October 20, 2024 • 46 mins
(00:50) What do you do when you have an abundance of zucchini? If you're Chris Fennimore, you create a beloved cooking show that’s been a Pittsburgh favorite for over 31 years! Join us as Chris shares how his garden's bounty led to a unique television journey, one that focuses not on celebrity chefs, but on real people and their cherished family recipes. These stories capture the heart of cooking as a way to preserve heritage and build community on screen, transforming simple home-cooked meals into a celebration of family history.
(15:08) Chris reflects on the challenges and joys of adapting marathon cooking sessions into engaging TV segments, with tales of themed episodes like "Grandma's Kitchen Wisdom," which continue to resonate with audiences for their timeless appeal. Alongside these cooking memories, Chris shares delightful encounters with culinary legends, highlighting the camaraderie and shared passion that define the world of cooking shows.
(28:37) Beyond the kitchen, Chris lets us into his life of harmonious pursuits—gardening, music, and family. Listen in as he recounts how a shared garden plot blossomed into love and inspired both personal happiness and professional creativity. Chris’s stories of performing with the Pittsburgh Banjo Club, nurturing a family, and savoring Italian food during family trips reveal his life’s passions.
As we wrap up, Chris envisions making his vast archive of community-focused television segments accessible for future generations, ensuring these stories of food and heritage continue to inspire. And of course he left us a great idea for mushroom risotto!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Doug (00:01):
Welcome to the Pittsburgh Dish.
I'm your host, Doug Heilman.
How did a bountiful summergarden lead to over 30 years of
local food television that otherpublic broadcast stations just
can't replicate?
We talk tales of cooking,family romance and banjos From
(00:22):
Brooklyn to Pittsburgh to Romeand back again, all with this
week's guest.
Stay tuned.
Thanks for listening to thePittsburgh Dish.
Check out our website atwwwpittsburghdishcom for past
episodes, our recipe blog or ifyou'd like to support the show,
(00:44):
that's wwwpittsburghdishcom.
Now on to the show.
Thank you so much for comingover and for being on the show.
I'm glad to be here.
Would you introduce yourself toour listeners?
Chris (00:59):
Well, I'm Chris Fennimore .
A lot of people think of me asthat cooking guy.
That's right, because for thelast 31 years we have been doing
cooking shows on WQED here inPittsburgh, and the thing about
the shows is that they are notlike Julia Child or Jacques
(01:20):
Pepin, where you have somebodywho is a culinary genius and a
wizard in the kitchen.
All of the guests on our showare people in our broadcast area
.
The first one I did was Z isfor zucchini, and it was so
(01:42):
strange because I had a gardenfilled with zucchini right up
here at the Homewood Cemetery.
Doug (01:47):
Oh yeah.
Chris (01:49):
And the zucchini were so plentiful that summer that you
could stand at the edge of thegarden and zucchinis would jump
into a basket.
I didn't know what to do withall of these.
So I went back to the office Iwas also the director of
programming there and I said tomy director of continuity, Nancy
(02:09):
Polinsky.
I said, nancy, would you pleasemake a promo on a little thing,
asking people to send theirrecipes for zucchini?
She said is that legal?
You're crazy.
I said, well, I need a lot ofrecipes for zucchini.
She said is that legal?
You're crazy.
I said, well, I need a lot ofrecipes for zucchini.
(02:31):
Yes, and she goes.
But but are we allowed to dothat, can you know?
And I said, yeah, sure, I meanyou know it's in our budget.
We can make little promos.
Yes and uh, so she did.
And she said if you haverecipes for zucchinis, send them
to this address.
And all of a sudden it was likepandemonium at the station
because the letters came pouringin.
(02:54):
The response was overwhelming,to say the least.
Now I'm reading through these,trying to figure out what would
be good recipes for me to make.
And they're not just recipes,they're family stories and I'm
sure I've told you that you,this story, yes, uh, that they,
they would be like this.
(03:15):
Um, this is my aunt margaret'srecipe for stuffed zucchini
boats.
My aunt margaret never so we'realready on a tangent here and
she used to come to our houseevery Thanksgiving because she
didn't have any other place togo and she always brought these
(03:38):
zucchini boats because shewanted to feel like she was
participating in the meal.
Um, we never liked the zucchiniboats you're getting a lot of
story.
I know, so I'm here's thismaiden aunt, you know, uh, but
they love her, so they don't sayanything about how terrible
(03:59):
these zucchini boats are oh and,by the way, here they are for
your cookbook or your show orwhatever.
Doug (04:04):
Right exactly.
Chris (04:07):
But then the story goes on and it says now that my Aunt
Margaret is gone, we still makethese every year.
And what I realized was thatrecipes, our kinds of recipes
not the fancy-dancy ones, butour kinds of recipes are all
about family history.
But our kinds of recipes areall about family history, the
promulgation of family ethicsand traditions, and it's all
(04:33):
conveying stories.
And you relive those storiesevery time you make whatever
that dish is.
And so many of the recipes inall of our cookbooks are Aunt
So-and-So's, this, uncleRonnie's, that, my grandma's,
this.
We did a whole cookbook ongrandma's kitchen wisdom Only
(04:54):
recipes from grandmas.
If you weren't a grandma, don'tbother sending it in.
And that one is still one of myfavorite cookbooks because the
stories in there wereunbelievable.
And in our old cookbooks weused to actually put a lot of
these stories Right, not justthe recipe but as much of the
stories as I could fit in there.
