Appetite For Life_ The Biography Of Julia Child Part 10

Chapter 14.

BACK H HOME (AND C COOKING).

ON THE R RANGE.

(1956 1958) "We lived in an age ... of the decline and pall of the American palate."

JAMES BEARD, New York Times, 1959 1959

BEFORE JULIA and Paul settled into Eisenhower's Washington, more specifically into the Georgetown of Stewart and Joe Alsop, they reacquainted themselves with their country. Itinerants in their own land for the last two months of 1956, Julia and Paul moved from rural Pennsylvania to Boston, from Chicago to Southern California, from Northern California to Boston, and back through Pennsylvania to the District of Columbia, reuniting with family and friends. But they began and ended their travels with Charlie and Freddie at their house in rural Pennsylvania, where they had wed ten years earlier. Finally, their Georgetown house, rented out while they were in Bonn, was available, and their goods and furniture arrived from Germany. and Paul settled into Eisenhower's Washington, more specifically into the Georgetown of Stewart and Joe Alsop, they reacquainted themselves with their country. Itinerants in their own land for the last two months of 1956, Julia and Paul moved from rural Pennsylvania to Boston, from Chicago to Southern California, from Northern California to Boston, and back through Pennsylvania to the District of Columbia, reuniting with family and friends. But they began and ended their travels with Charlie and Freddie at their house in rural Pennsylvania, where they had wed ten years earlier. Finally, their Georgetown house, rented out while they were in Bonn, was available, and their goods and furniture arrived from Germany.

One of Julia's initial observations was that the country had become partial to flaming food, either in pretentious restaurants or on the backyard barbecue (three million dollars were spent the following year on barbecue equipment alone). On top of that, James Beard, now the dean of American cooking, had published The Complete Book of Outdoor Cookery The Complete Book of Outdoor Cookery two years before. Had Julia stayed longer at her father's Pasadena home, she would have learned of Joseph Broulard, a native of the Jura in France, then the reigning chef in Los Angeles, a city whose top restaurants were French. Broulard, she later discovered, sp.a.w.ned several Los Angeles restaurants and chefs from his Au Pet.i.t Jean. two years before. Had Julia stayed longer at her father's Pasadena home, she would have learned of Joseph Broulard, a native of the Jura in France, then the reigning chef in Los Angeles, a city whose top restaurants were French. Broulard, she later discovered, sp.a.w.ned several Los Angeles restaurants and chefs from his Au Pet.i.t Jean.

They also discovered the boom in population and building in Los Angeles, along with the quality of the wine at the Charles Krug vineyard in the Napa Valley. Though it took many years before Paul would acknowledge domestic wines in the same sentence with French, he found the bottles they sampled surprisingly good and bought a case.

Julia was astonished to realize how many Americans were letting Swanson do their cooking and eating on tin trays in front of the television. Twice in their wanderings, families turned on their television sets after a meal, much to Julia's amazement. At the Childs' in Pennsylvania they enjoyed The $64,000 Question The $64,000 Question, but found the TV game show "a waste of time." The country had turned to prepackaged quiz shows and prepackaged food.

VILLAGE LIFE IN GEORGETOWN.

Julia bought a new range, an enormous black restaurant range, on which she would cook the remainder of her life, during two months of major renovations on their house at 2706 Olive Street, the last house on Olive before it curved into Twenty-seventh Street at the little green parkway. They were on the outskirts, in an area of smaller houses, of the most elegant place to live in the city. Georgetown had a village atmosphere in the middle of a city of monuments, and everyone knew each other because they went to the same market, post office, and barbershop.

They exchanged the third floor of a modern housing development in Plittersdorf on the Rhine for a 150-year-old three-story wooden house. Julia finally got her gas range, and instead of the cold, wet winters, they enjoyed the comfort of an air-conditioning machine on each floor. Though there would be snow this winter, Washington, DC, summers were unbearably hot and humid. With the rent money Paul had wisely collected and banked for eight years, they had enough to redo bathrooms and ceilings to stop the leaking, take out a part.i.tion to make the kitchen larger, replace the wiring to avoid any possible fire, and repaint the house. Even the walkway above the ground-floor kitchen, which connected the street to the sitting- and living-room floor, had to be rebuilt. But the first room Julia finished was her bedroom/office (on the top floor with Paul's tiny studio and the guest room), where her typewriter and books awaited her.

If the rent money financed the renovations, the estate of Julia's mother underwrote her career, including the gas range and the cooking equipment from Dehillerin. She bought a new dishwasher (to save on a maid, she told Simca) and a sink with a grinder to dispose of the waste. She informed Simca that her mother's inheritance "allowed me to carry on extensive cookery work. My, I hope we don't have to move out of here in 2 years ... I couldn't stand it! ... I shall ... cut my throat." Caro Weston McWilliams, who cared little about high cuisine or cooking, would have been thrilled with her daughter's enthusiasm and sense of fulfillment.

Julia and Paul would have preferred to be living in Paris. Yet, in retrospect, it was fortuitous for her book that they were home again, where she could cook each recipe with the food available to the people who would buy their book. They were also enjoying being homeowners, especially since they could afford to fix it up with style; both took pride in their little nest. Paul's aesthetic sense turned each room into variations on a different color, and he became a "madly enthusiastic gardener," Julia confided to Simca: It is great fun being back here to live. I never could get the feel of it when we just pa.s.sed through on vacations. One thing I do adore is to be shopping in these great serve-yourself markets, where ... you pick up a wire push cart as you come in and just trundle about looking and fingering everything there is.... It is fine to be able to pick out each separate mushroom yourself.... Seems to me there is everything here that is necessary to allow a good French cook to operate.

The new supermarket around the corner on M Street (which curved into Pennsylvania Avenue) was not the only discovery: there was now scouring powder for copper pots, which she sent to Simca, and an electric skillet with a thermostat and timer, ready-mixed pie crust, and Uncle Ben's rice (she had no use for ready-made pie crust or soup). Each new invention was tested and reported to Simca, who promised to visit early in 1958. Julia's curiosity and enthusiasm were infectious.

