Recently we asked six popular cooking school instructors in the Chicago area to stop by for a roundtable chat about the state of culinary arts education. What resulted was a wide-ranging exchange of views, some predictable, others esoteric. On hand were Maria Battaglia, Italian food authority and owner of Evanston`s La Cucina Italiana cooking school; Madelaine Bullwinkel, owner of the Chez Madelaine Cooking School in Hinsdale and publisher of a bimonthly newsletter on the culinary arts; Elaine Gonzalez, a well-known chocolate maven, consultant and teacher; Monique Hooker, chef and teacher at the Cooking and Hospitality Institute of Chicago (CHIC); Jacalyn Linko, owner of Jacalyn Linko Catering in Evanston and a cooking teacher; and Jean True, owner of True Cuisine Catering and Cooking School in Glen Ellyn. Representing the Tribune were Steven Pratt, assistant Food Guide editor, and Pat Dailey, Cooks` Dialogue columnist.
Tribune: What do you feel are the current trends in home cooking?
Monique Hooker: For my students I`m happy to report, it`s the real basic stuff. It`s not showoff.
Jacalyn Linko: People are so into nutrition. They`re reading magazines and every available publication that they can. They want to know the healthiest way to be.
Hooker: Definitely. There is so much emphasis (on health), not coming just from the cooking part but from the social changes. Family togetherness is also coming back, so that food also is taking a part in that. People are trying to come back to real basic health. What we mean by nutrition is more balance and less fat. We`re not into finding out about vitamin C.
Jean True: My teenage boys just can`t stand to see any fat on their plate. They are really sensitive to that. They`re all into athletics and they`re told by their coaches to eat, so they`re really conscious of the amount of fat they are taking in . . . which is great.
Madelaine Bullwinkel: There`s a difference I think between what we see as trends as teachers and what our students see. I do a little experimenting in the spring. I suggest class subjects to people to see what kind of reaction I get. I went to Krochs (and Brentano`s book store) one day and found eight new books on cookery and said, ”Wow! Ducks, quail, game,” and then I brought this up to my students and . . . no reaction. However, from them I got the suggestion of vegetables. I had taken vegetables for granted.
Elaine Gonzalez: Since I view the world thru chocolate eyes I have to tell you that after they have done all that cooking, they still want that sweet reward at the end. . . . I still find that among the sweets, prejudiced as I may seem, chocolate certainly has lasted. I think that little by little Americans are discovering that there really is good American chocolate.
Our next questions dealt with the changes in how people are cooking, or if they even are cooking.
Tribune: How do you reconcile your passion for cooking with a changing American lifestyle? How do you say to your students, ”Keep cooking.”
Hooker: Well, you have to show a few techniques that are valuable to them: how to cook the food and how to cut the vegetable and keep it in the crisper.
True: The people who take cooking classes have some of that passion (for cooking) more than those who don`t. They`ll put forward that extra effort because they love food.
Maria Battaglia: I think that`s what I found is responsible for a lot of the success of Italian food, too. That you don`t have to waste. That you buy four pounds of pasta and a few cans of tomato sauce for staples and you go to the store every few days for broccoli or a few spears of asparagus or cauliflower. And you have pasta without tomatoes or with tomatoes, or risotto. These are staples that are in the house when you come home. Either the sauce is already in the freezer or whatever.
I don`t think the family expects to have so many different kinds of food. You have pasta and sauce and you`re going to eat healthy. . . What scares me is the palate of some people, what they`re willing to put up with just because of convenience.
I don`t want to put down the microwave or Ragu Spaghetti Sauce from the jar, because all these things can be doctored up. We love cooking, we like what we are doing but on the other hand we can`t go to the store every day. We don`t have the two hours to cook.
Hooker: Convenience food is still taking a place (in the diet), because in many cases both parants are working. They`re giving in to the jar spaghetti sauce or the canned chicken stock. But even though you are using those they can still, as you say, be doctored up. You can add vegetables to it, spices and herbs to make it taste more like the real thing. At the same time they are listening to everybody saying ”fresh is better, fresh is better,” then when you tell them that the canned tomatoes are better than the fresh tomatoes
(that are picked green in Florida and Mexico and then are gassed to turn red before sale), they say, ”Wait a minute.”
