We are interviewing Julia in San Di who is interested would have to be an ego, California, where, with her hus awful clunk not to learn. Of course, band-manager Paul Child, she has come there's a difference between learning to conduct an in-person cooking dem techniques and having talent. It's like a onstration for the benefit of the Uni pianist; there will always be good musi versity of California Medical Center. cians, and then there will be the genius. The sponsoring group represents a BON APPETIT: What would you tell the growing sophistication in home cook novice about the best way to start learn ing, which has been fostered in large ing to cook?Can you learn from a book? part by Julia's own books and television appearances. One of the sessions, for JULIA CHILD: Of course, if the book is example, is to be devoted entirely to well thought out. The first thing to do pufF pastry, a subject so specialized that is to really start cooking and to remem even four or five years ago it would ber right from the beginning, as my never have filled the hall. Yet seats for husband says, that everyone falls flat on the demonstration are sold out. The his face when he starts learning to walk. San Diego connoisseurs and others like Suppose you are trying to make your them are now comfortably launched, in first mayonnaise. Naturally you are Julia's opinion, so it's time she turned going to read carefully and to try to her attention to people who love to follow the directions, but suppose it cook but still get upset when she says doesn't turn out? It's still a learning coq au vin instead of chicken stew. experience. It's like your omelets—start "Just the other day," she confides, "1 doing them. What if one falls in the told a woman to use some tomato stove? A dozen eggs doesn't cost as fondue and she seemed to think that much as $25 per lesson. INTEBVIEW would be far too difficult. So 1 said. In my books 1 like to start out giving Then just use some tomatoes sauteed something like a chocolate mousse as a WITH in a little butter with salt and pepper,' beginning recipe because you're going and she seemed very relieved. 'Yes,' she to learn how to melt chocolate, what to told me, 'I could do that!' " do with egg yolks, how to beat whites, "Julia Child and Company," which how to fold. These are fundamentals, airs on the PBS television network things you will do again and again. beginning in October, and the compan BON APPETIT: Don't you think it makes ion cookbook of the same title (which a big difference when a person has been \J will be published in conjunction with JULIA lucky enough to be raised in a home the show) represent a departure in for with good cooking? mat—but not in principle—from Julia's famous "French Chef" series. Each seg JULIA CHILD: Tremendous difference. ment will present the cooking star and You're lucky to grow up in a home with CHILD her guests (the company) at a party a big family kitchen and everybody has meal—for example; "A Kitchen Cock something to do. You learn to cook BY RITA LEINWAND tail Party," and "Dinner for the Boss." without even knowing you're doing it. Though the titles are thoroughly And I think it's terribly important to FOLLOWING A REIGN OF some fifteen years contemporary and the recipes new, take children along on shopping tours as America's best-known "French Julia's cooking still stems from the clas because if little Johnny has picked out chef," California-born Julia Child has sic cuisine which she studied in post something and later cooks it, then he come to a decision. It's time, she tells war Paris when, in her words, "Cooking will be anxious to taste it. It's like the us, that she break out of what she calls was a serious art form, nothing was too French apprentice system when you are her French "straitjacket." And in her much trouble to do absolutely beau part of a family of good cooks. new TV series, "Julia Child and Com tifully, and the feeling in the kitchen BON APPETIT: What if you weren't so was of art for art's sake." pany," we won't be hearing much about fortunate and you really needed the French cooking, only "inventive cook stimulation of live cooking classes? ing—general good cooking." BON APPETIT: So often you've been How do you pick out a good school? So saying, the doughty Julia crinkles heard to say that anyone can learn to After all, anyone can put up a sign that her hazel eyes into the mischievous cook, yet some people have much better smile she's beamed at us so many times says "Cooking School." Some people luck than others. Just what is the vital feel that cooking teachers should be a c r o s s h e r T V k i t c h e n c o u n t e r . S h e element that makes the difference? credentialed. What do you think? knows she has done more than any other cooking personality to popularize JULIA child: I do think there are some JULIA child: Oh no. If the teacher and demystify French cuisine for the who are not hungry enough to be good knows more than the students—that's American public; yet she will not rest cooks and have little interest in food. fine. If I were a beginner, I would be until every man, woman and child is It's rare that those people will cook very happy to learn from anybody who totally without fear in the kitchen. well. But a normally endowed person could teach me anything. Then I would 88 BON APPETIT / SEPTEMBER 1978 PHOTOGRAPHED BY BRIAN LEATART go on to a more advanced program. I am sider indispensable in your kitchen? not against having home cooks as JULIA CHILD: A good knife and a good teachers. Of course it's one thing to frying pan. want to learn to cook for your family and quite another if you are talking BON APPETIT: What do you think about about starting a restaurant. Then you the food processor? would want to go to a school for profes JULIA CHILD: Marvelous, the most im sional chefs. portant kitchen implement invented BON APPETIT: Could you suggest a min since the electric mixer. imum library of basic cookbooks every BON APPETIT: You haven't forgotten kitchen should have. about the microwave? JULIA CHILD: Well, 1 would think my JULIA CHILD: I have one. We have two own Mastering the Art of French Cooking, freezers and 1 use the microwave a great Volume One [Knopf, $15}, because it is deal for defrosting and reheating a textbook. Then, certainly everyone chicken stock, for melting butter. I do should have the Larousse Gastronomique very little cooking with it. I find it [by Prosper Montague, Crown, $20], La much easier to bake a potato, for in Technique [by Jacques Pepin, Quad stance, in the oven. rangle/The New York Times Book Company, $20} and The Joy of Cooking BON APPETIT: Microwave seems to have [by Irma S. Rombauer and Marion large appeal among people who have Rombauer Becker, Bobbs-Merrill, $10} very limited time for cooking. What because it is one of the most thorough advice do you have for them? of the American books. I also love The "If I were a JULIA child: If you're talking about James Beard Cookbook [E.P. Dutton &. busy people who like to eat, then 1 Company, $7.95} and his fish cookery would say, the more you know about beginner I'd be book, James Beard's New Fish Cookery cooking the faster you can cook. There [Little, Brown and Company, $9.95}. is no excuse for someone to say, "I work very happy to A good way to judge a cookbook is by all day and when 1 get home at six, I learn from looking up a recipe you already know. can't make dinner." I find that I can See how a bechamel sauce is made, if make a very good meal in an hour, the roux is cooked. If it's not, then the simple, but very good. anybody who author doesn't know what he is doing. BON APPETIT: How much use do you cou d teach me BON APPETIT: Do you have any basic make of convenience foods? cooking commandments? JULIA child: We don't use much- anything." JULIA CHILD: Thou shalt read the recipe sardines, tuna fish, almond paste. For through before starting to cook. That's one of my TV shows 1 was planning a important. And certainly, thou shalt session on quiche, and our neighbor gather all the ingredients and pots and happened to tell me she was so pleased pans to begin with. It is ridiculous to with a quiche she had made in a bought start out and find you need a two-quart shell that 1 decided to use one for our cake pan and you don't have it. Or TV quiche. The main thing is to get got to produce food, anything that will you're doing a fish and there's nothing people to cook. If they make their first help is just fine.