It's not whether we can cook the perfect turkey. It's whether we can survive Cooking In Other People's Kitchens
As the cook in the family, when we arrive at our sister-in-law’s, granny’s or parents’ home for Christmas, we're expected to roll up our sleeves, pull on a pinny and take over. Everybody loves our perfectly-timed bird, our crunchy roast potatoes and our wonderful brandy butter. They have no idea how much we rely on our sharp knives, a familiar oven and heavy-bottomed pans.
Spider plants in the sprouts
Having space to work in would be a start. A friend of mine remembers trying to cook in a kitchen so cluttered that 'spider plants infested with greenfly were dangling into my sprouts'. Dream kitchens can be so, er, dreamy, that there’s nowhere to do the food prep, particularly if the non-cook owners of the kitchen designed it themselves. And no, it’s not convenient to place a vase of scented lilies on the counter just when we’re trying to put a 15lb bird down and check if the juices run clear.
Four pepper mills, none that work
Then there’s the store cupboard challenge. We cooks are used to falling back on our stocks of capers, balsamic vinegar, harissa paste and Worcestershire sauce to add a certain je ne sais quoi to whatever we’ve made. We rummage in cupboards to find stock cubes which have dried into mini-bricks, unidentifiable dried herbs, rancid olive oil, mummified bulbs of garlic and four pepper mills, none of which work. As for equipment, spare us the ordeal of the bendy serrated knife and the glass chopping board.
Survival skills
Buy yourself a knife roll and travel with your knives and any must-have jars and seasonings. Or give the relative whose kitchen is challenged, a Braun stick blender, a good non-stick saute pan and whatever else you’d love to find in their kitchen on your next visit. If you visit often, leave essentials behind. This doesn’t always work. My Maldon salt disappeared, only to turn up later, in the bathroom cabinet, next to the shampoo. Did my in-laws mistake it for bath salts?
Blunt knives drove them crazy
Did you ever see BBC2’s Take on the Takeaway? Angela Hartnett, Dean Edwards and other chefs try to convert curry and kebab lovers to home cooked food while also beating the takeaway on price, speed and taste. They cook in the non-cooks’ kitchens, with the equipment already there. Allegedly. Now that is an achievement and perhaps why there don’t appear to be any more programmes in the offing. Blunt knives and bumpy frying pans drove them crazy.
What drives you mad in other people’s kitchens? We'd love to know.