Paul shared Julia's professional pa.s.sion, but no longer had much enthusiasm for his own career. He liked the art work and the perspective it gave him on the international political scene, but he mainly worked for the income and the occasional pride he could still take in his work. In December, while he was in California, he had finally been promoted to foreign service rank three (FSS-3), where he made a modest $9,660 a year.

"Julia thinks I should be President," Paul once told his brother. His efficiency reports (one acknowledged he was "underrated") gave him the highest rankings for character and ability, dependability and thoroughness, organization, and his wife: "Mr. Child has an intelligent and charming wife who is an a.s.set to him professionally as well as representationally." Other evaluation phrases explain why he remained at rank four so many years: "interests primarily cultural" and "impatient with certain administrative details ... and tendency to be self-effacing." That he ranked low in "knowledge of administrative practices" and was thought "to doubt his ability as an executive" reflect his disdain for office politics and the bureaucracy. Thus he lacked ambition for promotion (though his letters to Charlie through the years reveal that he expected promotion). In 1959 he was promoted, nevertheless, to Acting Chief of the Exhibit Division.

Because Washington was a hub through which many pa.s.sed, Paul and Julia entertained a number of people they knew earlier in Washington and in India, China, Paris, Ma.r.s.eilles, and Bonn. There were also, of course, Julia's friends from California and Smith (Mary Belin lived in nearby Evermay mansion) and Paul's Connecticut connections. As always, Julia was interested in political and social issues. With Nancy Davis, who had worked for Adlai Stevenson, Julia went to hear Dean Acheson address Congress, attended Inherit the Wind Inherit the Wind starring Melvyn Douglas, and sat in the front row to watch Eisenhower's inaugural parade. ("I find I am a mad parade watcher," she wrote Simca the following October when Queen Elizabeth came to town, "and besides I have never seen a queen.") She awakened early to try (unsuccessfully) to see Sputnik circle the globe and watched the squabbles on Capitol Hill with keen interest. starring Melvyn Douglas, and sat in the front row to watch Eisenhower's inaugural parade. ("I find I am a mad parade watcher," she wrote Simca the following October when Queen Elizabeth came to town, "and besides I have never seen a queen.") She awakened early to try (unsuccessfully) to see Sputnik circle the globe and watched the squabbles on Capitol Hill with keen interest.

They missed the Washington of Dean Acheson, believing the government was now run by lesser men. Secretary of State John Foster Dulles, Acheson's "despised" and "untrustworthy" successor, seemed to have a callous absence of loyalty to the professionals of the State Department, firing many, and supporting the rule of Chiang Kai-shek. The closest Julia came personally to the government was on February 14, 1957, when the FBI interviewed her about Jane Foster, though all she remembers telling them was that she did not "think someone that funny and that scattered could be a spy." In her datebook she p.r.o.nounced the visit "very pleasant," which reflected both relief and the influence of her proximity to the seat of government.

All Washington loved to dine out, though few took to cooking as a serious profession. For several months after Julia's kitchen was finished, they entertained "like mad": dinner or c.o.c.ktails for Cartier-Bresson (the French photojournalist); Walter and Helen Lippmann; Nancy Davis, who was marrying Wing Pepper of Philadelphia; Helen Kirkpatrick, former Information Officer for the Marshall Plan in Paris and recently a.s.sistant to the President at Smith College, who was marrying Robbins Milbank; Sherman and Nancy Kent, whom they had last seen in Ma.r.s.eilles; Avis DeVoto from Cambridge. Several OSS buddies, including Guy Martin, were living nearby.

During their wanderings, they had seen all of Julia's family, but now they looked forward to their frequent weekends at Coppernose in Pennsylvania, where Julia and Freddie cooked seriously, most often a large turkey (poultry not readily available in France, thus requiring careful changes in timing and cooking temperature). At the wedding the following spring of Erica, the eldest of the Child children, Julia arranged the flowers, Charlie decorated the cake, the Kublers provided the music, and Paul took the photographs. Her wedding to Hector Prud'homme (Rachel Child married Anthony Prud'homme several years later) was indeed a family matter, for now the Childs were connected by marriage to the Bissells (Marie and Richard Bissell's daughter Anne Caroline was married to Hector Prud'homme, Sr.) and to the Kublers (the elder Bissells' son d.i.c.k Bissell was married to Betty Kubler's sister). This tight band of people (Julia called it an "ingrown," happy family) remained their emotional support as well as the best company for holidays, including the traditional August in Maine.

Julia and Paul's new red Ford pounced out onto a rocky point of land which stuck out into the sea on Mount Desert Island. They were surrounded on three sides by ocean, rocks, and lobster pots. With the excitement of being "home," they drank in the sea smells and familiar surroundings of Lopaus Point, examining every improvement, the new addition, and Freddie's herb garden. This was the first real herb garden Julia had seen; "I found it just heavenly," she wrote Simca. They picked blueberries and raspberries and reminisced. They waded out into the surf and sea spray to take the lobsters out of their anch.o.r.ed cages.

They hardly had their fill of lobsters when it was time to drive down to Cambridge for book and cook work, taking ten lobsters along with them to Avis.

IN NOTHING ELSE SO.

HAPPY OR SAD.

Julia's greatest joy was in the kitchen, testing recipes, discussing tastes and results with Avis or Freddie-if she was in their kitchens-or taking notes for Simca-if she was home. She had less success cooking with Freddie ("It must be something psychological," she said about working with her sister-in-law). She shared everything with Simca: variations in cooking techniques, ways to bring down Simca's high blood pressure, America's feelings about the racial tensions in Little Rock, Simca's servant problems (with her p.r.i.c.kly temperament, she had trouble keeping a maid), and the wisdom of Simca publishing some articles and recipes in French periodicals (Julia frequently encouraged her to a.s.sert her professional authority).

