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It all started
way before I was born. Before my grandparents, and their grandparents, and further and further back to a time I can’t
even fathom. The love of food and the desire to create delicious meals is in my blood.
My earliest recollections of food are my maternal grandmother’s big pot of tomato sauce and my paternal grandmother’s
big pot of tomato sauce. I do have to make that distinction, since my parents are from two very distinct areas of Italy—Naples
and Sicily.
In high
school and the early years of my marriage, I learned how to analyze restaurants’ featured dishes, and developed recipes
to enjoy at home. I entertained frequently, having almost every holiday and family gathering at my home; and hosted many gourmet
dinners for friends, with most of the dishes created just for those special occasions.
Whenever a get-together was planned, the menu was always discussed. Food was the topic of many conversations with family
and friends. It was a big part of our lives.
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| Scallop Cakes from "Herbed-Wine Cuisine." |
Food continues to be a big part of my life. In 1994, I started a catering and specialty food gift basket business,
Splendid Provisions. In 1997, my cookbook, Herbed-Wine
Cuisine was published. From 1998 to 2001, I compiled recipes for three state cookbooks, North Carolina, Virginia, and
New York, in the Cooking Across America Cookbook Collection™. For several
years, I developed recipes for specialty food companies, and began to research and write about food. I started to conduct
seminars and food demonstrations and began teaching cooking classes.
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| Manicotti Torta from "Con Amore." |
After six
years of research and writing, my culinary novel, Con Amore, was published. It’s
a story about a group of Italian chefs who attend a week long conference to learn about Italian food in American culture.
The characters attend seminars and cooking workshops, developing relationships as they create recipes for their restaurants.
My catering and gift basket business
turned into developing custom cooking classes for groups and individuals, based on what the participants wanted to learn,
teaching in their kitchen or mine. For several years I taught cooking classes through the local community college. Last year
I began to teach smaller groups in my kitchen. Interest in my classes, and a greater interest in home cooking and
a healthier and easier way to cook has lead me to offer a series of employee workshops.
I write
Simply Elegant, a quarterly e-newsletter with rotating articles about food, decorating, and entertaining, and book
reviews. I also write Tutto Italiano, a monthly e-newsletter about everything Italian. Visit my Web site at www.jtmancuso.com to learn more.
I
teach cooking because I love to teach and I love to cook. I also teach it because cooking is a great skill to master; and
it’s a skill that can be mastered on many levels. For survival and frugality the cook can master the basics, for enjoyment
and indulgence, the cook can create elaborate gourmet meals. In between, there’s a whole world of food just waiting
to be explored.
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