Biographical Buffet

My mother never taught me to cook. She was born in 1906 and learned to cook in traditional ways, and without spicy curries and the like. I have never found any pastry that was as good as hers. But I was destined to be a provider, not a housewife and mother, so there was no point in passing those skills on to me. Also, my mother could not eat cheese, and she passed that sensitivity down to me and my sister (but, oddly, not to my brothers).

Meat tended to be boiled in the 1950s in England, and I hated it. Fish was not very fresh, so I hated that too. My childhood featured a lot of vegetables, fried eggs on toast, and tomato soup.

Now I’m old and living on Social Security. I’m living with a friend of mine and her husband. They’re younger than me, one works and the other is recovering from major surgery. So when I can, I cook for them. That’s something I didn’t see coming. But I have a small number of dishes I picked up along the way in the last fifty or so years. Welcome to my cookbook for beginners.

Day 1 1970’s Theme: Alcohol before Food

When I first lived alone, I invented my only original dish, “Curried Eggs á la Jane.” I would cook it for friends after drinking. Basically, I could make it in anyone’s house. I just needed eggs and access to herbs and spices. Usually, the eggs were fried. Occasionally I would get fancy and scramble them or make an omelet. As they cooked, I would add substantial amounts of whatever took my fancy from the spice drawer. I always enjoyed them, and I always felt proud that I had cooked, all by myself. To be honest, I don’t remember anyone else saying anything good or bad about them.

I started out as a trainee accountant, sharing a flat in London. Then a series of progressively cheaper bedsits in progressively seedier areas. After a brief stint being very broke selling encyclopedias (when I couldn’t afford to cook, or to eat much at all), I went into insurance. Very basic stuff.

I’m always surprised when I meet people who’ve never lived alone. How do you skip from living with one set of people to living with another, without ever striking out alone, and learning to be comfortable with yourself? I’ve lived about half my life alone, and half with other people (family, friends, lovers). On the whole, I prefer to be alone, depending only on myself.

In the years since then, I have learned to cook sausages, bacon and potatoes to accompany the eggs. Sometimes I fry up bacon or onions or bell peppers before pouring the eggs in the pan. It’s not necessarily healthy, but it makes a satisfying meal. And I can honestly say I taught myself to make it.

Day 2 2010s Theme

I’ve lived in a number of different places over the years. When I was living alone in Texas and reinventing myself into a career that did not require me to stay young forever, a woman came and lived in my house, bringing a variable number of dogs with her. At one stage, we had thirteen dogs in the house – three of mine, five of hers, four she was trying to find homes for, and one she was sure would be just perfect for her sister in Connecticut. Living with women is not really any different from living with men. One day I came home and she had ripped up all the carpets. It was too hard to keep them clean with that many dogs in the house. Fair, but I’d have liked to know about it in advance.

She had those skills of cooking and cleaning and organizing that I had always lacked. She introduced me to a dish that really titillated my palate. Bacon and sausage, chopped into small pieces, fried together with onions and potatoes, with paprika sprinkled into it.

To be honest, I didn’t much care for the paprika or for the onions being only lightly cooked. But forty years had passed, and I had more faith now in my cooking abilities. I turned it into a longer, slower cook, so the onions were clear and starting to caramelize, and added cumin instead of the paprika. Heaven on a plate! Apparently, women know about cooking as well. It is now my second go-to dish.

Day 3 1990’s Theme

After spending time in Texas and in Barcelona, I decided to move to Australia. Good old IT gave me the ability to find work easily, and the job helped me immigrate. Once again, I was on my own in a new place. In Sydney, I went out drinking with a young man and met his roommate, who was a chef. By now, this was one of my interview questions, so I ditched the first guy and took up with the roommate.

I went so far as to cook him one of my few dishes, spaghetti Bolognese, with wholewheat pasta, to make it healthy. He fiddled with it on his plate and then said “Let’s go to Canberra!” It’s safe to say he did not like the dish. We got in the car and drove for three or four hours to Canberra, abandoning the dinner I had cooked.

I was a systems architect, and using my real skill set, I helped guide his career, and he eventually became a successful computer consultant.

He was a creative cook – he’d eat something at a restaurant and then try to replicate / improve it at home. He learned to make pad Thai that way. What he could not do was follow instructions. We tried to make tacos, but it was a disaster. I could buy the Old El Paso taco kit, and I could make the tacos well by slavishly following the recipe. Whenever he tried, it was a disaster.

So another string to my bow, although it does not involve any creativity, is tacos. Honestly not worth the investment here in Texas, though. It’s too easy and cheap to buy tacos better than those I make.

Day 4 1970’s Revisited: The Partnership Between Alcohol and Food

How did I learn to make spaghetti Bolognese? Working in insurance, I finally found a job as a computer programmer. All that brainpower made me a shoo-in for the job when companies were just starting up computer departments. Suddenly I went from basic wage to highly-paid specialist.

My first long term relationship was with a chef. He was under manager of a pub when I met him, but he had actually studied cooking in London. He knew all about the basic sauces, how to construct a menu, plating, the whole business. I used to be his commis chef, although my skills were not up to his standards. So I had all the dull jobs that I couldn’t mess up. I would time things, turn, stir, etc. I was not capable enough for chopping or tasting or seasoning. Our marriage was much like our relationship in the kitchen. Eventually I tired of bringing in all the money while he sneered at my lack of ability in other areas.