The Houghton Mifflin people and Avis (who was working as a scout for the publishing house of Alfred A. Knopf) encouraged Julia to place recipes in The Ladies' Home Journal The Ladies' Home Journal (the food editor said the recipes were "too involved"), (the food editor said the recipes were "too involved"), House & Garden House & Garden, and Town & Country Town & Country. Julia sent several recipes to Woman's Day Woman's Day, a publication of the A&P grocery store chain, but never heard a word back from them. The Washington Post Washington Post called because they heard of her kitchen, but when the article appeared she was disappointed they had not used any of her recipes or made any mention of Simca. By the fall of 1957 the ma.n.u.script was so dog-eared, they had to get it retyped. called because they heard of her kitchen, but when the article appeared she was disappointed they had not used any of her recipes or made any mention of Simca. By the fall of 1957 the ma.n.u.script was so dog-eared, they had to get it retyped.

Simca's correspondence was equally loving and encouraging. She was testing Julia's poultry recipes, as Julia was testing her vegetable recipes. Simca reported on "Chef Oliver," Raymond Oliver, who cooked on French television. They used yellow and rose onionskin paper for their carbon copies to keep track of their chapters and responses to their responses, which they kept carefully filed. Theirs was truly a collaborative work, and one they believed would be seminal. Aware of James Beard's new American recipes and each American cookbook (Betty Crocker's Picture Cook Book (Betty Crocker's Picture Cook Book had sold more than three million copies since 1950), they took seriously the few attempts to present genuine French recipes, such as in had sold more than three million copies since 1950), they took seriously the few attempts to present genuine French recipes, such as in Gourmet Cookbook II Gourmet Cookbook II, which they considered "poor." "Ach, la concurrence!" "Ach, la concurrence!" Julia sputtered when a new book or recipe appeared. "Ours will have to be better!" They worked as hard as they could and would not compromise quality; the only compromise would be a multivolume publication. Julia sputtered when a new book or recipe appeared. "Ours will have to be better!" They worked as hard as they could and would not compromise quality; the only compromise would be a multivolume publication.

Several issues were emerging that affected the development of their masterpiece. Most immediately, Julia noticed changes in the produce, equipment, and cooking habits of her native country. In Bonn, she had noticed at the commissary that America was enthusiastic about what culinary historians Karen and John Hess called "precooked frozen gourmet glop." The Hesses criticized Craig Claiborne, the new food editor of the New York Times New York Times, who graduated from a Swiss hotel school, for hailing fifty-five new items from General Foods' "Gourmet Foods" line and calling others "exciting products" of 1958: Seabrook's "inspired beef a la bourguignonne," Pepperidge Farm's frozen puff pastries, Betty Crocker's "glamorous" new instant meringue, Carnation's "excellent and quickly made" Golden Fudge, Fluffo margarine, and Campbell's frozen fruit pies. Very discouraging for two women who had spent the better part of five or six years preparing a book to teach French recipes.

Moreover, there were several issues related to the cookbook itself. On her first visit to Cambridge the month they arrived, Julia tried to convince her Houghton Mifflin editor, who was also testing their recipes, to publish what they had so far (soups, sauces, poultry, vegetables), then work on other volumes. They would need four or five more years to complete the fish and meat chapters, Julia argued, in order to make her appeal more convincing. (Privately to Simca, Julia acknowledged that a multivolume plan complicated their relations with Louisette.) At first the editor agreed, saying they would publish this first volume at Christmas 1958, calling it French Cooking, Vol. 1: Sauces and Poultry French Cooking, Vol. 1: Sauces and Poultry. Then Lovell Thompson, the general manager, said they wanted only one book, but Julia would not make a decision until Simca arrived in January 1958.

Cooking problems also delayed completion, from the oversized turkeys that had to be cooked differently from the French poultry to the difficulty of finding creme fraiche (Julia informed Simca that adding b.u.t.termilk or yogurt to cream and keeping it at room temperature for a day produced the same results). American veal was not as pale and tender as the French; U.S. butchers offered different meat cuts; except for parsley, few fresh herbs were available; Americans ate a lot of broccoli, which was rare in France-and so the discoveries went. Occasionally a recipe, when retried, did not produce the same results it had in Paris, Ma.r.s.eilles, or Bonn. "h.e.l.l AND d.a.m.nATION, is all I can say," Julia wrote Simca on July 14, 1958, in a rare expression of frustration: "WHY DID WE EVER DECIDE TO DO THIS ANYWAY? But I can't think of doing anything else, can you?"

Two other, more personal factors, prolonged the completion of the book, though eventually ensuring its validity and longevity. First was the lack of experience on Julia's part. Never having cooked seriously before going to Paris, she approached her work as a novice studying an established tradition instead of acting on a creative or instinctive level to discover recipes or taste combinations. She approached foods and recipes deliberately, asking basic questions of why why and and how how, thus enabling her to write the clearest and simplest explanations for readers. Second was the influence of Paul Child's rhetorical a.n.a.lysis (they were now taking memory cla.s.ses together), which subjected everything to logic and thorough testing, sometimes six different ways. "Paul pushed her to a certain standard," say his nieces and nephew. This influence from Paul cannot be underestimated in evaluating the quality of the ma.n.u.script Julia and Simca were preparing.

Julia was overjoyed when Simca and Jean Fischbacher (his stay was briefer) at last arrived from Paris in January, for she had done little else the final months of 1957 but revise the chapters and have them retyped. Simca stayed three months and would visit friends or former students in New York City, Chicago and California. But the great event was the trip to Boston, buried then in a blizzard. Because the trains were not running, Julia and Simca took the long bus ride from New York City and arrived on Avis's doorstep at one o'clock in the morning. Avis recorded her memory thirty years later: I waited up for them, and it was snowing fiercely. They went in to see Houghton Mifflin with this huge box of ma.n.u.script. [They] presented over seven hundred pages on poultry and sauces alone alone, which is when HM said they weren't about to publish an encyclopedia. Although Dorothy [de Santillana] was extremely anxious to publish the book, because she had cooked with a lot of the recipes and knew they worked, all the men said, "Oh, Americans don't want to cook like that, they want something quick, made with a mix." They were pushing a cookbook, a Texas cookbook, by Helen Corbett-there seemed to be marshmallows in everything, and that's where their advertising money was going. Houghton Mifflin has regretted it ever since.

