A graceful presence in food world

Marion Cunningham, the author of the revised "The Fannie Farmer Cookbook," had a mission to change our cooking habits. She inspired many to head to the kitchen.

July 23, 2012 at 1:48PM
FILE - This May 27, 2004 file photo shows Marion Cunningham, a venerated figure in the food world, at home in Walnut Creek, Calif. Cunningham, the home-cooking champion whose legacy can be found in the food-spattered pages of "Fannie Farmer" cookbooks in kitchens across America, died of complications from Alzheimer's disease, a family friend told the San Francisco Chronicle. She was 90.
The legacy of Marion Cunningham can be found in the food-spattered pages of "Fannie Farmer" cookbooks. This 2004 picture shows Cunningham in her Walnut Creek, Calif., kitchen. (Associated Press - Ap/The Minnesota Star Tribune)

Marion Cunningham and I were sitting at a table overlooking the IDS Crystal Court, lamenting the depleting numbers of home cooks while we nibbled on breakfast. She was on tour with her latest book, "Learning to Cook With Marion Cunningham," and she had the family dinner on her mind, a topic dear to my own heart and kitchen table.

"We have strangers cooking our meals," she said at the time. "It's hard not to be preachy. But I have this sense of urgency. It's easy for us to be swept along by feeling too busy to cook." It was 1999 and she was 77.

Cunningham, author of seven cookbooks and a resident of Walnut Grove, Calif., died last week at age 90. For two years, in 1999 and 2000, she wrote the Home Cook column for the Taste section of the Star Tribune.

The graceful, lovely, very elegant cook -- a legend among food writers, restaurateurs and many home cooks alike -- had a career that, like Julia Child's, began in her 50s. Hers was prompted by a class she took from James Beard in Oregon. Charmed by Cunningham -- we all were -- Beard asked her to become his assistant, which she did for more than a decade. After he recommended her as author of the revision of the classic "The Fannie Farmer Cookbook" -- the quintessential book for home cooks -- she found nationwide attention and a forum for her love of the family meal.

"Mealtime is our most civilizing ritual," she told me that day. "There is no substitute."

I can still hear her voice, quiet but fervent: "I can't change the world, but it doesn't hurt to be heard by a few. To me, the kitchen is the soul of the home."

Celebrate with cooking

In honor of her life, I headed to my kitchen last weekend and pulled "The Fannie Farmer Baking Book" from my shelf. I knew I could rely on Cunningham for a simple dessert suitable for an open house for my parents' 60th anniversary. She didn't disappoint. There on pages 224 and 230, I found the bar cookies that could sit out for an extended time on a buffet: Chewy Fudge Brownies and Lemon Squares (only make the latter if you have fresh lemons on hand). Long before the party was over, the platter with the bars was empty. Cunningham wouldn't have been surprised.

In one of her Taste columns she wrote, "I recently read that one should only cook contemporary dishes, not old-fashioned recipes. I take exception. In my view, the only two categories for recipes are good ones and bad ones, and the only way to find out which is which is to cook them."

No question which category the bar cookies fell into. RIP Marion. You made the world a better -- and tastier -- place.

Follow Lee Svitak Dean on Twitter: @stribtaste

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about the writer

Lee Svitak Dean

Taste editor

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