Battaglia: Think about where the tomato was when it was put into the can. Did it come from Mexico and then to Los Angeles and then Chicago and then to New York or was it just put in the can in Mexico?
Hooker: What we can do as teachers is not so much to teach a recipe as to (teach) how to get everything they can out of that one (class) session, out of everything you do, even just with one class. It`s how you put it together. . .
Tribune: What kind of people sign up for cooking classes?
Hooker: All kinds of people. A lot more men, a lot more men. Many times the classes are more than 50 percent men. A lot of young people. A lot of people who have just left home or just left college. And some are just into food, I don`t want to call them yuppies. But they are really just finding themeselves in a very nice salary level after a college degree. And many of them come from homes where they had good taste, and they want to learn how to do it themselves. You`ve got people who are empty nesters who are coming back and have a little more time to do things. And those who just want to know about things they hear like ”fresh is better, low cholesterol.” They want to know how do you go about it?
Battaglia: When I brought Italian chefs to Chicago, it was mostly men in my classes. They didn`t mind paying $100 for a class. All ages too, very young, some old.
Tribune: What kind of things do they want to know the most?
Battaglia: For me they want to know fish, fish, fish. And different sauces with pastas.
Tribune: Do people come to class because they don`t know a thing? Do people walk in because they honestly can`t turn on a stove?
Hooker: I used to have a class in which they don`t know how to cook, they don`t know how to boil water. You do have to tackle a potato.
Tribune: Do they learn?
Hooker: Oh, they`re estatic at how simple it really is. I take a very elaborate dish and then take it apart. Once you take it apart they realize how easy it is.
True: Cooking is not brain surgery. Don`t make it any harder than it is.
Battaglia: In the beginning of all my classes I say, ”There are no dumb questions, ask anything, please ask questions.”
Bullwinkel: There`s a social element, too. I have a feeling people come to my classes, many of them, as a day off. To be getting together with people of like interests-people who like to cook, people who like to garden, nuturing tasks. We share some things, we have a meal together, and that gives support. True: We have classes from seven (p.m.) to ten. We cook and it`s all hands on, and then, afterwards, we go upstairs and have a little gathering to talk about it.
Tribune: That brings up another question. What`s the best teaching technique? Is it demonstration? Hands on?
Gonzalez: Everybody wants to come to class and jump into the pot. They don`t want to wait; they want to start doing, doing, doing. I say you have to watch me first. I definitely have them watching a whole day before I even let them touch anything. I think the biggest mistake is to have them jump in before they know what`s going on.
I think in many ways they can absorb much more in demonstration. Of course for artistry, granted, hands-on is important.
Tribune (to Linko): Do you agree?
Linko: Not really. I think there`s certain things, like if you`re going to have a menu. It`s not really practical to get everybody to cook it, if they don`t know how to cook. But I think something like pie-making, breadmaking, I think you really almost have to do it. I demonstrate it and then they get in and do it.
Hooker: They`re all anxious to get their hands on because that`s what they`re there for.
Having a small class is important for a demonstration. With 50 people there`s no way you can teach anything. With a small amount of people they all feel that it is very personal. In many cases it is a business and you can understand that too, but. . . if you keep the class small you can keep a one to one relationship.
Gonzalez: And the facilities are not there for a large class.
Linko: I like classes of four to six, which is not always financially rewarding.
Bullwinkel: It does work in classes of six. You have to keep parameters around things, but it still works and it still tastes good.
Sometimes I make mistakes. Sauces don`t work, but you can`t go upstairs and cry. You just start over. You talk about how you can fix it, and they feel better about that. You can recover. That`s what cooking is.
Gonzalez: Also during that demonstration period you break down intimidation, and you loosen everybody up. Get so you laugh, and you need that relaxed feeling, even though, as you say, you have to have those parameters.
Hooker: One thing we have to communicate is that cooking is fun. But if you are going to make it fun you have to be organized. Like any profession.
People want to see how to organize yourself, not only in shopping but in preparation, as you are doing it. You don`t wait to read the recipe to see that you need the flour when your hands are covered with butter. That`s where the fun is.
Besides the general questions about the state of home cooking and cooking classes, we also were curious about some specific techniques in the kitchen, and we discovered there are no pat answers.
