied "Cool!" My husband came fully equipped for the job. What the rest lacked in experience, they made up for with enthusiasm.
Lee, the 8-year-old, was the most eager. He chose Monday night and announced a menu of pizza from Flying Pie and buttered noodles. Clearly, we needed to cover some issues, namely balancing a menu and managing his time. We also needed to make an addendum to the rules: Takeout food does not equal cooking.
"Sorry, buddy, but you actually have to help cook on your night and offer a well-balanced meal. Your menu constitutes a major carbo-load. Plus, you have tae kwon do on Mondays until 6. If you start cooking that late, we'll be eating dinner past your bedtime."
"Uh, Mom, what's a carbo-load?" he asked.
I explained, and we talked about protein-based foods, which I encouraged him to make the focal point of his menu. I further defined dinner as at least three things on the plate, such as a protein, and a couple of side dishes, such as veggies and a salad.
"How about lobster? We haven't had that since I was a little kid," he said. Note to self: must also cover food budgeting.
After a brief period of reflection, he returned with a rather well-balanced menu: homemade pizza, carrot sticks and apple slices. I suggested a simple salad, just to accommodate the grown-ups, which led to heavy negotiations about pizza toppings. Eventually, we agreed there would be no "yucky stuff" such as olives or onions, but sauce is OK. We struck a deal and moved on to the grocery list.
Since his writing skills are still developing, I agreed to help. We discussed ingredients, what to make from scratch and what was worth buying pre-made. We touched on the subject of food budgets, but he still thinks a buck is big money. I figured my financial lesson could wait until he has graduated from a piggy bank to a wallet.
Lua, my 19-year-old niece, was next. She's lived with us long enough to appreciate the task and be suitably horrified. Her previous cooking experience included Top Ramen, bag-o-salad and the occasional foray into the land of baked goods.
She'd expressed a mild interest in learning to cook, mainly by keeping me company in the kitchen. However, she came to us with an interesting culinary history. She's of Persian-American descent, was born in Venezuela, and spent two years living in China during her formative cooking phase. She's a dedicated lactose-intolerant vegetarian. How's that for a resume?
She expressed no small amount of hesitation.There are a lot of us and she was intimidated. Once she got her arms around the idea, she embraced it with the enthusiasm and idealism of a college student. No horizon too broad, no task too daunting.
"OK," she said, "I'm cooking ghormeh sabzi and Persian rice with potato tah-dig."
She described the ghormeh sabzi as a Persian stew made of spinach, leeks, cilantro, parsley, onions and kidney beans cooked with lime juice, dill and fennel. Although typically made with meat, Lua's version would be vegetarian. The dish is traditionally accompanied by tah-dig: fluffy, buttery rice with crispy potatoes cooked on the bottom. She'd never made it, though she'd sampled it in Persian homes many times. I would love it, but pointed out that it would be about as appetizing as a bag of worms to 4-year-old Olivia and her brother, Lee.
"They'll like the rice. They can eat that," Lua offered. She then offered scrambled eggs as an alternative main course and I agreed that would be perfect. Next step: the grocery list, a challenge since she didn't have a recipe. I reminded her that a major part of the job was coming up with a comprehensive list of ingredients.
"I guess I could Google the recipe or call my Persian aunties," she suggested. I reminded her of the three-things-on-the-plate rule and after only a little whining she buckled down. She sent Google searching for gormeh sabzi. She called the aunties, confirmed the recipes, translated them from Farsi, adapted them to suit her vegetarianism and made a complete grocery list, including saffron.
I complimented the magnificent job she'd done, but pointed out a couple of glitches. I could gain 5 pounds just watching the rice dish arrive at the table. I suggested serving whole-wheat pita bread, an alternative choice for those more challenged around the middle. This apparently was an insult to tradition (I could hear the aunties shrieking), but she finally caved in.
Next was the saffron, which was about $18 a bottle. I asked her to research where we could purchase it cheaper. Otherwise, she'd have to do what all great cooks do when they can't afford something: eliminate or substitute. Clearly, I had to remain the primary shopper. If they got hold of my wallet, we'd be broke.
Next up was Camille, the 14-year-old and a kid with solid talent in the kitchen. She has the gift of intuitively knowing what foods work together, and no fear of experimentation. She can also re-create restaurant dishes from memory. On a busy night in the kitchen, this is the girl I turn to. She didn't even blink about cooking for our crowd.
