This morning I was listening to a radio interview with Simon Wilson, editor of Cuisine magazine, when he said " recently cooking has replaced gardening as the latest trend." I'm sure the many of us who left home in the seventies to go flatting or get married will disagree.
Personally I think the interest in food and cooking began in the late sixties with home cooks copying the restaurant meals of the day. Who remembers dinner parties that took all day to prepare and included any of the following - Garlic Prawns, Shrimp Cocktail, Salmon Mousse, Steak Diane, Lobster Thermidor, Beef Wellington, Veal Marsala, foil baked potatoes with sour cream and chives, salad with proper vinaigrette dressing, Brandy Snaps?
We experimented with Asian cuisine with the help of Charmaine Solomon and her books. We served pumpkin seeds with drinks just like the Greek restaurants did back then. Everyone had their own special way of making Spaghetti Bolognaise and Minestrone Soup.
And don't forget the hippies with their lentils and mung beans.
We drank aperitifs before dinner and liqueurs after dinner , Mateus Rosé, Blue Nun and Tyrells Long Flat Red during dinner. And someone always took the Mateus bottle home to make a lamp stand or stick a candle in the top.
It is obvious from the number of food blogs there is a new generation of young people discovering the delights of food and cooking. I see it as a continuing trend, not the latest fad.
