5 Lessons from Julia Child

A recent episode of the Stuff You Should Know podcast was about Julia Child, and that in turn prompted me to re-watch the movie Julie & Julia. (You can currently watch it on YouTube for free, though with random ad breaks.)

Between the two, I started thinking about what an amazing person Julia Child was, and how her example offers many lessons for all of us.

Be willing to try something new

If you’re not that familiar with Julia Child, you may not know that before she and her husband Paul moved to France (where Paul was stationed for work), she had never done much cooking. She fell in love with French food there, and since she felt at loose ends, she wanted something to do. After a few false starts, she settled on learning to cook, and she never looked back.

And she clearly took to it well. It’s hard to know if she was a natural or if she just worked so hard that she became an excellent chef. One of the funny scenes in Julie & Julia, which may or may not be true, was of her practicing cutting onions so she could beat out the men in her class who were also training to be chefs.

Even if that wasn’t true, it’s clear that she was always willing to try something new. Cooking, writing a book, and being on TV – none of these were things that she ever planned on, but she was willing to give them a try.

Don’t worry about making mistakes

One of the things that likely worked in Julia’s favor was that she was willing to make mistakes. In fact, once she had a cooking show, she insisted on keeping the mistakes in the show so others could see how she recovered from them.

She knew that it’s not possible to avoid mistakes, and trying to be perfect was impractical. Instead, what you really need to do is learn from your mistakes and know how to recover from them.

This is true in cooking, but it also applies to pretty much everything else, including eating mindfully. When you’re trying to get into the habit of being mindful with food choices and how much you eat, etc., odds are that you’re not going to get it right on the first try. The goal then is to learn from what happened so that you can apply it moving forward, and while you may still make mistakes, you’ll hopefully improve as you go.

You can find your passion later in life

One of the things that’s always inspiring about Julia is that she didn’t know from a young age what she wanted to do. All too often, you hear about people who are child prodigies, or at least find their passion at a young age and work towards it.

That wasn’t the case with Julia. She didn’t start cooking until she was 36, and she didn’t start her cooking show until she was 50. Clearly, that didn’t stop her from becoming successful, and that’s rather encouraging for those who have not found their passion at an early age.

Don’t give up

Of course, it also helps to be persistent, and Julia was certainly that. She proved that even before she started cooking.

In her earlier life, Julia worked for the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) during World War II, as she was too tall to join the military. Among her other tasks was helping to develop a shark repellent. This may sound like an odd task, but the problem was that sharks kept setting off underwater explosives that were meant to target German U-boats, so they wanted to find a way to keep the sharks away from the explosives.

Julia experimented by cooking up different combinations of ingredients and sprinkling them in the water to see what worked. She found one that was effective, still in use today, and she considered it her first “foray into the world of cooking”.

She used similar perseverance in her cooking and with getting her first cookbook published, despite setbacks along the way. All of which is a good reminder not to give up on what’s important to you.

Savor your food

And finally, she reminds us to enjoy our food!

I don’t know how accurate Meryl Streep’s portrayal was in Julie & Julia, but I suspect it wasn’t too far off. Julia herself said how she loved French food, and it seems doubtful that she would have gone into cooking if she didn’t truly enjoy what she ate.

One of the funny scenes in the movie is when Julia is telling Paul that she feels like she needs something to do while he works, and he asks what she really enjoys doing. She replies, “Eating.” Again, I don’t know if that particular scene was true, but I think it likely captures the spirit of truth behind Julia’s relationship to food.

You don’t have to eat French food to enjoy what you eat, either (although all the butter in French cooking may help). If you eat foods that you love, take the time to notice that while you’re eating. Slow down enough that you can truly savor the flavors that you love.

This is especially a good reminder as we come up on Christmas, another holiday where we’re often tempted to overeat. If you take the time to appreciate your meal, you may be less tempted to eat more of it than you need. But even if you do overeat, at least you’ll get the maximum enjoyment out of it, which is still a plus.

Julia Child was inspirational

It’s not an exaggeration to say that Julia Child changed how people cooked in America, and without her, we likely wouldn’t have many of the cooking shows that we do now. She was the first to do that, in her own unique and amazing way.

We can’t all be like Julia, but we can all learn from her. Remember that it’s okay to try new things, even at an older age, and it helps to be willing to make mistakes. Don’t give up on what you really want, and be sure to enjoy your food along the way. Sounds like a good recipe to me.