PBS changed my life

I know how fortunate I've been through life.  I've learned through bitter lesson why not to take anything in life for granted.  And this sense of gratitude fills all the chambers of my heart.  Even the place where my dream kitchen lives.

I learned to cook watching PBS.  It's the american Public Broadcast System where independant ideas are brought without agenda or corporate influence - the poorer cousin to the BBC if you will as there isn't a compulsatory fee for having PBS, but there are many, MANY telethons and appeals on a yearly basis to beg, wheddle, guilt you into giving and provide ongoing financial support in exchange for the pleasure of their programming, broadcast without any commercials.  It's the refuge of classics such as Masterpiece Theatre, Colin Firth's Pride and Prejudice, Sesame Street, This Old House (anyone else remember Bob Vila?), Justin Wilson - the frankly scary backwoods cook who could reel yarns bigger than the trout he was "cooking cajun".  Nova, a science program which was much more accessable and enjoyable than what most science teachers could offer.


But for me, there were few like the incomparable Julia Child.  Through her I learned it was part of the process that you could make mistakes and still have a lovely meal.  Her sense of fun and the unashamed way she loved food inspired me to be adventurous and let myself learn how to do things by trial and error.


My husband Tony thrilled me by finding Julia's The French Chef on DVD and giving them to me as a present.  It's fun to re-live the golden days of when her programmes came into my Saturday afternoons when I would spend the day in the temple of my mother's kitchen.  I was glued to those b&w images, watching Julia's hands flying over a chopping board.  The suppleness of her wrists folding meringues through batter.  The power in her shoulders as she hoisted platters laden with a bounty of creations you just knew smelled the way you could imagine all of Paris smelled in the early mornings... butter and sugar and cinnamon and love.

So here I am, still devoted and with the help of modern technology, still watching and learning from Julia on my saturday afternoons a lot of miles removed and many years later. I've found there are still things I'd either missed or wasn't ready to take in on her shows.  But this could also be because as the years go by, and the tasting dishes from around the world pile up, I realize there is so much more I do not know about food and the world than what I have already achieved - and my how exciting it is to look forward to meeting the challenge in getting to know them all!

Bring on the lemongrass and galangal root, look out Thailand - here I come!