Elementary Art

“Every artist dips his brush in his own soul, and paints his own nature into his pictures.”

- Henry Ward Beecher

Do you know someone who has made an art out of cooking? Do you know someone who conjures up the most magnificent dishes by tossing together “a little bit of this, and a little bit of that”?

My grandmother would bake exquisitely by touch. No recipe required, just a taste and touch here and there. Yet even without a formal process her baked goodies were always consistent, down to the last crumb. Her chocolate chiffon and baked cheese cake were works of art.

There was a time however, when she was taught to bake by following a recipe. As a young girl learning to bake with her mother, she would have followed the same recipe over and over again, without changing anything. Then over time she would have experimented.

“What if I threw in a touch of cinnamon? What if I added less sugar and more eggs? What if I baked at 120