Vegetarians in Paradise
Ask Aunt Nettie

We're delighted to share our Aunt Nettie with you. She's agreed to answer any questions you might ask about food, its preparation, and even clean-up tips. But we have to prepare you. She just might want to come right over to your house and help you fix dinner.

To send any questions to Ask Aunt Nettie, .


Here's an e-mail from David in Santa Clarita. He's a vegetarian who is just getting into the kitchen mode.

Dear Aunt Nettie,

I often come across recipes that call for a pound of this, 8 ounces of that, or 2 1/2 pounds of something else. When I shop I don't usually weigh anything. I just buy in quantities that will take me through the week. Do you just guess at amounts?



Dear David,

I have jes the perfect solution to yer dilemma. An invaluable item on my kitchen counter is my 5-pound scale. I bought it at a restaurant supply store an' it cost a purty penny, but it's handier than you might think. When a recipe calls fer that pound an' a half o' potatoes, jes put a plate on yer scale an' adjust the dial pointer to zero. Then put yer taters inta the plate an' watch the dial til it reaches yer pound an' a half. I also discovered that with the scale, I can git consistency in a recipe. When I make that special dish six months later, it tastes jes like I remembered it. I betcha you'll fall in love with yer scale shure as little apples fall from the tree.


If You Haven't Met Aunt Nettie. . .


Our Aunt Nettie has a head like a hard disk. It's filled with megabytes of information about food and cooking. And she's just itchin' to share her learnin' with city folk who live in mortal fear of the stovetop.

Aunt Nettie grew up on the farm. She did not eat out of a can or reach into the freezer. There was no microwave to pop her food into. Everything she made was from scratch. All the food she ate was natural, without pesticides. It was grown right there on the family farm, and she had to cook to survive. At eighty-three years young she still leaps and bounds around the kitchen and can shake, rattle, and roll those pots and pans with the best of them.

Nowadays, Aunt Nettie just shakes her head and complains, "Nobody cooks anymore. They have no idea about puttin' a meal together." She's on a mission. She wants to help those younguns eat better so they can grow up healthy like her own eight kids.



Click here for past Ask Aunt Nettie Columns



Vegetarians in Paradise