My mother is a very accomplished cook. For this dinner she pulled out all the stops and served what was then her "signature" meal: chicken Kiev, wild rice sauted with vegetables, homemade cracked wheat dinner rolls, and Caesar salad (made the right way, with anchovies and a raw egg yolk). Dessert was cold lemon souffle.

Mr. Burrows was a man who appreciated good food. He polished off the chicken, wild rice, rolls, and salad, complimenting my mom several times upon the delicious meal. Then dessert was served. As I walked into the dining room carrying the creamy, pale yellow souffle topped with whipped cream rosettes and grated chocolate, his eyes lit up. "I adore lemon desserts," he proclaimed, and he proceeded to eat three helpings. He told my dad at one point that his sweet tooth would be the downfall of him yet, and that he would not be surprised if he developed diabetes, a prediction that, sadly, turned out to be very true.

In school the following day, he asked me to once again thank my mother for that excellent meal, and added, "Your mother is a very talented cook. You should strive to emulate her."

At the time I was 17 years old. I only knew how to make chocolate chip cookies, popcorn, and brownies, and I wasn't terribly interested in anything of a domestic nature. However, after a year of living in a college dormitory where the food, to put it bluntly, sucked like a thousand great big sucking things, I got an apartment with my friend Marcie and started cooking up a storm.

Nowadays I don't have much call to prepare a meal like the one that impressed Mr. Burrows so much on that blustery spring evening nearly thirty years ago. But I have the recipes. I know the techniques. I could do it.

Jeanne Gravelle Hultman
Class of 1977

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