I have been revisiting old columns lately in an attempt to begin compiling them into groups. I have found that the topics I have covered over the past decades are literally all over the place. But after having dinner with our dear friends Kathy and Greg the other night this one brought back puddles of laughs and memoires.
The title of this column sounds like a cooking show. It must because when I comment to friends about my new cooking creations, I say, "I got that from cooking with Kathy." And they always look at me and ask, "What's that?" That is what it is. I am actually cooking with my friend Kathy.
I have learned in my life that people who are too proud remain pretty shallow. I have no problem going to a neighbor's house, knocking on her door, and asking her to come show me how to grow a garden. Or asking a friend to help me design a room or landscape. We all have special gifts, and I am open to learning from others. Kathy was that friend who has taught me many things over the years, but the one I have enjoyed the most is watching her cook.
In 2010 our first venture was her bread pudding, then came an Old Italian recipe of meatballs and red sauce. We spent a couple of hours making enough to eat and store extra. We had both decided that we would venture out to uncharted waters for even her by tackling Julia Child's famous Beef Bourgenion. And when the boys all piled into the kitchen to dig in the refrigerator for food the day before I was to cook the dish, they found four tubs of mushrooms. When they asked me about this, I announced in Julia Child's famous crackly high pitched voice that I was going to make "Beef Borgenion! They all stared in shock as one asked me, "Have you lost it, Mom?" It was then that I realized they had never seen or heard Julia Child.
In truth, the only thing I was crazy about was conquering a recipe that was too complicated for this reading teacher to comprehend. Good thing I was cooking with Kathy because she walked us both through it. I had my list of groceries to get and she had hers. On my list was six cups of Chianti. Of course the alcohol would be cooked out during the three hours of cooking, but tell that to all the people in Franklinton who saw me hanging out on the liquor aisle for twenty minutes. I read each bottle trying to find Chianti. I even went so far as to track down the manager to double check.
I think I also did that to clarify what I was doing if people started to question him about that lady who writes for the paper and was reading all the liquor bottles over and over again talking on her cell phone calling the labels out to someone on speaker. That lady who walked out of the store with nothing more than two large bottles of Burgundy. If I had turned around and faced the crowd to explain, "It's for a recipe!" I still don't think it would have been very believable. But then, they have never gone cooking with Kathy.
Over the years we did accumulate a wealth of recipes from my husband's family and her family. And these recipes have been passed down to my sons upon their weddings. Nothing like memories that also taste like the south where butter must be a vitamin!
