American Action Fund for Blind Children and Adults
Future Reflections Special Issue on Cooking A LETTER FROM THE EDITOR
Escape From the Tiny Kitchen
by Deborah Kent Stein
My Aunt Autumn once paid me a compliment that I have always remembered. I was visiting her for the weekend, and she had invited some friends over for dinner. We spent the afternoon in the kitchen, preparing an elaborate meal with soup and salad, meat and vegetables, and a rich, creamy dessert. As I stood at the counter chopping celery, Aunt Autumn commented, “It’s such a pleasure working in the kitchen with you! We share space so easily and comfortably! There’s an intuitive feeling about it—we never get in each other’s way.”
Aunt Autumn’s comment was unique and wonderful to me. For most of my life I had heard statements that were quite the opposite when I offered to help in the kitchen, no matter whose kitchen it happened to be. “Don’t worry, I’ve got everything under control in here. There really isn’t enough space in this kitchen for another person.” “There’s no room in here for you to help me. You can wash dishes after we eat.” “There’s hardly any counter space. I can barely move around in here myself. Just sit at the table and talk to me.”
The kitchens of the world seemed to shrink the moment I approached. The message was unavoidable; my help wasn’t needed or welcome. In all those tiny kitchens, I would only be in the way.
My mother was a bit of a perfectionist, and it was hard for her to watch me in the kitchen without swooping to the rescue. Fortunately, she came up with an original way for me to get some cooking experience on my own. Every Thursday, when Mom took my brother to his weekly piano lesson, I was in charge of preparing a simple family dinner. Mom would set out the ingredients and give me careful instructions before she and Gordon headed out the door. Then I had the kitchen all to myself, and I reveled in the sense of being in charge.
Despite those weekly forays into cooking, I didn’t really experience the joys (and occasional disasters) of the kitchen until I had my own apartment, a third-floor walkup on the rundown side of Boston’s Beacon Hill. I purchased ingredients at the neighborhood market, experimenting as I went along. With no one standing by to warn me about the pan sizzling on the stove or fly to the rescue when I picked up a knife, I had the freedom to learn through my mistakes and successes.
At that time I had only one Braille cookbook. It was called Cooking without Looking: Food Preparation and Techniques for Blind Homemakers, by Esther Knudson Tipps. The brief introduction explained that the book was “Taken from a Master of Science Thesis from the University of Texas, August, 1956.”
The book was embossed in three soft-cover Braille volumes, with recipes that included breads, casseroles, cookies, meats, and vegetables. Sometimes Ms. Knudson Tipps was needlessly timid, as when she advocated baking hamburgers in the oven to avoid frying them on top of the stove. Overall, though, her book was an excellent introduction. I was thrilled to know that there were other blind cooks out there in the world. I wasn’t alone as I mixed and stirred and waited breathlessly for the results.
Over the years the kitchen lost its mystery. I didn’t live to cook, but I certainly cooked to live. By the time NFB President Mark Riccobono suggested that Future Reflections publish a special issue around cooking, my early adventures in the kitchen were a distant memory. Was there really anything to say about cooking that was especially relevant for blind children and teens? Did parents and teachers of blind children really need a cooking issue? How much interest could there be? What was there to say?
When I sent out preliminary queries, however, the response was overwhelming. To my surprise and delight, our readers were eager to share stories about their cooking challenges and triumphs. Clearly President Riccobono was onto something. An issue on cooking was long overdue.
The contributors to this issue represent people with a wide variety of perspectives. Carol Castellano explains how she exposed her children (one blind and one sighted) to cooking before they started school, letting them help out as she prepared the evening meal. Justin Salisbury describes his search for a fully accessible machine that would allow him to make espresso at home. NFB Past President Dr. Marc Maurer explains how he learned to grill hamburgers. Several authors share their experiences learning to cook and teaching cooking to blind children and adults.
Some of the contributors to this issue, including Melba Taylor and Jim Papania, cook professionally. MasterChef Christine Ha shares her story of becoming a celebrity cook.
Of course, cooking is only the first step in the dining experience. Eileen Rivera Ley writes about the etiquette of dining, a topic she has studied extensively. As she points out, preparing a meal is only the first step. In the end it's all about the fellowship.
I hope you enjoy reading this special issue of Future Reflections as much as I've enjoyed putting it together. I hope these stories will help more blind young people make room for themselves in the kitchens of the world. Those kitchens are not so tiny after all.