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Meeting Julia Child

July 16, 2025 by DickH Posted in Uncategorized Leave a Comment

Meeting Julia Child

by Leo Racicot

I had become good friends with the well-loved American writer, M.F.K. Fisher (Mary Frances) when, on one of my many, cherished visits to her bungalow home in Glen Ellen, her friend, Julia Child, phoned her for a chat. After she hung up, I saw a bulb light up above Mary Frances’ pretty head. She said, “Julia lives in Cambridge. You live in Lowell. I’d love for the two of you to meet. You’ll get along swimmingly!”

I jumped at the chance to meet the famous French Chef. MF made all the arrangements and in March of that year, after Julia gave a talk at the Boston Public Library followed by a book-signing at nearby Newbury Street’s Harvard Bookstore Cafe (now gone), I stepped meekly forward, calling out my name to “Mrs Child”. “Oh!”, she burbled to the long line of admirers waiting for her autograph, “Leee-ohh’s here!! Leee-ohh Rass-ee-coe is a friend of M.F.K. Fishah!!” Everyone clapped as I ascended into Seventh Heaven.

Every Saturday afternoon, when I was a boy, lying belly-down on my living room couch, watching Julia Child, The French Chef chop, dice, bake, parboil and joke her way into everyone’s heart, including mine, never in my wildest dreams did I imagine I would one day be standing in front of her (or rather, I should say, cowering under her for at an imposing 6′ 3″ tall, she towered over my quivering smallness like Juno halloo-ing down from Mount Olympus. To say I was a tad nervous is to say that flames are hot).

But she put me at ease immediately in that goose-y, Warner Bros. cartoon of a voice, “Call me Jooo-leeah!!”. I had wondered to myself whether some of her t.v. personality might be a put-on for entertainment’s sake. I was wrong; Julia was as engaging, eccentric, generous, smart and daffy as she was when she cast her magic spell every week over PBS viewers here in Boston and all over the world.

With a wave of her hand, Julia shooed her entourage away proclaiming, “Leo and I shall be dining alone”. We were ushered to a corner table by the head chef himself, a dark, jolly Buddha from Tunisia named Moncef. We ate and drank lustily, and spoke about many subjects (at least Julia did; I was happy just listening to her hold forth on a constellation of topics the scope and breadth of which was infinite, for Julia, I would come to learn in the years ahead, did not care to talk shop. Local politics, world affairs, space exploration, the literary and arts scene, libraries, her days as a spy for the O.S.S., the Cambridge community and neighborhood she lived in — these were the subjects she was more apt to pile onto her conversational plate. She was one of the most intelligent people I have ever met, as well as one of the funniest; her comedic skills and timing could, at times, rival Lucille Ball’s; And she was possessed of an Olympic energy. “I never tire!” was her motto, and I saw her outlast, outdo, outshine people 20, 30, 40 years her junior, including me.

Our evening was a total delight.

So it was with some regret when it ended that I hailed her a cab and watched it whisk her away into the night. My time with her was so once-in-a-lifetime and surreal, it was as if it had taken place in a dream. “Well, I probably won’t be doing that again anytime soon, if ever”, I thought as I made my happy/sad way home…

****

Years later, I took a job as caregiver to the son of former members of The Roosevelt Administration, Hilda and Francis Shea. My responsibilities were solely to instill living and language skills in their son, Richard. I was told to report to an address on Francis Avenue. And though I knew the street was only a stone’s throw away from Harvard Yard (having trained at Harvard Divinity School years before), I had no real idea where Francis Avenue was in relation to its neighboring streets.

Imagine my surprise, then, when, about a month after taking up my duties there, the house manager, Bob Stone, took me over to the kitchen window, pointed to a grey house in the near distance and said, “I bet you don’t know who lives there”. I said I did not and Bob exclaimed, “Julia Child!!” I was so beside myself, I made the mistake of telling Bob I had actually had dinner with Julia and the story of our evening together, and about M.F.K. Fisher. I say “mistake” because the very next day, Ms. Shea, my employer, came down to the kitchen asking if I knew how to make a sauce soubise. I said I did not and told her the on-going joke among my friends that “Leo could burn boiling water if you give him the chance”. “Oh, come, come now”, tittered Ms. Shea, “I know you’re friends with M.F.K. Fisher and Julia Child. You’re being much too modest.” No amount of protest could convince Ms. Shea that knowing M.F.K. Fisher and having dinner with Julia Child once did not mean I could cook. She led me over to a wall spilling over with cookbooks galore and declared, “You are my son’s companion and now you will be my chef as well.” I swallowed hard. Was I ever in the stew. Because Hilda Drosnicop Shea never took “no” for an answer. From anyone. Ever. She handed me a cook’s apron, showed me where all the pots and pans were kept and said, “Let’s see what you can whip up for this evening’s meal.”

Only God knows what came out of the oven those first, few months because I certainly didn’t. Somehow, my concoctions didn’t look a thing like the pictures in the cookbooks. Let’s just say it was not uncommon for staff to call out for pizza delivery as soon as they saw what I had plunked down for them on the table.

One particular fright that was supposed to be Hungarian goulash but looked like a volcano had erupted in the Dutch oven and tasted even worse, became the final straw. It was time to call in the cavalry (a.k.a. Julia Child, or as we all in the house came to intone whenever something inexplicable sat bubbling on top of the frightened stove, “What Would Julia Do??”)

It is little known about Julia, I think, that she was one of the most accommodating celebrities on the planet. Her home phone number was listed in the book; not only did she not mind people calling her for culinary rescue; she also welcomed them, for she loved all things food-related and saw herself as a teacher and felt it her duty to school her students or at least listen when they needed kitchen assistance. Perhaps because fame had come to her later in life, she had not let it go to her head. Down-to-earth, practical, and having herself made many mistakes on her way to “Mastering the Art of French Cooking”, she more than understood (the reader will please forgive my use of the obvious idiom here) that “You have to break a lot of eggs before you can make an omelet”.

And so, Julia and I became better friends this second time around. We went to the movies together, took fine walks around The Writers’ Block, shopped at Farmer’s Markets and local grocerias, went for rides to see the New England foliage.

Mostly, we spent happy hours in her kitchen, her patience and good nature explaining why my souffle had taken a nose dive, why eating my Apple Brown Betty was like sticking your tongue into a giant sugar bowl or why the catfish casserole “should never have been put into a recipe book in the first place; some recipes simply don’t work!!” She helped me become, over time, if not her or M.F.K. Fisher, then certainly a reasonable facsimile thereof. I can whip up a mean jambalaya, can tease the most succulent juices from the driest meats, and my Beef Bourgignon has been known to draw near-orgasmic sounds from those lucky enough to find it on their plates. Ahem.

For this is the basis of what Julia Child did. Her gift to America. That she was able, through talent, but also through hard work and perseverance, belief in herself and a soupcon of “funny” thrown in for taste, to turn a country of unculinary dolts like me into cooks who won’t flinch when handed a pot, a pan or a brand new recipe to grapple with. Julia Child changed the way we think about food, about eating, about ourselves in our kitchens. She liberated the American palate, mired for generations in a diet of meat, potatoes and gravy. She introduced new foods to the American table, opening our minds to experimentation and international cuisines. We eat better because she explored better foods for us to eat. Julia was a true pioneer and like all pioneers, found the courage to step out onto an unknown road and bid us follow…

I miss her. I imagine we all do. With a spirit as brave and nonesuch as hers, how can we not?