When Julia heard them say, "We are not going to publish an encyclopedia.... Americans wouldn't cook that way," she said to Avis and Simca with her usual dogged determination, "We'll just have to do it over."

That is just what they did, said Avis, spending "the next two years completing a single book" to put in all chapters, including desserts. Avis was absolutely convinced of the uniqueness of the book, though she confided to a mutual friend that she had serious reservations about Julia's writing ability. The talent she had nurtured after Smith had withered under the demands of government forms and recipe details.

LA CUISINE CHILD VS.

CUISINE "GUNK"

Julia and Paul developed a style of entertaining that endeared them to Washington circles, a style in keeping with a truly modern kitchen and dining s.p.a.ce (which opened onto the garden) and the demanding work her cookbook needed. She and Simca returned to Washington from Boston to devise a new strategy for the book and their work. Any entertaining Julia did during 1958 and 1959 would be connected to their book. She never chose a menu because it was her best work; she was constantly experimenting and testing. If a dish went wrong, she said nothing. This was one of her maxims: no excuses, no explanations. She informed Simca, "I am not doing any elaborate entertaining at all until I get this MS out of the way. What we do is to have 4 people in on Sundays."

Guests long remembered the informal warmth of her kitchen here and later in Cambridge, where they continued their ritual. Lee and Gisele Fairley, both of whom worked with Paul in Bonn and were now stationed in Washington, remember many visits to the Childs' "dollhouse": "Julia was ensconced in her gleaming professionally equipped kitchen [and] we would sit around the kitchen table (a huge butcher's block of wood) sipping Paul's dry martinis ... and watch Julia prepare the dish(es) of the day. After eating, there was a postmortem discussion, though mostly between Paul and Julia."

Lyne Few and his wife, whom they met in Dusseldorf, were also frequent guests after being posted to Washington. Few remembers: Julia's impressive kitchen with beautiful pots and pans hanging everywhere, and a large rough-hewn table in the center. The guests would sit on comfortable benches and consume delicious c.o.c.ktails which were Paul's specialty. Julia would chat with us as she bustled around concocting fabulous dishes. Paul explained that she was working on a cookbook and hoped we would excuse her for using us as guinea pigs. Never were there more willing victims.

Paul usually made what they called "Ivan's aperitif" or what Julia later called the "Upside-Down Martini": in a red-wine gla.s.s, filled with ice, they poured both dry and sweet vermouth (they preferred Noilly Prat vermouth), then floated a little gin on the top, decorating with a twist of orange or lemon rind. "Hold it by the stem so it will ring," suggested Julia as they touched gla.s.ses.

Rosalind and Stuart Rockwell-he was director of the Office of Near Eastern Affairs for the Department of State-lived next door and were frequent guests, along with another neighbor, Bob Duemling, who walked to work with Paul. Because Duemling was single (he had dated Rachel Child for several years), he was frequently a guest. The Rockwells remember the chicken dishes (with one portion removed by Julia for tasting) that Julia would bring over for dinner-Paul had had his fill of them. Rosalind would never forget Julia's generosity to the mother of an active young son. "When Stuart took me to the hospital for the birth of our second child, Julia offered to take care of our son Steve. When I asked that she keep him out of the kitchen, she immediately moved all of the long knives."

The following January, to celebrate five birthdays around January 15-Paul and Charlie, Freddie Child, Paul Nitze, and Stuart Rockwell-Julia cooked a grand meal and Paul wrote a poem for the occasion they called "The Pentapolloi Party." Such care was typical of the Child hospitality, and Paul read his lengthy verse to: Splendid Nitze, Rockwell Bold and Glamor-laden Freddie, Plus Charles and Paul, those brilliant men, intelligent and steady.

Behold the dawn of greater days, of love rejuvenate....

In its informality, La Cuisine Child La Cuisine Child matched what matched what House Beautiful House Beautiful called "the Station Wagon Way of Life" in the 1950s. But in the quality of the food and the time spent in its preparation, there was no comparison. Americans were then eating canned vegetables with marshmallows melted on top, frozen chickens cooked in canned mushroom soup, frozen fish sticks, and dishes that could be served during commercials or cooked on the barbecue outdoors. They were shopping the center aisles of the supermarket, to use food editor called "the Station Wagon Way of Life" in the 1950s. But in the quality of the food and the time spent in its preparation, there was no comparison. Americans were then eating canned vegetables with marshmallows melted on top, frozen chickens cooked in canned mushroom soup, frozen fish sticks, and dishes that could be served during commercials or cooked on the barbecue outdoors. They were shopping the center aisles of the supermarket, to use food editor (Gourmet) (Gourmet) Zanne Early Stewart's a.n.a.logy, not the outside aisles where the fresh produce was waiting. Zanne Early Stewart's a.n.a.logy, not the outside aisles where the fresh produce was waiting.

Processed food products and junk food led to unwanted poundage, which in turn stirred up a wave of dieting and diet books (sprinkled with saccharin and white sodium cyclamate powder), swelling by the end of the century into a tidal wave. Avis decried to Julia the "gunk" in American kitchens and the increasing number of ma.n.u.scripts for diet books she was receiving, which would henceforth outnumber cookbooks. She described as "gruesome" one she had just received: [There is] not a single honest recipe in the whole book-everything is b.a.s.t.a.r.dized and quite nasty. Tiny amounts of meat ... are extended with gravies and sauces made with corn starch.... Desserts ... [are] sweetened with saccharin and topped with imitation whipped cream. Fantastic! And I do believe a lot of people in this country eat just like that, stuffing themselves with faked materials in the fond belief that by subst.i.tuting a chemical for G.o.d's good food they can keep themselves slim while still eating hot breads and desserts and GUNK.

In 1959 chemists pushed the tidal wave with Metrecal, a powder to be added to milk to make a meal-an "adult version of baby formula," as Harvey Levenstein called the "glutinous drink." Within two years sales would total $350 million. These dieters and instant home cooks were also consuming women's magazines, whose food editors and lifestyle or entertainment editors were setting the tone for the country. They, not the home economists or master chefs, were telling American cooks what to prepare and how to serve it.

