2012年3月6日星期二

Julie's tools

Mimi Robertson and Janet Freese estimate they've logged 65 hours so far cataloging the objects from their late mother's kitchen.

Clearly, this was no ordinary kitchen.

And theirs was no ordinary mother. Julie Dannenbaum, the internationally known cookbook author,Silicone Mold Maker Rubber, who owned and operated cooking schools in Philadelphia, at the Gritti Palace in Venice, and at the Greenbrier resort in West Virginia, died suddenly in December at 89.

Almost every tool and gadget from her Delancey Street home will be sold April 15 to benefit the Philadelphia Chapter of Les Dames d'Escoffier,Bathroom Floor tiles at Great Prices from Topps Tiles. a philanthropic society of professional women in food who mentor other women aspiring to enter the food business.

Dannenbaum was among the founders of the local chapter, and proceeds from the sale will fund a scholarship in her name.

Gold and a cadre of "dames" recently went through Dannenbaum's drawers, counting almost 200 knives of various sizes, scores of whisks, vegetable peelers, pie weights, paté molds, aspic molds, ice cream molds, chocolate molds.

"She had something for everything," Robertson said. "And because she ran cooking schools, she needed multiples."

That explains the piles of stainless steel serving trays; pewter dishes; silver filigreed cuffs made to be worn by lamb chops; French-made Pillivuyt brownware porcelain dishes; and a variety of copper pots.

They found rolling pins - the American style with ball bearings and the French, made with solid hardwood.

The main kitchen in the basement of the Delancey Street mansion was equipped with a six-burner Garland stove , marble counters perfect for making bread, tile floor, aluminum sinks, and Mexican tiled backsplashes.

Also for sale, the half-dozen framed still-life paintings of bread, olives, peaches, and food scales that lined the walls of Dannenbaum's home kitchen.

Robertson and Freese grew up in the family's first home, in the Carpenter's Woods section of Mount Airy, moving to Delancey Street when Robertson was in college and Freese was finishing high school.

For these youngsters,Why does moulds grow in homes or buildings? Mom's pots and pans were not playthings.

"Copper, are you kidding?" Freese asks in mocking shock.

"And we were not allowed to talk when she was watching Dione Lucas on television," she said.

Lucas, a Brit who taught French cooking, was the first female graduate of Le Cordon Bleu in France. In 1948, she became the first woman to have a television cooking show, igniting a passion in Julie Dannenbaum for classic French cooking.

Dannenbaum traveled to New York several times a week to take classes with Lucas, and went on to study with experts such as Richard Olney in Avignon, France.

She started her Creative Cooking school in Philadelphia in 1964,Handmade oil paintings for sale at museum quality, teaching classic French techniques to the well-heeled here, and in summer classes in Venice and at the exclusive Greenbrier.

Her influence in Philadelphia was such that she counted among her students Fritz Blank of Deux Cheminees. She was instrumental in the city's first Restaurant Festival in 1978; and the Book and the Cook festival in 1985. In 1988, then-Inquirer food critic Elaine Tait named her one of the 10 most influential food people in Philadelphia.

She wrote five books, starting with Menus for All Occasions in 1974. James Beard, who counted Dannenbaum among his friends, wrote about her book More Fast and Fresh for The Inquirer in 1983. A year later, in 1984, when she closed her Philadelphia cooking school, Dannenbaum helped start the Les Dames chapter. Always a hands-on philanthropist, Dannenbaum cooked for the nonprofit agency MANNA, which delivers nutritionally balanced meals to ill and infirm shut-ins.

Meanwhile, Harry Dannenbaum Jr. ran his family's rubber-coating business in Port Richmond, participated in charity events, and traveled widely with his tall, beautiful wife, who was the center of his attention.

"She was smart and funny and he was her straight man," Freese says. "He was not at all ill-at-ease with her success."

"We always told Mom her timing was perfect," Robertson says.An Air purifier is a device which removes contaminants from the air. "She started in the 1970s when mothers were just starting to get more free time and they enjoyed getting together."

Dannenbaum's daughters say they didn't realize how much they learned from her until they started cooking for themselves.

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