In the beginning...

IN THE BEGINNING...

My love affair with food started early—at ten days old, to be exact. That was when my mother (who claims that she was, at age 21, “too young and stupid” to know any better) fed me solid (baby) food. So I guess I caught on early, and the affair has been the love of a lifetime.

I don’t think I was ever a fussy eater, though there were a few foods that I refused to eat at different times in my life. The only thing that I absolutely refused to eat as a child was cooked carrots—probably because my mom, like 1960’s mothers everywhere, served canned carrots, and I still wouldn’t want to eat those today, though I would eat carrots prepared virtually any other way. I also went through a period when I didn’t join my family in Sunday-night Chinese food feasts, probably because the gluey texture and bland flavor of Long Island-style Cantonese did nothing for my taste buds. My taste for Chinese didn’t really blossom until the first Szechuan restaurant opened in our area, and then I was hooked.

How many kids would order a plate of sauteed chicken livers and onions at a restaurant? I did. How many kids ask for a Winnie-the-Pooh-shaped cake pan for Hanukkah? I did. There may have been other kids who eagerly anticipated their fathers’ arrival at the end of the work day when the fathers came with boxes of Hershey’s Golden Almond Bars. Like many other suburban Jewish kids, I looked forward to Sunday morning breakfasts of bagels, lox, and cream cheese, though the real treat was the chocolates my parents purchased at the appetizing store--especially the chocolate-covered marshmallows with a layer of caramel on the bottom.

My interest in baking also started early, with the aforementioned cake pan (and yes, I did make cakes with that pan). Naturally I had an Easy-Bake oven, though eventually I graduated to using the tiny cake pans to make cakes in a “real” (toaster) oven. I also spent hours poring over my mother’s copy of the Betty Crocker Cooky Book, which was loaded with color photographs of cookies of every kind. I would study the photos and the recipes and imagine how very wonderful it would be to make each and every recipe.

But I think I really caught the baking bug when I went on a class trip to the Wonder Bread factory. I was about nine years old at the time, and I can still remember the incredible aroma of a factory full of baking bread. We were given paper hats to wear in the factory and at the end of the tour we were each rewarded with a single Hostess cupcake. To top it all off, my teacher then distributed recipes for bread, which I was desperate to make at home.

Fast forward many years, to my young adulthood in New York City. I did what all college graduates living in New York did—I got a job in an office, first in a music management firm, then in the publicity department of a publishing house, a career I pursued for nearly eighteen years. All the while I baked—for family and friends, for co-workers, and once in a great while, for someone who would actually pay me to bake something for them. I collected cookbooks by the dozen and subscribed to food magazines. I even obtained, through a book search company, a nearly-new copy of the Betty Crocker Cooky Book, and reveled in the idea that I could bake every cookie in that book if I desired, now that I was a grown-up with my own kitchen. I took a wedding-cake weekend workshop and made my brother’s wedding cake, to much applause.

I got married and had two daughters, and I loved baking elaborate cakes for their birthday parties—think Sponge Bob, Scooby-Doo and the Powerpuff Girls. It was never a bother to bake cupcakes for their classroom parties or bake sales—I looked for excuses to bake. And while I was sitting at my desk talking to authors and producers and editors, I kep thinking, “How can I go from this to baking for a living?”

My transition, when it happened, is the stuff of fairy tales to the ears of those who have always wanted to switch careers. My co-worker Dawn was a fellow baker, and she and I would have long discussions about our craft. She left publishing and worked for a woman named Marie who had a baking business in her apartment, mostly making elaborately decorated cookies for various clients. Dawn and I would occasionally get together for lunch, I would hear about how much she loved her baking job and her boss, and I would think, “If only I could get a job like that!”

Eventually I did get a job like that—with Dawn, at Marie’s apartment. They were looking for help for the holiday season and I was looking for a new food-related career. And from that moment on, as they say, I have never looked back.

It’s been a wonderful six years since I made the leap from publishing to pastry. I have worked for bakeries, caterers, and a school (more on these later) and have also taught cooking and baking, both in classrooms and privately. I have baked wedding cakes, birthday cakes, and decorated cookies for nearly every holiday and occasion you can think of. And even though baking is now my “job,” I still love it as much as ever. For me, a good time means pulling out the butter and eggs and sugar and chocolate and trying a new recipe, or visiting an old favorite, at my home for family and friends. Baking makes people happy—the people who eat the results are always happy, but so are the people who do the baking.

So why start this blog now? These days it seems to be the next, required step in one’s career, particularly in freelance-type work where it makes sense to have a way to connect to others with similar interests. I hope to make contact with lots of other people who love to bake, cook, eat, and talk about baking, cooking and eating. I’d like to share my thoughts about food with a wider audience and I look forward to hearing back from those of you who are moved to respond to my writings.

So, welcome to my blog...happy cooking/baking/eating...while I dream up the topic for my next entry!

Sherri aka Cakegirl