Tribune: Do you use a garlic press?
Linko: No, I don`t. I find that cleaning that garlic press is more of a hassle than using a knife. What I tell people is that if they want to use a garlic press, use it. I don`t have any objections to it in terms of taste, but I use a knife. If I`m in a hurry I smash it (garlic), but I don`t demonstrate that. Otherwise I just break it in half and slice it.
Hooker: There are different ways of using garlic, There`s chopped garlic, you got minced garlic, you got creamed garlic. With a garlic press you always get the same garlic. You don`t get the fiber, you get just the pulp and the oil. Sometimes you want it to release its flavor very slowly so the taste
(develops). If you are cooking something fast you want to release the flavor, so smash it. If you are cooking a stew, mince it so it releases very slowly.
Battaglia: Different recipes warrant different ways of using garlic. I use a garlic press. Some recipes you want a more pronouced flavor than others. There are lighter recipes where you just want to cut the garlic or just peel it and put it in the oil. I think it depends on the recipe.
Bullwinkel: I think it has a bitter taste when it`s crushed with all those oils coming to the surface, just like the acrid taste you get from onions. That exposure does make a difference, so I`ll mince it. Actually my favorite way is to crush the garlic in a medium, like in olive oil. When it doesn`t come in contact with the air you get the full force of it.
Tribune: How do you separate eggs?
Gonzalez: I`ll go with using a garlic press, but I sure wouldn`t go with an egg separator.
Battaglia: In the shell (pouring from shell half to shell-half).
True: In the shell. It`s so much faster.
Tribune: What about the bacteria?
Gonzalez: Try not to think about it.
Tribune: Are you teaching raw eggs recipes now?
Hooker: We take the whole egg into the heat. We don`t use raw eggs anymore.
Tribune: No mayonnaise?
Hooker: We use a very high acid to mix with the yolk. The hollandaise is thickened to a one more degree of temperature than is necessary to kill bacteria. We don`t teach them to add raw eggs to something cold like a vineagrette anymore.
I use raw eggs myself but they`re naturally raised eggs. I use them myself but I don`t teach it. It`s like asking someone to take leftover food home.
Bullwinkel: Americans are terrified of germs. I don`t know what it is. It`s a fixation that goes back to the 19th Century. When Pasteur discovered bacteria people stopped using yeast. Thats when baking powder began to be used.
One of the biggest questions was about where do cooking teachers go for advice, who are their favorite cooking writers?
Tribune: What cookbooks do you recommend?
Gonzalez: If you`re old and you`re from Chicago, without question the books we all recommend are the Antoinette Pope cookbooks (now out of print)
. Antoinette had a very famous cooking school. She`s the the one who would say ”You go to the drawer, you open the drawer, you take something out, you do this and this and this”. . . with a lot of emphasis on presentation. . . I measure every book by that one. Not that I use it as much anymore, but it was so honest and so well thought out. Other books left things out. Maida Heatter (American cookbook author who specializes in desserts) is another one, I like.
True: Monique Hooker was my book. Taking her classes.
Tribune: But you can`t have Monique in your kitchen. What do you recommend?
True: Julia (Child, author, television personality and the Grand Dame of American cooking). Stephen Raichlen (American cookbook author, teacher and critic). Encyclopedic books.
Hooker: Technique books. Recipes you can get anywhere. Jacques Pepin
(French chef, cooking teacher and author of two illustrated books on cooking techniques).
Linko: I grew up with Betty Crocker. I was 10 and that was the cookbook my mother used. But, for me, I`d have to say Madeline Kamman (cookbook author and teacher) made me a cook. Her`s was the book I used a lot.
Bullwinkel: Julia, Kamman. She (Kamman) also talks about chemistry. And the Joy of Cooking. And one book is Rose Beranbaum`s ”The Cake Bible”
(William Morrow, $25).
Gonzalez: I think for a baking book is still Paula Peck (author of ”The Art of Baking,” now out-of-print but regarded as an important book on baking .
Battaglia: My mother hated to cook, so I started cooking in high school. I used the Joy of Cooking. Then I started traveling to Italy and learned a lot from chefs by working in restaurants. I reccomend Macella Hazan`s books and Giuliano`s Bugialli) books (both are widely published cookbook authors and teachers).
