Kolumni

Finnish Cooks

8.7.2010 0:01 Mary Nurminen

There are many different kinds of cooks out there. I have classified a few different ones you find here in Finland:

The farm wife cook: Has been cooking 2-3 hot meals every day for the past 30 years.

Usually doesn't sit with the family to eat. Specialty: potatoes and gravy. But that gravy is like a work of art, it's likely the most delicious stuff you've ever eaten. Philosophy: food should taste good and fill you up.

The modern city-woman cook (who also happens to be the daughter of the farm wife cook): Hates old-fashioned foods she considers unhealty, and especially potatoes and gravy. Doesn't like meat very much either. Doesn't really care much if the food tastes good or not, as long as it has a lot of disgusting vegetables in it. Philosophy: heathiness over everything.

The young urban gourmet cook: He knows good food and he knows good wines. He loves nothing more than to spend an entire Saturday preparing a fabulous meal for himself and a room full of friends. Specialties: anything which requires weeks to find all of the ingredients and then days to actually make the food. Why oh why do I not have more friends of this type?

The working mother cook: Believes that every food she makes should go for 2-3 meals. Goodbye meat and mashed potatoes. You can only eat them once. Hello soups and casseroles.

The cooking goddess: Is ALWAYS in the kitchen. Buys only the basics from the store. Even bread from the store is 'valmisruoka' to her. Throws nothing away.

You don't even get to eat all of your mashed potatoes before she takes them out from under your nose and starts to make rieska.

The young single cook: Good with macaroni (plain), oatmeal, and tuna fish. Specialty is 'yoghurt á la mysli'.

The young cook after moving in with her boyfriend: Learns to make gourmet foods. They eat a lot of things like 'Coq au vin'. Spends a lot of money on a very expensive garlic press to get the best taste for her food. Believes that they will always eat this way and their eventual children will be gourmet eaters too. She will never feed them sausages like some bad mothers she knows.

The young cook when pregnant for the first time: Back to the yoghurt and mysli.

The young cook 8 months later: Now uses the expensive garlic press to grind up vegetables to make baby food.

The not-so-young cook after 3 years: Specialties: sausage soup, sausage casserole, and sausages with french fries. Philosophy: if they'll eat it, give it to them.

The Grill Master: Although he almost never cooks during the winter, in summer he is a new man.

Anything that can be grilled - he'll grill it. Buys new kinds of meats, tries out different marinades. If there are guests for dinner, he may gather another man or 2 around the grill with him, pass out cold beers, and make a party of the job.

The Perfect Hostess (but only in short-lasting spurts): When in the mood, loves to put together huge meals for huge numbers of people. Specialties: sticks to a few things she does well and people seem to like. Is perfectly charming throughout and really enjoys it.

Until the spurt is over, and then she goes back to her normal self. This can even happen in the middle of the meal, when she might suddenly declare that everyone is welcome to more food, but they have to grill it themselves.

I know this one well because I am one of them.

VOCABULARY: Derogatory: loukkaava, halventava; Put down: loukata; Cling: takertua

Mary Nurminen pähkäilee suomen kielen ja suomalaispsyykkeen kiemuroita.

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