Julie Powell and her husband didn’t eat everything she made from Julia Child’s cookbook. “We always took a bite of everything but didn’t always clean our plates. We gave away a lot of food to friends, and what I didn’t like I took to work,” Powell said.
How Julia Child helped Julie Powell master the art of life
By KATE LAWSON
The Detroit News
http://www.kansascity.com/entertainment/story/1349418.html
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If the expression “you are what you eat” still applies, then Julie Powell would be devouring boxes of Cracker Jack.
Nutty, salty, sweet and highly addictive, the secretary-turned-blogger-turned-book-author — and now the subject of the film “Julie & Julia,” opening Aug. 7 — is all that and more.
Dressed in a pretty royal blue silk blouse and dark denim skirt, she looks like a schoolgirl and talks like a sailor as she reflects on the last seven years and the project that helped change her life — cooking all 524 recipes from Julia Child’s “Mastering the Art of French Cooking” in 365 days.
Q. You were 29 when the project began. Obviously in undertaking such a daunting thing, you had to have already been an accomplished cook.
A. I wouldn’t say “accomplished”; I knew how to cook — not step-by-step from the “Joy of Cooking” or anything. Actually, my favorite cookbook was from Paul Prudhomme (the famed New Orleans chef). I had moved to New York from Texas, and I was really missing my mother’s cooking. She made a gorgeous seafood gumbo, and I really wanted to re-create it. It was the roux that was my undoing. I borrowed a spoon from a friend and kept stirring and stirring the flour and butter over high heat to thicken and darken it. I didn’t realize the spoon was plastic, and when I pulled it out of the pot, the end had melted off. I had no clue. Still, I loved to entertain and was wildly ambitious; I was always fixing dinner for my friends.
What was the motivation behind the project then?
I was lost. I was a temp secretary in an awful job in New York after the 9/11 attacks, and it was sucking the life out of me. But it was beyond the cooking. I had a revelation that I needed to do something. I needed structure, I needed progress, and I needed to do something besides coming home every night watching TV and getting drunk.
It was your husband Eric’s idea about blogging, which was a relatively new concept then. Were you a writer before you started blogging?
I always had half-finished novels lying about, poems I’d written, but it’s hard when you get started for you to believe in yourself as a writer. The blog helped me stay focused.
Did Amy Adams, who plays your character in the movie, contact you before her role?
No, actually it was in the contract that I had to stay away from the set, which was really difficult actually because Nora (Ephron, the director) filmed most of the exteriors in my neighborhood. Amy was everywhere, at my subway stop, where I shop, outside the building where I used to work. One day I could even look out my window and see them filming. It was surreal. I felt like I was being stalked.
Any advice you can offer to anyone attempting this same project?
A complete novice should start at the beginning, and you can see that Julia has written the book for the home cook. Every ingredient is available in a supermarket. Of course, it would help if you had a good butcher, though, especially when you need to extract bone marrow, you should have them do that for you. The first recipe is a delightful Potage Parmentier, which is a simple potato soup. And while it would never make the cover of Gourmet, it is a wonderful soup and the perfect place to start.
I understand that when Julia Child read your blog she thought you were “glib and unserious.” How did that make you feel?
I’m sorry I never got to meet her. I really think Julia affected so many people so profoundly. We all have our own ways of remembering her, and everyone has their own Julia. I think my Julia would be just fine with me.
How is your husband doing with all the publicity? I know that in your next book, “Cleaving: A Story of Marriage, Meat and Obsession,” you not only write about learning to become a butcher but an extramarital affair you had with a friend.
Eric was remarkable. He’s never not been there, and I don’t know another man who would do that. Except maybe Paul Child; he was with Julia all the way. And yes, we are together and happy.
Is there anything you miss from your old life? Are you different now?
Well, I’ve calmed down but not entirely. And I sure don’t miss my job.
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