Julia was completely outside the small but growing food world of New York City. She was familiar with many names from the national magazines she read in Europe and knew that Dione Lucas had a school and television program and that James Beard wrote many cookbooks and endorsed a stream of products (living, his biographer said, by "trade-offs, favors, freebies, and consulting"). But Julia had never met them or the real power brokers who edited the magazines, such as Helen McCully at McCall's McCall's, the first food editor of a major magazine who was not a home economist, and certainly the most powerful food editor in the country. She was learning their names, but harbored a certain skepticism. She had yet to meet Craig Claiborne (New York Times) (New York Times), Ann Seranne (Gourmet) (Gourmet), Poppy Cannon (House Beautiful) (House Beautiful), or Cecily Brown-stone (a.s.sociated Press). But her time was coming.

THEIR AUDIENCE.

When Julia and Simca put aside their weighty ma.n.u.script, began their streamlined version, and copyrighted the name L'Ecole des Trois Gourmandes, they did not change their purpose or what they called their "intended audience." Their purpose always remained to teach "the servantless American cook" authentic French techniques, not "adaptations," to achieve, as nearly as possible, French results. The audience, as Paul once said, is "Everybody "Everybody, like bird-shot from both barrels, from Brides to Guides and from Sophisticates to Wistful Mates." Julia told Avis in 1952 that they wanted a book "understandable to the novice, interesting for the practiced cook." She and Simca first agreed in 1954 that they were "writing for an audience that knows nothing about French cooking; that will follow every word that we utter ... or be put off if we do not explain thoroughly." For this reason, she occasionally-as in the case of veloute aux champignons veloute aux champignons-rejected a recipe that was "too complicated for our audience." The following year it was "a literate audience that LIKES TO COOK AND WANTS TO LEARN." Now, with her growing awareness of the shortcut cooking in the country, she suggested to Simca they include fewer grande cuisine grande cuisine and more and more cuisine bourgeoise cuisine bourgeoise dishes, dishes, ... which is complicated enough for them. They are not used to taking the time and care we are used to taking in preparing things.... n.o.body has a mortar, sieve, or pilon for pounding things ... we shall have to emphasize in our introduction that LOVE is one of the big ingredients ... and that the taste of food (not its looks, ease of preparation, etc.) is what you are striving for, and why some shortcuts won't work.

To keep in touch with their future audience, Julia occasionally taught cooking cla.s.ses, the first one on April 27, 1957, for a group of women who met every Monday to cook lunch for their husbands. Later that year she responded to a request to teach a cla.s.s of eight in Philadelphia, four hours away by car, which she did monthly through the spring of 1958. From ten until two, when the food was served, she hurriedly cooked the following menu: oeufs poches duxelles, sauce bearnaise oeufs poches duxelles, sauce bearnaise (which in their book would be called (which in their book would be called oeufs en croustades a la bearnaise); poulet saute portugais; epinards au jus oeufs en croustades a la bearnaise); poulet saute portugais; epinards au jus (the blanched spinach would also appear in their book); and (the blanched spinach would also appear in their book); and pommes a la sevillane pommes a la sevillane. Every detail was carefully typed up ahead of time and later narrated to Simca, who was giving cooking cla.s.ses to a group of U.S. Air Force wives in Paris. During her visit to Washington, Simca was involved in a couple of the cla.s.ses Julia was giving in 1958 at her own home, under the name L'Ecole des Trois Gourmandes. The first menu: quiche aux fruits de mer, coq au vin quiche aux fruits de mer, coq au vin, and tarte aux pommes tarte aux pommes.

Not long after Paul told friends their "nest is feathered," he learned they were to be transferred to Oslo, Norway. This time he would not repeat his Germany experience of transferring before he learned the language, and so he negotiated a six-month delay-and then two more months-so he could learn the language and Julia could get further toward completing the book. Beginning in September 1958, Paul began what would amount to 116 hours of Norwegian study from the wife of the press attache at the Norwegian Emba.s.sy, who offered to teach him (the U.S. State Department did not teach the language) without pay. By the next spring he and Julia were very chummy with the Norwegian amba.s.sador and his wife.

Bob Duemling, who would leave for Rome in the spring of 1960, remembers the party that Paul and Julia gave for a dozen friends to honor the woman who had taught him Norwegian. "Paul made a delightful speech to thank her, then gave her a small box. She burst into tears." Later Duemling examined the gift Paul made: the wood was covered with gesso, painted as a replica of a famous Norwegian fresco of a saint which he had copied, then antiqued to look like a medieval icon. "It was an elegant and thoughtful gift that showed Paul's imagination and talent."

A PERMANENT HOME IN CAMBRIDGE PERMANENT HOME IN CAMBRIDGE.

There was a storm in Cambridge in January 1959 when Avis DeVoto called to say a house was coming on the market at 103 Irving Street and they must come immediately to see it. They took a train in the freezing rain and literally bought the house out from under a family who were walking through the house at the same time. According to Avis, Paul tapped on the walls of the four floors (counting the full bas.e.m.e.nt) and Julia looked longingly at the two pantries and large, well-organized kitchen with a restaurant stove.

A half year before, during the 1958 Fourth of July weekend with Avis, Julia and Paul had expressed an interest in eventually settling in Cambridge. But a walk about the town with an agent turned up nothing available. Now, with only three months left before leaving for Oslo, they bought the three-story house for $48,500 and asked the third and present owner, Mrs. Margot Smith, to remain on while she looked for another home. Julia explained their decision: Paul said he did not want to be in government any longer than sixty years of age. He wanted to devote himself to the creative arts. So we decided where we wanted to live. We looked in California, but that was too far away. Paul had grown up in Boston and loved the area, and we stayed with Avis DeVoto, who had a friend in the real estate business. Avis was wonderful to us. We looked at the house for twenty minutes and immediately took it, while the other people were talking it over among themselves.

