My so-called cooking skills

I really don’t like to visit my relatives who have passed on All Saints Day. I go to change the ? owers then say a quick prayer and leave.

But this doesn’t mean they aren’t always on my mind. The ? rst to go was my surrogate father, Nicanor Tomas, or Daddy Toot to me, who passed away when I was 15. I remember how well dressed and fragrant he always was and I remember how he used to eat. He loved paksiw na talimusak, a small ? sh that was about ?ve inches long. It was delicious because his wife, Lola Dede, was a marvelous cook.

She made the most wonderful kare-kare and adobo.  Sharing his niche is, of course, my Lola Dede. Her real name is Mercedes and she had a marvelous laugh. She made delicious fried chicken. It was the size of a squab, but squabs are fourweek-old pigeons. Lola fried four-weekold chicks. First she cooked them in vinegar, garlic, salt and pepper, then she deep-fried them whole. All her guests got one. It was the most delicious fried chicken I have ever had.

On the niche above theirs are my mother and my grandmother. My Lola Ching was another fabulous cook. Her Sunday cocido was a winner; her mechado, absolutely irreplaceable. Her sotanghon soup with bola-bola I learned to cook; also her fresh lumpia that was made with singkamas or turnips sautéed with pork and shrimps and cilantro. That’s the way we cooked our vegetables when I was young. You sautéed them with garlic, onions, tomatoes, shrimp and pork. When the children were growing up I remember doing a whole batch of this mixture and freezing it.

I would just tell our cook to sauté whatever vegetables she would cook in them green beans, cabbage, whatever. And Mommy! Mommy could bake. I remember waking up to her bread buns baked with chorizo inside.

They were out of this world. She baked them from scratch, waiting for the yeast to make them rise, kneading. Mommy taught me to bake bread. She cooked a delicious jambalaya, bacalao and chicken curry with mango chutney and all the trimmings.

I come from a family of women who were outstanding cooks. Once I was also an outstanding cook. I used to make bouillabaisse from scratch, including the rouille, a sauce you served with it. I baked well bread, cakes, cookies and pies. When the children were teenagers I became an expert at roasting chicken and turkey.

I would create new recipes every time. Once I roasted a turkey stuffed with chestnuts, Chinese mushrooms and rice but basted with hoisin sauce. It was delicious.

I would wake up at ? ve in the morning and begin chopping my ingredients for the turkey, stuff it and put it in the oven before eight so it would be ready by noon. I used to make mashed potatoes au gratin using the blender and grated queso de bola as the topping.

Ask my children. There was a time I was the greatest producer of roast turkey or of roast anything. The other day my husband decided to buy a roll of pork for roasting. I said I would do it. You see, he has a driver who is also a good cook but not the same way I cook. So I tried to roast this pork, stuf? ng it with prunes soaked in scotch. When it was done, some of the prunes forced themselves out and dried up against the glass container.

We had no sea salt, only re? ned iodized salt. My roast was a total failure. I have never failed at cooking before. Not when I was married to the father of my daughters. Not when I was with the father of my son. Not when I was a single parent when I could deliciously roast anything anywhere.  What has happened to my culinary skills? Am I simply out of practice? Did God give me the skills before to teach me to discipline myself, to imagine ? avors and mix them cleverly, to teach me how to concentrate and cook well and not think of my broken heart and my children’s broken lives?

Was it to teach us all to come together around a dinner table and enjoy the delicious dishes I knew very well how to make? Or am I just getting old and forgetful? When I moved from my apartment to my husband’s I placed my cookbooks in storage and haven’t found them yet. My husband is okay with my inability to cook but I am distressed. Should I watch Sandy Daza on TV? Maybe I should take cooking classes. How do I learn again?

Please, Daddy Toot, Lola Dede, Lola Ching, Mommy: teach me to cook again. That’s what I did on All Saints Day weekend. I asked all my relatives who have gone ahead what should I do to get my cooking skills back?

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