Rose Madeline Mula: If You Can't Stand the Heat
My mother was a terrific cook. Despite that fact -- or maybe because of it -- I am not. While she was alive, I could always count on wonderful meals, without ever having to go near a stove. So I didn't. I figured that I could learn when it became necessary. Nothing to it. All I'd need would be recipes. Anyone who can read, I reasoned, can cook -- which is true, up to a point. But how well? Ah, there's the rub.
Living alone, I did not have in-house critics to provide feedback for my culinary efforts. Nevertheless, and not to brag, when I invite friends and most kin to dinner, they invariably lavish praise on every course. "Why not?" some of my other, less kind relatives point out; "It's one less meal they've had to prepare for themselves."
Such remarks do not inspire confidence.
Right, Actress Joan Fontaine in movie trailer for The Women
It was with considerable trepidation, therefore, that I entered the kitchen of my hostess, the legendary actress, Joan Fontaine, one long-ago Thanksgiving morning, to offer my assistance. Acting was not Miss Fontaine's only talent. Not by a long shot. She was also a hole-in-one golfer, a prize-winning fisherwoman, a hot air balloonist, an accomplished horsewoman, and a pilot. "When you've had as many husbands as I've had, Darling," she'd quips, "you learn all their hobbies." And one hobby all hubbies shared in common was a love of good food. No problem. Joan was also a gourmet cook who studied at the Cordon Bleu in Paris.
No wonder I was intimidated that day. But though my mother did not teach me to cook, she did teach me good manners, so I asked, politely, "What can I do to help, Joan?" "Can you cook?" she asked. "Not really," I said truthfully, "but I should be able to manage some simple tasks." "All right," said she. "You can section the fruit for the salad."
She handed me an apron and sat me down at a table in front of a large bowl, a bag full of oranges and grapefruit, and a paring knife. I figured, how hard can this be?
I found out. She stopped me as I was mangling orange No. 1. "No, no -- not that way -- this way," she said demonstrating. Within seconds, she had removed the skin expertly, in one long piece, and then cut into the orange. With one swoop, she sliced into a segment and up the other side, removing a perfect orange slice and leaving behind only the membrane from both sides. In less than a minute, she had repeated this feat until all that was left in her hand was a complete "empty" orange-only membranes and core.
I tried to imitate her. Disaster. "Never mind," she said, "I'll do it. It will be faster."
"See, that's why I can't cook," I wailed. "That's what my mother always says."
"Good God, I don't blame her," said Joan. "The woman should be canonized just for letting you near her kitchen!" She then banished me to the den to write place cards.
I have never lived it down.
Thirty years later in a phone conversation, after her usual, "How's your love life, Darling?" (which she knows never compared to hers, even in my wildest dreams), she twisted the knife: "Are you having any more success in your kitchen than in your bedroom these days?" This, in spite of the fact that a mutual friend who had dined at my home a few years ago and claimed to enjoy it (again, he didn't have to cook it himself) wrote her a glowing review of the meal.
Instead of a letter, he inserted the message in a large mock-up of a front page of the show-biz bible, "Variety." Echoing "GARBO TALKS," the historic headline touting Greta Garbo's first talking picture, his headline read, "MULA COOKS!" Unfortunately, his praise gave me a false sense of security.
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