Josiah Royce (18551916) and his wife were the first owners of the house from its construction in 1889 until 1944. Royce was the famed idealist philosopher during the "Golden Age of Philosophy" at Harvard, when he taught with George Santayana and William James (whose mother-in-law lived at No. 107). One of Royce's students was Gertrude Stein, who lived with her brother Leo at No. 123 when she attended the "Harvard Annex" (later Radcliffe) from 1893 to 1897. Poet e.e. c.u.mmings was born across the street at No. 104. This area, once part of the Norton Estate, was called the Shady Hill area (Paul had taught at the Shady Hill School in 193031) or the Divinity School area, between Beacon Street and Harvard Divinity School, north of Kirkland Street.

Julia and Paul had already met some of their neighbors three years before: the John Kenneth Galbraiths (Julia went to Smith with Mrs. Galbraith) and the younger Arthur Schlesingers were a part of the DeVoto group that Bernard celebrated in his famous little book The Hour The Hour. Buying here among all the university professors and writers was like buying a piece of Bloomsbury for a Londoner. More important than the heady environment was the fact that this was Paul's hometown, where he taught school one year, and later where his love Edith Kennedy lived and died; indeed, two of her sons, Robert (architect for the restoration of the DeVotos' house) and Fitzroy, still lived in Cambridge with their families. It seemed natural for a girl reared by a New England mother and sent to Smith College to choose New England. In 1957 Julia told Simca that New England "is the cradle of our country and has a very special character."

Julia had twenty-seven daffodils blooming in their Georgetown yard by the second week of April. Paul was feeling older than fifty-seven years, as he was slowly recovering from a tonsillectomy, when the shippers picked up their goods for Oslo. The painters prepared the Georgetown house for renting, while Julia sent her copy of the rejected ma.n.u.script to Avis. "I thought you might just hang on to it in case HM might need another copy," she wrote. "I have not been able to proofread it at all, but have confidence in ... the proofreader and typist. She is a jewel, and it looks beautiful, I think." Avis would recall that "Julia left the book in my lap."

"Elegance of Cuisine Is on Wane in U.S.," Craig Claiborne announced four days later in his front-page article in the New York Times New York Times. The fault of the decline lay in the decline in its Frenchness, he a.s.serted, and among those he interviewed was James Beard, who said, "This nation is more interested in preserving the whooping crane and the buffalo than in perpetuating cla.s.sic cooking and table service. We live in an age that may some day ... be referred to as the time of the decline and pall of the American palate." One food historian called this article "a news report of national crisis of some import, at least for the well-heeled readers of the Times." Times." Houghton Mifflin was not listening. Julia was preparing to walk out the door. Houghton Mifflin was not listening. Julia was preparing to walk out the door.

The routine was familiar: lunch with Jane McBain, c.o.c.ktails with the Lippmanns, dinner with the Bissells, and the farewells went on for days and days, despite Paul's fatigue. From the deck of the SS United States United States on a beautiful sunny day in New York Harbor, they waved to Charlie and Freddie, Alice Lee Myers, and John and Phila McWilliams (who had recently visited them in Washington). Julia wept with sorrow to be leaving, though, always upbeat, she told Avis, "We are indeed awfully lucky to have this post ... which I hope will be our last!" They knew that when they returned from this last station, they would have a new and bigger house. Now they began talking about the new world they were to conquer and the French and then Norwegian soil that lay ahead. After a day and a half of champagne, caviar, and truffled pork loin, Julia spent two days in bilious discomfort, recovering in time to meet Simca in Rouen to re-create that first on a beautiful sunny day in New York Harbor, they waved to Charlie and Freddie, Alice Lee Myers, and John and Phila McWilliams (who had recently visited them in Washington). Julia wept with sorrow to be leaving, though, always upbeat, she told Avis, "We are indeed awfully lucky to have this post ... which I hope will be our last!" They knew that when they returned from this last station, they would have a new and bigger house. Now they began talking about the new world they were to conquer and the French and then Norwegian soil that lay ahead. After a day and a half of champagne, caviar, and truffled pork loin, Julia spent two days in bilious discomfort, recovering in time to meet Simca in Rouen to re-create that first sole meuniere sole meuniere lunch that had changed her life. lunch that had changed her life.

The reunions with Max Bugnard, Helene Baltrusaitis, and others were sweet. The USIA's special exhibit, "The Twenties: American Writers in Paris and Their Friends," which Helene coordinated for the emba.s.sy, had concluded just five days before and she introduced Julia to the woman whose collection had been the basis of the exhibit: Sylvia Beach, the publisher of James Joyce's Ulysses Ulysses. After dining at Lipp, La Grille, Closerie des Lilas, La Mediterranee, and other sentimental places of memory, Julia was down again with a fatigued liver. But she and Simca got in two days of hard work (their ham en croute en croute was "not a success") and a meeting with the Gourmettes before Paul and Julia drove away on a beautiful May day to Bonn. They lunched beside the Rhine and visited friends for three days. After dining with Erica and Hector Prud'homme in Amsterdam, they drove past the whitewashed stone houses of the flatlands of Denmark toward their ship to Norway. was "not a success") and a meeting with the Gourmettes before Paul and Julia drove away on a beautiful May day to Bonn. They lunched beside the Rhine and visited friends for three days. After dining with Erica and Hector Prud'homme in Amsterdam, they drove past the whitewashed stone houses of the flatlands of Denmark toward their ship to Norway.

Chapter 15.

"I A AM AT H HEART A V VIKING"

(1959 1961) "... far from the extravagances of Place Pigalle."

PAUL CHILD.

