US cuisine queen dead at 91

Julia Child, the grande dame of US television cooking shows whose operatic voice and irreverent attitude brought French haute cuisine into America’s humble kitchens, died in her sleep at her California home on Friday at the age of 91.

“She died … very, very peacefully in her sleep,” Child’s nephew David McWilliams told Reuters. “It was the way she wanted to go.She didn’t want to be in a hospital.” Child was with family, friends and her cat Minou when she died of kidney failure at her Santa Barbara home, said her niece, Philadelphia Cousins.Child, who would have been 92 on Sunday, was wilful to the very end, pulling off her oxygen mask just hours before her death, she said.Child has been synonymous with fine cooking in America since 1963, when her first TV show, ‘The French Chef’, became a public television hit and sold millions of books.Friends said they were devastated, among them Ihsan Gurdal, owner of one of Child’s favourite stores, Formaggio Kitchen in Cambridge, Massachusetts.”She would stand by the counter, taste things, make remarks, tell customers what to buy, what’s right, what’s not,” Gurdal, who knew Child for more than 20 years, told Reuters.”She didn’t spare her words.What came into her mind came right out.It was beautiful.” Asked by a radio interviewer once what her ultimate meal would be, Child said:”Red meat and a bottle of gin.” Longtime friend Jacques Pepin, who cooked for the late French President Charles de Gaulle and starred with Child in her final TV cooking show, told Reuters: “People have said she was more French than I was, and to a certain extent it was true.She was a true person.There was nothing fake about her.And people can see that through the camera.” President George W Bush paid tribute, saying Child “enriched America with her optimism and enthusiasm for life …She taught millions to enjoy cooking.” During World War II, Child was said to have helped concoct a shark repellent that helped Allied forces blow up German U-boats.She insisted her contribution to the war effort was more mundane – working as a filing clerk.”I was never a spy,” Child told Reuters in 2002.After the war, she moved to Paris with her diplomat husband Paul Child.By her own admission, she was barely able to boil water when he introduced her to fine cuisine.”I was 32 when I started cooking; up until then, I just ate.” She enrolled in the famed French cooking school, the Cordon Bleu, and later studied with master chefs like Max Bugnard.Then in 1961, in collaboration with French colleagues, Simone Beck and Louisette Bertholle, she wrote the bestseller ‘Mastering the Art of French Cooking’.The book was groundbreaking for introducing French cooking to a nation whose cuisine was best known for meatloaf, hotdogs and hamburgers.That book spawned the PBS television series ‘The French Chef’ and was followed by several other shows where she brought a simple, American approach to gourmet food.Born on August 15 1912, in Pasadena, California, Child’s breakthrough was an appearance on a book review show on Boston’s WGBH station to discuss her cookbook.Russell Morash, who later produced and directed ‘The French Chef’, recalled thinking, “Who is this mad woman cooking an omelet on a book review programme?” But viewers loved it.As the trend toward healthy eating grew in recent years, Child accused those who advised cutting out rich foods like red meat and butter of being “nutritional Nazis”.”Either have the real thing and a little of it or have something else.I like real hamburgers and real meat, real butter.Eat everything.Have fun,” she said in 1992.Bonnie Moore, president of Women’s Chefs and Restaurateurs, said Child had “taught a generation of women chefs that they can excel in a traditionally male-dominated field”.Child always downplayed that role.She told Reuters before her 90th birthday, “By chance, I was the right woman at the right time and I did it.” – Nampa-Reuters * Additional reporting by Greg Frost in Cambridge and Oliver Ludwig in New York”It was the way she wanted to go.She didn’t want to be in a hospital.” Child was with family, friends and her cat Minou when she died of kidney failure at her Santa Barbara home, said her niece, Philadelphia Cousins.Child, who would have been 92 on Sunday, was wilful to the very end, pulling off her oxygen mask just hours before her death, she said.Child has been synonymous with fine cooking in America since 1963, when her first TV show, ‘The French Chef’, became a public television hit and sold millions of books.Friends said they were devastated, among them Ihsan Gurdal, owner of one of Child’s favourite stores, Formaggio Kitchen in Cambridge, Massachusetts.”She would stand by the counter, taste things, make remarks, tell customers what to buy, what’s right, what’s not,” Gurdal, who knew Child for more than 20 years, told Reuters.”She didn’t spare her words.What came into her mind came right out.It was beautiful.” Asked by a radio interviewer once what her ultimate meal would be, Child said:”Red meat and a bottle of gin.” Longtime friend Jacques Pepin, who cooked for the late French President Charles de Gaulle and starred with Child in her final TV cooking show, told Reuters: “People have said she was more French than I was, and to a certain extent it was true.She was a true person.There was nothing fake about her.And people can see that through the camera.” President George W Bush paid tribute, saying Child “enriched America with her optimism and enthusiasm for life …She taught millions to enjoy cooking.” During World War II, Child was said to have helped concoct a shark repellent that helped Allied forces blow up German U-boats.She insisted her contribution to the war effort was more mundane – working as a filing clerk.”I was never a spy,” Child told Reuters in 2002.After the war, she moved to Paris with her diplomat husband Paul Child.By her own admission, she was barely able to boil water when he introduced her to fine cuisine.”I was 32 when I started cooking; up until then, I just ate.” She enrolled in the famed French cooking school, the Cordon Bleu, and later studied with master chefs like Max Bugnard.Then in 1961, in collaboration with French colleagues, Simone Beck and Louisette Bertholle, she wrote the bestseller ‘Mastering the Art of French Cooking’.The book was groundbreaking for introducing French cooking to a nation whose cuisine was best known for meatloaf, hotdogs and hamburgers.That book spawned the PBS television series ‘The French Chef’ and was followed by several other shows where she brought a simple, American approach to gourmet food.Born on August 15 1912, in Pasadena, California, Child’s breakthrough was an appearance on a book review show on Boston’s WGBH station to discuss her cookbook.Russell Morash, who later produced and directed ‘The French Chef’, recalled thinking, “Who is this mad woman cooking an omelet on a book review programme?” But viewers loved it.As the trend toward healthy eating grew in recent years, Child accused those who advised cutting out rich foods like red meat and butter of being “nutritional Nazis”.”Either have the real thing and a little of it or have something else.I like real hamburgers and real meat, real butter.Eat everything.Have fun,” she said in 1992.Bonnie Moore, president of Women’s Chefs and Restaurateurs, said Child had “taught a generation of women chefs that they can excel in a traditionally male-dominated field”.Child always downplayed that role.She told Reuters before her 90th birthday, “By chance, I was the right woman at the right time and I did it.” – Nampa-Reuters * Additional reporting by Greg Frost in Cambridge and Oliver Ludwig in New York