Cooking influence and style

[LindaZ]

I come from a Polish/Irish background and grew up watching my father and grandmothers cook, all from scratch. I lean mostly on the Polish side of cooking, but I've adapted my own ideas into recipies, and changed ingredients in establishe recipies to turn out some pretty decent stuff. We now live in the South and so I'm very much into Southern cooking. Two things I can't seem to master are biscuits and bread. Thank goodness for Grands and a bread machine!

 

[spork]

Like my mom, I, too married a military man and have had great experiences with other people who are well-traveled and love to experiment.

Claire, I have two cookbooks handed down from my mother, dated early 70's. Each about 200 pages with about 4 recipes on each page. Each recipe is credited with a name and station around the US & world. The descriptive tagline on their cover reads, "Favorite Recipes from Military Officers' Wives."

 

[jusnikki]

Definitely not my mother (I hate to COOK) nor my paternal grandmother...memories of her stringy potroast and overcooked vegetables makes me avoid potroast at all costs. My maternal grandmother was a very good cook. She taught me the basics like bread, pie crusts, and lefse. Things every good descendent of Swedish and Norwegian ancestors should know. I loved to cook from an early age. As a teen, I earned my ski pass by baking 4 dozen cinnamon rolls Friday and Saturday nights to sell at the local ski area. I don't like using canned or boxed anything. So, I make almost everything from scratch. If I want to eat it, I have to figure out how to make it. Of course, having over 1000 cook books in my culinary library doesn't hurt.

1000 cookbooks??? If I only had the space........lol.

 

[Steve Kroll]

I can't say my cooking style came from my mother. I began cooking for my 4 siblings and my family when I was 8-years-old, so I suppose I developed my own style as I went along. It was a matter of necessity and my mother was rarely present in the kitchen.

My story is much like Katie's. Though I loved my mother dearly, she was not the best cook in the world. Even she would admit it. She also worked late most nights at her job and usually didn't get home until after 6:00 PM. So by the time she got home, it was more convenient to open a can or throw a frozen pizza or TV dinner in the oven than to make something from scratch.

I don't recall exactly when I started cooking, but as my mom told it, when I was about 10 I saw a cook on television (more than likely Julia Child) make a cheese souffle, and asked mom if I could try to do that. So she pulled out her unused copy of "Joy of Cooking" and gave it to me. I never did make the souffle, but I did learn to make a number of other recipes in that book.

By the time I was about 12, my brother and I were doing most of the cooking around the house.

So in a way, my mother was my influence... just not as a cook herself.

As for my own style, I think it might be best described these days as "healthy eclectic." I try to incorporate a lot of things I've learned from many different sources.

 

[CWS4322]

I'm the cook in my family, self taught from my first cookbook and my Mother's BH&G. We had a very limited budget when I was little and no imagination from my parents. I really hate eating the same thing every day, so a menu of 7 dishes repeated each week was not working. I drug out Mom's cookbook and started learning what I could do with what I had, but gave us different tastes and styles. I'm still the only one who cooks from scratch and enjoys being in the kitchen. My sibs and parents hate cooking, to them it's a chore.

If it's Monday, it must be spaghetti...my brother and I would place bets on the drive home from university on Friday afternoons...would it be frozen peas or green beans with the steak and salad that was Friday nights. In the summer, she'd swap out spaghetti and chili (Tuesday night) for walleye or grilled burgers. And, Wednesday was Spanish rice...something I haven't eaten for years! Sunday was always roast beef. Saturday was tacos. I can't remember Thursdays, but I think it was meatloaf covered with cream-of-mushroom soup...

 

[jusnikki]

My Mum then later learning Patisserie in France.

I just googled French Patisserie and it's sooo wonderful....
All the beautiful, beautiful pastrys...

 

[jusnikki]

My story is much like Katie's. Though I loved my mother dearly, she was not the best cook in the world. Even she would admit it. She also worked late most nights at her job and usually didn't get home until after 6:00 PM. So by the time she got home, it was more convenient to open a can or throw a frozen pizza or TV dinner in the oven than to make something from scratch.

I don't recall exactly when I started cooking, but as my mom told it, when I was about 10 I saw a cook on television (more than likely Julia Child) make a cheese souffle, and asked mom if I could try to do that. So she pulled out her unused copy of "Joy of Cooking" and gave it to me. I never did make the souffle, but I did learn to make a number of other recipes in that book.

By the time I was about 12, my brother and I were doing most of the cooking around the house.

So in a way, my mother was my influence... just not as a cook herself.

As for my own style, I think it might be best described these days as "healthy eclectic." I try to incorporate a lot of things I've learned from many different sources.

Steve you look just like a football coach here. Everytime I see your pic I could almost swear that's him..lol. You're not related to any Bains are you??

 

[CWS4322]

1000 cookbooks??? If I only had the space........lol.

That was one of those impulsive buys at an auction--got all the boxes of cookbooks for $12. And then the DH had to build another bookcase...took the railing off the top of the stairwell at the farm and made that area into a bookcase...if there is a will, there is a way!

 

[Steve Kroll]

Steve you look just like a football coach here. Everytime I see your pic I could almost swear that's him..lol. You're not related to any Bains are you??

No "Bains" in my background, though my wife, when angry, has occasionally claimed I am the "bane" of her existence, lol.

 

[Mark Webster]

My Mother was called up early and so I learned the basics from my Father who had been a Navy Cook.

 

[babetoo]

No "Bains" in my background, though my wife, when angry, has occasionally claimed I am the "bane" of her existence, lol.

i have cousins with last name bains in tenn.