Cooking from scratch. (Eliot's Cooking Story)

I made chicken soup from scratch yesterday and it turned out great. Both of my room mates were suffering from a cold that I brought into the house so I felt it was the least I could do. As I was eating the soup I started to wonder how it is that I learned how to cook so many things from scratch.

MOM: The obvious candidate is my mum. Even since I was a little kid she has always let me help her cook. I used to pull up a chair beside her in the kitchen and watch watch her cook. As I got older she started to give me more challenging tasks. At a very young age (like 6) I can remember being in charge of dessert which usually involved pre packaged pudding mix. If any of you reading this blog have kids one day, do them a favor and teach them to cook. Everybody has to eat right? Why not be able to cook cheap good and nutritious food?

DAD: I inherited a bunch of amazing recipes from my dad. These treasured family favorites have been selected for taste, cost effectiveness and ease of preparation.

Grandma: All Things Ukrainian.
Gran: All manner of English food. Mostly roasted meat.

TV: Growing up I always watched cooking shows. Before food TV, one had to be at home by 4:00 to catch the best shows. For the most part food TV is far to stylized and has little to do with teaching people how to cook at home. Those slick producers from food network Canada could take a lesson from Biba.


The Early Years: 1983 - 2000
Frugle Gourmet: Cancelled because of sexual harassment lawsuits with his male staff
Urban Peseant: Because he always messed up his stuff, through him I learned how to recover a seemingly lost recipe.
Biba's Italian Kitchen: Every time I cook pasta I hear Biba's voice in my head. "you cook the pasta with the sauce, not the sauce with the pasta!"
Yan Can Cook: I don't think I could ever really do anything this guy did because he went to fast. Mostly I learned how to use asian ingredients. Also, I picked up my cleaver skills from this guy.
We Cook You Smile: The Best Chinese cooking show EVER! This was a cable access show filmed in Winnipeg at the river mandarin. The lady spoke almost no English, she just did her thing, almost always looking at the wrong camera.


The Food Network: Post 2000
Iron Chef: Not that I really cook with unisex salmon... I just liked to watch them do their thing.
Two Fat Ladies: Again... These two were fun to watch but I was horrified at a lot of the food they made. They were always using wierd brittish food and cheese I couldn't afford.
Alton Brown: Very funny, very though rough. I can only imagine what his books are like.
Ming Tsy: His mixture of east west was very helpful. A little more up to date than Yan.
Rachel Ray: Can't say enough good stuff about his girl. Her 30 minute meals are exactly what a student needs. Some people don’t like her but usually it's because she's too fun and nice.

So, the point of all this is... It's not like I have some sort of magical cooking power. It seems that I have managed to acquire a decent knowledge of cooking from a variety of places. I’m glad I watched cooking TV instead of Full House… Not much you can do with that now is there.