Friday night has often been a special night for me, a night of dining, dancing and relaxing—with myself as the beloved focus of my attention. Eating the evening meal alone can be seen as a sad thing in American culture, an indication that one is unattractive to the opposite sex, a nuisance to one’s friends, or even worse, a social pariah to one’s family. In America, if one eats alone, particularly on a weekend evening, then the unlucky diner is to be pitied and heads shake mournfully when discussing their plight. It is not so in France, and having grown up in a home with strong French roots, it was not so in our household. Once my sister and I were grown and left school behind, my parents assumed we would exercise the self-sufficiency we had been trained to value. There were no hovering visits or worried phone calls as to whether we were eating properly, or even if we were eating at all. My parents were certain that they had raised competent adults, full capable of shopping for and cooking a satisfying and tasty meal at the end of the work day.
Standing in my Mother’s kitchen and watching her prepare food was one of my favorite things to do as a child. It was a daily event that was as natural to her as breathing and she rarely used written recipes for the foods that were part of her weekly repertoire. Small portions of roast meat or fish appeared on our plates several times during a week, along with ladles full of steaming, perfectly cooked vegetables and home made breads with lots of butter. From Friday to Sunday, the meals became more festive, with cooking shared by both my Mother and Father.
My Father did not barbecue, a type of meal so foreign to our family’s palette and a masculine affectation so amusing to my Father’s sensibilities that I never even knew what “grilled” tasted like until my twenties. On Sunday mornings, my Father would begin to create breakfast about 9:00 a.m., letting my Mother sleep and groom as long as she wished before greeting her romping children. As easily as my Mother allowed observation and participation in her daily meal preparation, my Father did not. Our home became his grand restaurant, and as its owner and Chef, he chose to keep his techniques and recipes a secret, allowing no one to enter the kitchen once his process began. Of only one thing could we be sure as we waited patiently for the food to be placed on the table—there would be several dishes, and each of them would be delicious.
