Eden Prairie dad: 'Cook well; it's worth it'

Rob Barrett grabbed a cereal spoon from his kitchen drawer and began to measure the yeast and salt for his calzone dough. "I took all the measurements out of my cooking," he said. "It's mostly handfuls and spoonfuls."

Not your typical foodie show -- which helped prompt Better Homes & Garden's website, BetterRecipes.com, to name him the winner of its recent "America's Next Cooking Celebrity" contest. What that means exactly is yet to be determined; nothing's been signed, no limousines idle outside his Eden Prairie doorstep.

But at the very least, it's a bump for Barrett's website, www.cookingfordads.net. And for his online cooking show on YouTube, www.youtube.com/user/cooking4dads. And for his cooking column on the AOL parenting site, www.ParentDish.com (click on mealtime).

All this from a self-taught cook whose inspiration is helping other guys -- dads or not -- get over their mental block about working in the kitchen.

"I'm not a great cook, but I have fun with it," said Barrett, 43, who posted his first video to YouTube on Sept. 13, 2007. A friend had wished aloud that he knew how to make Barrett's super-simple Coconut Shrimp for his wife, which caused Barrett to wonder: "What is it about this that he thinks he can't do?"

He determined that some people (cough, guys) are visual learners whose eyes glaze over at printed directions such as "whisk together ... " this or that. So he shot a video recipe for his favorite dish, Red Pepper and Sausage Pasta, which involves doctoring a jar of pasta sauce with Italian sausage, a red pepper, rosemary and heavy cream.

Then he realized that some people (cough, guys) are flummoxed by a grocery store, what with its five colors of peppers, three colors of onions and dozens of olive oils. So he shot a video tour. "One of my friends says he goes through the store with this on his iPhone."

He comes honestly by his interest in cooking, inspired by his missionary parents who brought home recipes from various posts around the world. "We would have sukiyaki and fried rice and pork with mango salsa and never think anything of it," he said.

His role as a dad comes by way of his two daughters, ages 11 and 14, who occasionally help with recipes and make cameo appearances. His wife, Jan, remains the chief meal preparer "because she's such a good cook."

Tell that to Barrett's YouTube fans in China, where he records "tons of views." He's also big in the Middle East, something he chalks up to the sheer novelty of seeing a father in the kitchen. His video for Coke-marinated steak has been viewed 185,000 times.

Yet he said his most meaningful feedback came from a boy in Ohio named Ryan, who e-mailed him with a request to teach him to make tuna melts. "He said his family had never sat down together for dinner and he wanted to make something that they could all eat," Barrett said. "For whatever reason I started to do this show, I didn't expect to feel a sense of fulfillment like that." Makes his tagline, "Cook well; it's worth it," work on a couple of levels.

Barrett's most popular recipe right now is for Leftover Calzones, which use what's left of Thanksgiving dinner. On a round of pizza dough, he layers turkey, then spreads mashed potatoes ("They become the sauce"), some stuffing ("or dressing if you're not from Minnesota") and several "bloops" of cranberry dressing. Not a measuring spoon in sight.