The Straight-Shootin' Julia

I stumbled on this YouTube clip of Julia Child from a 1995 interview in which she briefly talks about McDonald's french fries and how much she used to like them. That is, until the fast-food chain stopped frying them in animal fat -- "they've been kind of limp ever since," she opined.

I agree. I remember McDonald's french fries from the early 1970s, and they were crisper and tastier back then.

While I'm taking you on a nostalgic journey with Julia, I should mention that if you want to watch old episodes of "The French Chef" (the PBS series that introduced her to millions of Americans), you can access such episodes via this link at Philadelphia radio station WHYY.

If you happen to be visiting the nation's capitol, you can visit the kitchen that Julia Child cooked in for over 40 years. It's housed within the Smithsonian Museum of American History.

Julia: No Enemy of Shortcuts

This past weekend, I finally got around to watching the movie "Julie & Julia." I enjoyed it, although I would have preferred to learn more about Julia Child's life, instead of seeing quite as much of Julie Powell's whiny, angst-ridden persona displayed on the big screen.

Maybe there's another reason I should have been annoyed by Julie Powell. According to this column by Ezra Klein in today's Washington Post:

. . . the past is being massaged to fit the needs of the present. In the movie, Amy Adams, playing blogger Julie Powell, tries to explain the importance of Child to her husband.

"She changed everything," Powell says. "Before her, it was frozen food and can openers and marshmallows." And after her? Most of us have all three in our kitchens. And no rendered beef tallow in our freezer.

"I felt like jumping up in my seat in the movie and saying, 'No, no, no!'" says Laura Shapiro, author of Julia Child: A Life. "There were things that came in cans she liked just fine, like chicken broth. She dubbed Uncle Ben's Rice 'l'Oncle Ben's.' "

Child adored supermarkets and admired McDonald's. She thought premade pie crust a wonderful invention and was supportive of irradiating food for safety. Cooking, for her, was not in conflict with progress. Rather it was, or could be, in partnership with it.

As a self-admitted user of premade pie crust, I think Klein makes a good point.