THE SHIP wove its long, winding way through the deep, island-strewn fjord toward Oslo. Julia and Paul awakened at five to take in the drama of this "land of the generous sea," and were not disappointed to discover that the steep forested cliffs, granite boulders, and smell of pine woods reminded them of Maine and the Washington State coast. Little wooden clapboard houses dotted the water's edge. The day began as slate-colored, the air cold and damp, and the experience strange, as any new land is to a visitor. But the smiling faces of Fisher and Debby Howe on the wharf warmed their 7 wove its long, winding way through the deep, island-strewn fjord toward Oslo. Julia and Paul awakened at five to take in the drama of this "land of the generous sea," and were not disappointed to discover that the steep forested cliffs, granite boulders, and smell of pine woods reminded them of Maine and the Washington State coast. Little wooden clapboard houses dotted the water's edge. The day began as slate-colored, the air cold and damp, and the experience strange, as any new land is to a visitor. But the smiling faces of Fisher and Debby Howe on the wharf warmed their 7 A.M. A.M. welcome. Debby had attended Bennington College with Julia's sister Dorothy. Howe, whom they first met in the OSS in India and last saw in Washington, had been in Oslo three years as Deputy Chief of Mission. welcome. Debby had attended Bennington College with Julia's sister Dorothy. Howe, whom they first met in the OSS in India and last saw in Washington, had been in Oslo three years as Deputy Chief of Mission.

Marching bands and more than five thousand children holding red balloons and red Norwegian flags filled Karl Johan Street, making their way to the palace to greet the royal family for Norway's Const.i.tution Day. May 17, 1959, was a new beginning for Julia and Paul, as well as the beginning of the planting season in Norway. "The color and noise of thousands of kiddies lifted my spirits-dashed by a terrible lunch," Julia noted, going through her usual "wish we were home" reaction, which always followed a bad meal in a new country.

The sun broke through to blinding brightness. They were picked up at their hotel by Eline and Bjorn Egge, whom they had met briefly at one of their farewell parties at the home of Mary Belin in Georgetown (Lieutenant Colonel Egge served at NATO headquarters in Paris with Captain Peter Belin). Their first Norwegian friends drove them up to Holmenkollen, where the Winter Olympics had been held seven years before. At 1,150 feet above sea level, they looked out like eagles over the city of Oslo. "I feel better about things," Julia wrote in her datebook.

"Julia and Paul [were] excellent representatives of their country in Norway," said Bjorn Egge, who would be elected president of the World Veterans Federation in 1995. "They liked people and the Norwegians were very fond of them. They were in fact the incarnation of American culture in Norway at a time we badly needed to have that aspect of the United States emphasized. From the very first moment they put a great deal into learning to know the very special brand of Norwegian outdoor culture."

For five long weeks, while Paul was at work in the emba.s.sy, Julia worked on the new cookbook-the one-volume edition-and explored the city. They lived consecutively in two different hotels, surrounded by unopened boxes. When Julia was not working she was roaming around the city with her usual energetic curiosity, often with Debby Howe, who showed her the commissary, the War Resistance Museum (the Norwegians had been under n.a.z.i occupation for five years), and the statue of Ibsen (their greatest dramatist) outside the National Theater. The sightseeing was interspersed with house hunting.

The summer sun in this land of Vikings, herring, and the sea seemed never to set. Though everyone was off the streets by 9:30 at night, twilight did not arrive until 11:30 P.M P.M. and dawn came at 4 A.M A.M. The days seemed nightless in this northern land, a third of which was within the Arctic Circle. Sharing the Scandinavian peninsula with Sweden, Norway swept up the western half of the peninsula to take in the entire fractured coastline northward into the Arctic and over the tops of Sweden and Finland to the Russian border. A country of coastline, in places only four miles wide.

Fjords sliced deep into the mountain interiors for the most dramatic vistas, unions of the power and beauty of nature, where the sea pounded the rock walls. The land was stunning, the people close to nature, open and innocent ("lean and glowing with health," Julia wrote in the first postcard to her sister Dort). Later she said, "They look like New Englanders, with the healthy color of Californians [for] they live outdoors every minute they can." As June approached, Julia noticed the hungry way the Norwegians drank in the brilliant sun and realized how long and cold the winters must be. Paul was amazed that "there are virtually no fat people at all!" He underlined that sentence in his letter, contrasting the people in the United States, "where baby-blubber bounces," and in Germany, "where pig-fat is almost a virtue." He was also impressed with how much time the fathers spent with their children, crediting the workday routine of quitting at about 3:30 for dinner and a nap, then family time. The Norwegians were the best-looking (especially the women), "clearest-eyed, healthiest, most vigorous and characterful we have ever seen." "We like the Weegians very much," Julia repeated in several letters.

PALAZZO LIVING OUTSIDE OSLO.

Seagulls squawked above. The air, Paul informed Charlie, smelled of spruce, pine, moss, and apple blossoms. Spring burst out in tulips. By July there was a heat wave and drought-the clearest, hottest summer since 1903-that by mid-October had broken all records. Paul Child sweltered in his corner office in the new and controversial building designed by Eero Saarinen, a building in which no windows opened. By August he felt he was baking "like a pate en croute." pate en croute."

Oslo, in southeastern Norway, was the capital and largest city, as well as the main port. The country's chief commercial center, Oslo got its produce from the mountains and the sea: forest products and processed food (chiefly fish). Night after night while they lived in hotels, Julia and Paul tried different restaurants, looking for a satisfying cuisine, but concluded that the food was the "worst" they had ever eaten anywhere. Julia's immediate and private reaction was that the cooking was "hideous," especially the fried foods. Publicly and privately, she would rave about the fish, especially the gravlax, "the best smoked salmon I ever ate."

Gawd, the salmon are splendid! [she wrote her family]. There is a great fish store here with a stupendous window display of crossed salmon 3 feet long, surrounded by salmon trout, and interspersed with lobsters, mackerel, flounder, and halibut. Above them is a garland of little pink shrimp ... They also have a "gravloch" [sic], which is salmon ... served with Stueder poteter Stueder poteter (diced in cream with mace), and a dill/cream sauce. (diced in cream with mace), and a dill/cream sauce.

"[We seem] far from the extravagances of Place Pigalle," Paul observed concerning the upright Norwegians. The state church was Evangelical Lutheran, the citizens devoted to rect.i.tude, fresh air, and early nights. As one wag said, the liveliest thing about a Norwegian is his sweater. Their puritanism showed in their food and drink. The beer was good, but all alcohol was heavily taxed. The breads were varied and honest, but the vegetables, salads, and meats were, in Paul's words, "lousy." These were friendly and hardy people who had been fishing the sea for many centuries. Pleasures were simple.