"I'm making cheese ravioli with browned herb-garlic butter and toasted almonds. I'll serve it with Caesar salad, steamed broccoli and garlic bread, with plain noodles for those who don't want cheese. Since no one else put pasta on the menu, I'm claiming pasta rights."
You have to respect that kind of authority. No questions asked, she wrote down her ingredients and didn't miss a thing. No $18 price tags, nothing difficult to find and no whining. With this kind of competence, she just might find herself brandishing my debit card at the market.
Lauren is 16 and not terribly interested in kitchen duty. She's the most adventurous diner and quite happy with whatever is put before her. Ask what she'd like to eat tonight and you'll get a solid, "Oh, whatever is fine." That kind of flexibility is annoying.
"Nope, 'whatever' is not fine," I said. "Remember the rules."
"Yeah, yeah, I know," she said, "you're not planning it, everybody's food stuff, and no pasta every night. I got it." She's good at following rules. She took her time thinking it through and finally came back with "cheese or black bean and corn enchiladas, refried beans and salad served with tortillas." I decided not to point out that double beans could mean trouble in paradise.
Once again, we hit a stumbling block on the grocery list. She wanted to make enchilada sauce "just like mine" so I agreed to list the ingredients and teach her the recipe. To my delight, she wanted to cook with me. Did I mention she's 16? How often does that happen? I grabbed the opportunity to spend kitchen time with her. There's no faster way to a mother's heart than requesting the secrets to her special sauce.
Phase II of chef's training: buying groceries. Shopping at this magnitude requires years of training, finesse and a pile of coupons. I decided to tackle this by marketing with one child at a time, guiding each through the process of checking prices, ingredients and sale items.
With the exception of the 8-year-old, the kids were impressed by how much food costs. The difference coupons had an even bigger impact. "Whatever will you do with the money you saved?" one quipped sarcastically.
Once in the kitchen, chef school offered varying lesson plans. Lee needed the basics, such as the importance of keeping your fingers away from the knife blade. Measuring spoons are also tricky when a child has only recently learned fractions. We also had to tackle some universal concepts: The rolling pin is not a samurai sword, nor is it OK to coat it in flour and roll it on the kitchen floor, no matter how intriguing a design it makes.
What he taught me is that the joy of creating a salad is more important than the actual size of the carrots and lettuce -- even when cut too big to accommodate most mouths.
Lua made Vegetarian Gormeh Sabzi several times before perfecting it. In keeping with tradition, she initially hand-chopped all the herbs and vegetables. We ate dinner quite late, but the food was absolutely delicious. She agreed to use the food processor next time and, aunties or no aunties, hasn't looked back. She still has a hard time with the three-things-on-a-plate concept, figuring that one great dish, served with excellent rice, is good enough.
You know what? She's probably right.
Camille didn't require any help at all turning out a restaurant-quality meal. The only lesson she needed was one no one wants to learn: Clean as you go. The kitchen was a wreck and though generally if you cook, you don't do dishes, we made an exception for her. She improved the next time, using only every other pan and bowl. She taught me the importance of respecting confidence, no matter how big a mess gets made.
Lauren made the sweetest meal. She cooked with me, jotting down measurements, asking pertinent questions about technique and timing. Despite the rule about not cooking the same thing every week, she re-created the enchilada menu a couple of times until she had it down. She now has total enchilada confidence and is learning the exact construction of my marinara sauce. I learned that no matter how old children get, there's very little that warms the heart more than holding their hand while they learn something new.
We're several months into the new routine now and it's getting smoother. Once a week the kids fill in a menu chart. They choose the weeknight that best suits their schedule and write down their selections. The flip side has space for grocery lists and more space to sign up for dish duty.
They often team up for cooking and cleaning -- one taking the role of chief cook and the other the kitchen slave. Each has learned to cook a number of good, affordable, healthy dinners that meet everyone's quirks. Occasionally I wear the chef hat all weeklong. When there are final exams, major projects, social and sporting events, I'll cut them slack. This buys me major points.
Most weeks though, the system works. The biggest lesson learned was mine. When you delegate a task, you have to accept the results. The nice surprise is that the results were awesome.
Now I act as consultant and spend more time reading and chatting while dinner is prepared. The kids have a greater appreciation for what goes into feeding this family, and they actually kind of like cooking -- a win-win situation. Class dismissed.
Jeanne Faulkner is a Portland freelance writer.