HOw To JULIA WOULD HAVE KNOWN

There is a great new book coming out TODAY!
It's called Julia Child Rules: Lessons on Savoring Life.

As many of you know, we have our Julia wall in the kitchen at the farm and we're even going to put up a framed picture of Julia for inspiration in the kitchen.  We love Julia and everything she represented.



The author, Karen Karbo, was looking for bloggers to participate in living life as Julia for a week.  Unfortunately, due to other commitments, I didn't participate, but I still wanted to give her a shout out for asking me to do it and write a blog post in the spirit of the theme anyway.  Remember, I'm a guy, and she still asked me.  That meant a lot.  And of course Julia loved everyone.  While we didn't get to fully live like Julia every day for a week, we did think of her during a recent visit to the grocery store.

We were watching a cooking show and they were cooking with parsnips.  I told 2nd Man that we've never cooked with them and we should try it sometime.
He says "then let's go get some parsnips!"  Whoo hoo, a spur of the moment decision, I love those.  "OK" I say, sounds good.  Off to the grocery store!

We gathered a basket of items and go to the register.  The cashier got to the parsnips and picked them up.  Of course, there was no sticker on them with the code number.  What did people do before scanners and codes?  Oh yeah, they learned about the produce.  But I digress.

He looks for a bit on his printed out list of vegetables.

I can tell he has no clue.

Parsnips
The conversation goes as follows:

What are these?  

Parsnips.

What?

Parsnips.

They're parchnaps?

No, parsnips.

Purselips?

Close, par-snips.

They look like carrots?  

Well it's related to a carrot but it's not one.

He holds one up and asks the cashier at the next register,
if she knows.  Do you know the code for this?

A white carrot?

No, the customer says it's called a parsnip.

What?  Parchlit?  It looks like a big carrot!

No, I interject, it's related to the carrot but it has a sweeter taste when you cook it.  You can roast it, fry it, even eat it raw.  We're going to mash it into a puree and mix it into some mashed potatoes.

He stared blankly ahead.  Apparently it wasn't on his list, and not on hers either.  Maybe he just got tired of looking.

He rang it up using the carrot code.

Vintage botanical parsnip image
As we walked out of the store, 2nd Man said,
"you were SO Julia Child in there, giving him background and ways to eat it".

I laughed and said I just knew that somewhere, Julia Child was laughing along with us.  I can only imagine the situations she encountered when she returned home to the states and was cooking, asking local stores for unusual ingredients, or trying to find a special pan or seasoning.

Of COURSE Julia would have known what a parsnip is!  I can hear her waxing poetic about how to cook it, how it tastes, and having a great story about picking it up at a fresh air market in France, or eating it at a little cafe in the countryside with a warm croissant and a glass of wine.  I guess I did the same thing, only without the great South of France part of the story.

Rule #3 in the book is "Learn to be Amused".

We were Julia, we really were...

...AND we got a great deal on parsnips that day.  :-)



Thank you Julia!

And thank you Karen Karbo for reminding us to live like her.
Check out  Julia Child Rules on Amazon.

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