Thanks to the Howes, they found what Julia called a "peachy" and "nifty" house on a hill next door to the Howes and almost across the street from the University of Oslo. Erica Child came from Amsterdam for ten days to help her aunt and uncle move into their house. She went to the stores with Julia to help furnish an empty house.

I went to department stores with Julia, who just bought towels and dishes, a sofa, can opener, beds and tables, and a gas stove with butane bottle. I had never seen anyone do that before. She had her Norwegian phrase book with her and she talked to everyone, gestured, lay down on the floor to ill.u.s.trate that she wanted a bed. She took care of business. She is so disciplined, such an extrovert. The people gathered round, drawn to her. We had such a good time.

For two weeks after Erica left, Julia set aside her book while she unpacked her batterie de cuisine batterie de cuisine (Paul said he hung seventy-four items), put up curtains, and ordered a large sideboard, chairs, and a table seating sixteen made of maple and suitable eventually for their Cambridge house. (Paul said he hung seventy-four items), put up curtains, and ordered a large sideboard, chairs, and a table seating sixteen made of maple and suitable eventually for their Cambridge house.

Paul wrote to Charlie about the "desperation [with which] one thrusts down one's roots in each new country," and surely Julia demonstrated this eagerness to be a part of the life of Oslo, where they expected to spend four years. She took the Trikk, Oslo's electric train, into the downtown area and opened herself up to meeting everyone and learning everything she could about the country. Professionally, her years in Norway opened her horizons to new ways with fish and gave her the time to complete her book and test her recipes.

On Sunday mornings the church bells chimed from every neighboring village, as they do, Paul noted, in Venice. "I would be happy to take this house and view with me everywhere," Julia told Dorothy and Ivan. From their bedroom window Julia could see across a field and then a forest of trees to the blue-green fjord below. According to the Howes, the house, which was some distance outside of Oslo, was owned by the biggest and wealthiest shipowner in the city. Paul discovered that he liked "palazzo living." They had a huge bas.e.m.e.nt with laundry and Paul's 200-bottle wine cellar (replenished via Copenhagen), a large attic, many rooms, a terrace, lawn, fruit trees, and by July more strawberries, raspberries, currants, and fraises des bois fraises des bois than they could jam, liqueur, or eat. than they could jam, liqueur, or eat.

For Julia's forty-seventh birthday they went to a restaurant with Fisher and Debby Howe. With the gift of a bra.s.s elephant from Muttra, Paul wrote to Julia about how much "we owe to Ceylon for providing the golden moment, the perfect environment, the necessary atmosphere, which revealed us to each other. I am happy, astonished and delighted that we met at all, that we had the good sense to marry each other, and that our life together is such a pleasure. Thank you for every concession, every restraint, every thoughtfulness, every cooperative act, every darling endeavor, that you contribute to our mutual life."

REBUFFED BY HOUGHTON MIFFLIN.

"Thank G.o.d I got this book cookery done before we came here, as it would have been impossible otherwise," Julia said about the lack of produce such as chicken ("they have only stewing chicken and baby chicken"). The vegetables were good in season, but the season was short.

Julia devoted July and August to completing her reorganization, recipe narrowing, and typing for the cookbook. "Julie's working like a bastid [sic] on her book-always has," has," Paul wrote Charlie, "but now that she actually sees the leet [sic] on the other side of the forest and realizes that, after 8 years of slogging through the windfalls, swamps, and underbrush, she will actually Paul wrote Charlie, "but now that she actually sees the leet [sic] on the other side of the forest and realizes that, after 8 years of slogging through the windfalls, swamps, and underbrush, she will actually emerge emerge in a few weeks, the realization is sweeping her on like a windstorm." She sent off the ma.n.u.script for Simca's approval (the last pieces were mailed on September 1), and then to a typist friend in Washington, DC, who sent it on to Houghton Mifflin. She felt "rather lost" without her book. in a few weeks, the realization is sweeping her on like a windstorm." She sent off the ma.n.u.script for Simca's approval (the last pieces were mailed on September 1), and then to a typist friend in Washington, DC, who sent it on to Houghton Mifflin. She felt "rather lost" without her book.

Julia knew Houghton Mifflin would take months to accept or reject the book, now called French Recipes for American Cooks French Recipes for American Cooks, so she joined a cla.s.s at the university nearby to study Norwegian more seriously (she was working through the grammar book on her own and practicing on shopkeepers). As in Bonn, she would learn the language faster than her linguist husband because she dealt with shopkeepers, housekeepers, the gardener, and service men.

But it was not until she attended her first emba.s.sy luncheon and sampled the tasteless fare that Julia made plans to resume giving cooking lessons. When the canned shredded chicken in what Julia called a "droopy, soupy sauce" was pa.s.sed to her, she looked across the room to Debby Howe, who gave her an apologetic, knowing look. Years later she would recall the phallic-shaped aspic filled with grapes and cut-up mushrooms: "It was sitting on a little piece of lettuce so you could not hide what you didn't eat. I didn't think anything like that still existed!" When the coconut frosted cake-mix cake, molded lime Jell-O salad, and artificial Key lime pie were served, Julia glanced wide-eyed at Debby. "I knew how bad the food was," Debby Howe said in 1994, "and I knew what Julia would feel about it." The entire meal was appalling, thought Julia; everything was sweet, and sickening.

Julia determined that no such emba.s.sy meal would ever be served to her again and made plans to offer cooking cla.s.ses for those who wanted them. Few did, but her Norwegian friends were enthusiastic. She began two practices here in Norway that continued for several years: she would cook a meal in the kitchen of a family, showing them how to prepare the lunch, and she would offer small cla.s.ses for six to eight women. Debby, who thought she "was a good sport, especially with diplomatic wives," cared nothing about learning to cook herself, for she had two young children and planned a number of the functions for the amba.s.sador, a woman named Frances Willis, whom Julia admired. "Julia was appalled that I did not want to learn to cook," reported Debby Howe.