When I was growing up one thing that I noticed was that my father would cook, and I had never heard of any other fathers in the neighborhood stepping into the kitchen. Sure, every father in the neighborhood barbequed, but my father also used the stove. He was also pretty good at it. As the years went by, I was amused when I saw dad sit in front of the television, watch cooking shows, and try to later recreate the recipes for the family. I wondered where he got his interest in cooking.
One of my first jobs as a teenager was as a cook in a restaurant. I picked up the various techniques pretty quickly. As I got out on my own, I continued to cook. I would also pick up recipes from various cuisines, experiment with new foods, collect cookbooks, and generally started doing many of the same things my father did. I also signed up for gourmet and Chinese cooking classes. And in my opinion, I was at least as good as my father at cooking (except I don’t quite have the Hofer Secret Potato Salad recipe recreated yet.) So I must have gotten my cooking skills and interest from my father before me. In fact, I believe all of the Hofer children have demonstrated above average kitchen skills. Where did my father get his culinary interest and talent?
My guess would be from his father. Grandpa Hofer was a professional chef. Growing up, I didn’t realize what that meant. My mother sure did. Whenever Grandpa Hofer came over for dinner, mom would fuss for hours in the kitchen trying to ensure that everything would turn out right. When he arrived and sat down to dinner, mom would always be nervous about everything being OK. Mom would ask, “Is everything OK?” and he would always reply that it was fine.
We never saw Grandpa Hofer all that often, so my favorite story about him is from my father. When grandpa was still working as a chef people would frequently ask him for his recipes. Since the recipes were his livelihood he was understandably reluctant to give them out. When the person persisted, he would give them the recipe — except he would leave out one or two key ingredients. Later, when the person came back they would report that they had tried the recipe and it just didn’t turn out the same. Grandpa would explain that it was the way he made it, so it should have worked; not telling the pest that were a couple of additional things that he added.
This past Christmas I opened a present from my parents. Inside was a chef’s hat with the initials CH embroidered on it. I now have a chef’s hat used by Carl Hofer. A few months later a bunch of my friends go together to video tape a cooking competition based upon the Japanese television show Iron Chef. I’ve always played the role of the Iron Chef whenever we’ve made these tapes. This time I had an actual, official chef’s hat to wear. I looked good. And my food blew away the competition.
I’m sorry Grandpa Hofer didn’t come around more when I was young. Maybe I could have gotten some of the recipes with the missing secret ingredients, or picked up a few techniques. Or at least fixed my version of French Onion Soup, Chicken with Cognac Sauce, and Moroccan Rice Pilaf for him.