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Julia Child could barely cook when she married at 34. She enrolled at Le Cordon Bleu in Paris at 37, and after one publisher rejected her manuscript, 'Mastering the Art of French Cooking' appeared in 1961, when she was 49.

Julia Child

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The story behind the card

Child wrote the book with two Frenchwomen, Simone Beck and Louisette Bertholle, and the three spent nearly a decade testing and rewriting recipes for an American kitchen, aiming for exact, foolproof instructions rather than a chef's shorthand. Houghton Mifflin turned the manuscript down, judging it too much like an encyclopaedia; Alfred A. Knopf published it in 1961, and it became a bestseller. On 11 February 1963, WGBH in Boston launched The French Chef, built on the same patient, step-by-step teaching; the show ran nationally for a decade and made Child a household name.

Türkçe oku
Julia Child 34 yaşında evlendiğinde doğru dürüst yemek yapmayı bilmiyordu. 37 yaşında Paris'teki Le Cordon Bleu aşçılık okuluna yazıldı. Bir yayınevinin geri çevirdiği Fransız mutfağı kitabı Mastering the Art of French Cooking 1961'de, Child 49 yaşındayken yayımlandı.

Child kitabı iki Fransız kadınla, Simone Beck ve Louisette Bertholle ile birlikte yazdı. Üçü, tarifleri Amerikan mutfağına göre neredeyse on yıl boyunca deneyip yeniden yazdı; amaçları bir şefin kendi kısaltmalarıyla değil, evdeki herkesin şaşmadan uygulayabileceği açık talimatlarla anlatmaktı. Houghton Mifflin kitabı fazla ansiklopedik bularak reddetti; 1961'de Alfred A. Knopf yayımladı ve kitap çok sattı. 11 Şubat 1963'te Boston'daki WGBH kanalı, aynı sabırlı, adım adım anlatıma dayanan The French Chef programını yayına soktu. Program on yıl boyunca ülke çapında yayınlandı ve Child'ı Amerika'da herkesin tanıdığı bir yüz yaptı.

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