He did, however, teach me to make that one dish. Spaghetti Bolognese. He used that sauce a lot, not just for pasta but also for stuffing marrows or peppers. It was rich and flavorful, not especially authentic, but everyone enjoyed it, and it could be cooked in large quantities. After our inevitable divorce, that became my specialty for when I entertained friends. Ground beef, beef stock, tomatoes, tomato paste, onions, bell peppers, garlic, oregano, basil, and sometimes mushrooms. I remember a friend asking me to put wine in the sauce. I did it to please him, but it ruined the flavor. Another time, a friend hated bell peppers and insisted on picking them out. I pointed out that he had picked out a mushroom by mistake, and he refused to eat it, saying “It’s guilty by association now.”

My Bolognese sauce is another reliable standby. The first day, over baked potatoes (I gave up pasta because of the gluten), then the next day as stuffing in peppers. Absolutely the best thing I gained from that first marriage. No time to list all the bad things here.

Days 5 and 6 1980’s Theme: Sex, Drugs, Rock’n’Roll, Alcohol and Food

When I first moved to Texas, I was in my thirties, newly divorced, and living in party city – Austin. I was out drinking and partying most nights each week. At weekends I learned to windsurf on the lake. On the rare occasions when I cooked for myself, I discovered the benefits of pasta sauce in jars. I started to cook chopped sausage and onion in the sauce, then serve it as a quicker, but less flavorful, alternative to the Bolognese. I learned to add oregano, basil, thyme, and fennel as time went by. Like the original Curried Eggs á la Jane, changing the herbs brings different variations to life.

I had a relationship / friends-with-benefits deal with the cook from my local bar. You meet people where you spend the most time. I had realized by now that if I wanted to eat well, I had to find men who cooked well. Although what he cooked was basically diner fare, he was a talented cook. He made wonderful breakfast tacos, for everyone who was still up partying after about 4 or 5 a.m. (Most of my friends.) Breakfast tacos made from eggs, onions and Jimmy Dean’s hot breakfast sausage in flour tortillas with hot picante sauce are the perfect end to a night’s hard drinking. Like him: good to look at, spicy, and physically satisfying.

Day 7 1990’s Revisited: Food Can Happen While You’re Drinking

I always enjoyed roast dinners. When I was young, I generally avoided eating the meat, but I adored the roast potatoes, onions, etc. I never learned how to cook an open roast, because I didn’t want the roasted meat, but I needed its fat and juices.

However, my Australian husband taught me to cook an open roast. Lamb roasts are popular in Australia, so he often cooked them. I learned to eat either lamb or pork as a counterpoint to the wonderful vegetables and sauces. (Beef was too strong a flavor, and chicken cooked too quickly.) I was aware that my friends in England would put their roast in the oven and go to the pub while it was cooking, and then it was ready to eat when they came home. This was a dish even I could master. It did not require exquisite knife skills, just an eye for buying good vegetables. Trial and error taught me the amount of time to allow each type of vegetable to share the roasting pan.

I experimented with vegetables, and ended up roasting potatoes, onions, garlic, parsnips and carrots. Often I needed a second roasting pan. That may have been my most successful marriage. It was a real partnership. Back to basics, with honesty and simple food.

Day 8 2020s Theme: Back to Basics

I moved to the Oregon coast and was surrounded by fresh vegetables in even the small convenience stores. The forest and the beaches were beautiful and restful. I saw wild animals regularly – deer, wild turkeys, even mountain lions. There were bears, but I never saw one. When I first arrived, the woman from Texas welcomed me. In my small Airbnb, she showed me how to make what she called chilli. (Note for purists: There is no one else in the world who would call this dish chilli.) This became my favorite way to celebrate the abundance of fresh produce in my new home.

Ground beef, onion, chili peppers, leeks, tomatoes, tomato paste, herbs and bone broth, and fresh vegetables, served in a soup bowl without rice or beans. As they say ’round these parts, “Anyone who knows beans about chilli knows chilli ain’t got no beans.” It was reminiscent of the spaghetti Bolognese, but with more vegetables and hot spice.

This can also be used to stuff bell peppers on the following day. It is a hit in my current home.

Days 9 and 10 2020s Revisited: The Cookbook Completed

Now, in my latest home in Texas, I have all these to draw on, plus a couple of new ones. Our oven broke down, so I could no longer make open roasts. My sister-in-law bought me an air fryer, and the open roasts were back! I have learned two new dishes with this piece of equipment.

The first, which is pretty obvious, is baked potato. Unlike the microwave, which leaves them with soft skins, these baked potatoes have crunchy skins and can be loaded with butter, sour cream and salt, and served with a sauce or with bacon.

The second is a kind of hamburger. With guidance from the husband of the household, who used to be a chef, I have become adept at making mini burgers from ground beef and sausage meat, soy sauce, and chopped onions. No buns – I don’t really like burger buns, and I have a slight gluten intolerance. Then I make “real” French fried potatoes in the air fryer; large-cut fries sprinkled with salt, and air fried. They taste like the chips from an English fish and chip shop.

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My adventures in the kitchen are the story of my life and my relationships. Family, friends and lovers contributed to these recipes. I get testy when people want me to change them up, because they are an integral part of my history. Ten dishes, all my own (except for the tacos). And in case you didn’t notice, I have given up drinking in my latter years!