More Men in the Kitchen

New Zealand Listener, Volume 32, Issue 824, 13 May 1955, Page 17

More Men in the Kitchen

\V HATEVER the private opinions of women about men in the kitchen may be, the regrettable fact of the matter is that when men can cook, they do it well. So much so that it really is criminal waste of talent for men’s contribution to kitéhen harmony to be confined to juggling with dishes and teatowels, When men, forsaking their soldering-irons as in the old song, go adventuring with pots and pans the pro..ducts are likely to be both novel and spectacular. The resultant mess, of course, is likely to be the same because men in the kitchen, unlike women, can never be persuaded to clean up as they go. Perhaps, in their Machiavellian fashion, they know what they’re about. The unspoken assumption these days is that the guests will do the washing-up anyway. In a spirit of masochistic curiosity Elsie Lloyd, who is in charge of the Commercial Division’s Women’s Sessions, invited ten male aficionados of cooking to lift the lid off their prowess and give the regular cooks (female) a taste of what cooking-undistracted by clinging children or husbands who won’t eat anything but roast beef and apple pie-is like. There have been other series of talks about food given by men for the NZBS before. Many of these have been more concerned with, shall we say, "the philosophy of food"-food and its accompaniments like wines and sauces and in its ideal combinations. There’s a Man in the Kitchen! rolls up its sleeves and attacks cooking from the point of view of serving up dishes with the maximum of flavour and the minimum of effort. One thing. the men seem to be agreed upon, It’s that New Zealand housewives spend too much time on cooking the frivolities-the sponges and sugary con-fections-when all that’s necessary in that line is a good fruit cake. Then many of the ten asbirants to "Cordon Bleu" status are in favour of following European usage and making a good meal out of one course, With perhaps a soup as well. Thus the fiddling preparations for the sweet course can be dispensed with except on special occasions. How do men come to take up cooking? Mostly, it seems, for the prosaic reason that they don’t live at homé but still Must eat. Richard Reynelds, one of those "whose other interests in life is managing a bookshop, confessed that at first it was a matter of brazening it out.. When his friends came to his flat for a meal he had to make it look as though he found cooking enjoyable, and later found that it was so. John Blennerhasset (whose specialty is a leek soup called Vichysoisse) believes that the training he received as a bachelor-having to cook in one pot on a gas-ring-was the best possible. He learned the beauties of variations on a single theme: the difference various spices can make and how to use prepared items like soup cubes and tinned foods intelligently and imaginatively. There are some delicious-sounding reincluded in the series. The thought

of "Glacé- soufflé Marie Louise" is enough to set one drooling like one of Pavlov’s' dogs. Then there’s Albert Zwartjes’s "Hot, Lightning,’ and Pat Smyth’s Pumpkin Pie. But why go on? Listeners will be able to hear There’s a Man in the Kitchen! from 2ZB's Women’s Hour, beginning on Friday, May 13, and later from 3ZB and 4ZB.,