And so I got all these recipesand I thought you know, this is
(05:19):
something unique, I'm also aprogram producer, right?
You?
Doug (05:23):
really had something here.
Chris (05:25):
I am.
And so I said to the person whowas the station manager.
I said could I have a littletime during the next pledge
period Because I would love todo a demonstration of a couple
of recipes and I'll type upthese recipes and offer them as
a thank you gift, like the totebag or the coffee mug or
(05:45):
whatever people use.
And so he said sure, knockyourself out.
Well, we didn't have a kitchen.
Doug (05:52):
What year is this, Chris?
Chris (05:54):
93.
Yes, 93.
It was the summer of 93.
So Nancy and I set up twotables and I cooked the five or
six recipes that I picked out ofthe book Ahead of time, ahead
of time.
And then I had all theingredients, and so the
ingredients were on the fronttable and the finished dishes
(06:16):
were on the table behind me, andso I would say so.
Then you chop this up, and thenyou put the onion in there, and
then you slice that and blah,blah, blah and put it in the
oven for 45 minutes, and itcomes out like this, and then we
would taste it.
Well, the phones rang off thehook, people wanted these and we
(06:37):
were reading, while I'm cooking, while I'm making believe I'm
cooking, nancy is reading theletters from everybody who sent
in their recipes.
So it was very heartwarming andit was, I thought, particularly
appropriate for publicbroadcasting, right, because
this was our way of sharing, forthem to share with us and for
(06:58):
us to share back with them.
And to me that's what publicbroadcasting is all about, and
to me that's what publicbroadcasting is all about, Aside
from keeping all these lovedones' stories alive through the
cooking you're bringing thecommunity into the station.
Well, on the next show, becausewhat happened was immediately
the people in the pledgedepartment said when's the next
one?
And I said I have no idea.
(07:20):
I didn't know this was going tohappen we picked cookies as the
topic.
Then we decided that I wasn'tgoing to make all the cookies.
We were going to have peoplecome in and make their cookies.
And that was the beginning ofthe format that we have now
followed for the last 31 years,and that is that people send in
their recipes.
(07:41):
We get usually a couple ofhundred recipes.
We select four or five peopleto come on the show.
I usually make one recipe,nancy usually makes one recipe,
and that is not so much a matterof our egos involved in you
know, we've got to be part ofthis but it's a timing matter in
terms of production.
So I usually do the first orthe last and Nancy does the
(08:03):
first or the last, and that wayif I need to do it all in five
minutes instead of 12,.
Doug (08:10):
I can do it, yes, smart.
Chris (08:12):
And also, if we're stuck for time, I can just stand there
and talk.
It works out.
It works out that way.
So that's why I've been doingsome of my recipes on that show.
Anyway, that's how the cookingthing got started.
But because I'm not a peoplealways say oh, chef Fennimore,
you know, chef Chris?
And I said no, no, no, I'm nota chef, I'm just a cook.
(08:36):
The only cooking that I learnedwas from my mother and my
grandmother, who we lived withmy grandmother, and this is in
Brooklyn.
This is in Brooklyn, new York.
I was born there in the 19thcentury and it's not a secret,
I'm 77 years old, so you know,you do the math.
(08:58):
But, and we lived in the BayRidge section of Brooklyn, which
was an interesting combinationof ethnic influences, because
right in my few blocks aroundour local church, it was all
Italian.
Then the next group was theIrish, and then there were the
(09:19):
Greeks and we had a Jewishcommunity.
So it was really you could walka few blocks and get a.
Well, the Norwegians I forgotabout the Norwegians.
Oh, my goodness they were.
It was wonderful to go overthere.
Doug (09:31):
So you could get all these food influences as a young
person Exactly, and I did youknow.
Chris (09:37):
So that's where I grew up and my grandmother being the
oldest of eight sisters, she wasthe one who had the Sunday
dinner and everybody who couldcome came, so we were somewhere
between 15 and 25 people everySunday around our table.
Doug (09:55):
Amazing, and didn't she make like dozens of dishes?
Chris (09:57):
Oh yeah, you know appetizers, then there was the
pasta course, then there was themain course, then there was the
dessert, then there was thewine and the fruit was the main
course, then there was thedessert, then there was the wine
and the fruit.
You know, it just went on allday.
Could you?
Doug (10:09):
imagine cooking for 30 people every weekend.
Chris (10:12):
No, but she just did it.
She just did it and she was aseamstress.
So she was at work every daybecause she had to take the
subway to Manhattan.
She worked on 34th Street inthe Garment District, so she
would leave the house at 6.30 inthe morning, get home at 7.30
(10:32):
at night and she would missdinner because my dad insisted
on having his nightly dinner atfive o'clock.
So she would always have herlittle soup and greens, beans
and greens or just escaroles.
She would just do escarole andwhatnot.
Anyway, back to the Sundaydinner.
As soon as you were old enough,they would start giving you jobs
(10:54):
that they thought you would becapable of, like okay, here's
how you shell peas.
And they would give you abushel basket full of peas and
you'd go there and that's whatyou did after you went to church
in the morning.
So we would come home and wewould just start working on this
dinner.
And I remember the time that Igraduated she says, all right,
(11:15):
here's the meatball mixture.
She didn't trust me to mix it.
Oh, no, no, no.
But she thought I could shapethem.
So I thought, okay, I couldshape a ball.
And you know I'm just, I took alittle bit.
It's like Play-Doh, you know.
You just roll it around in myhand and I put it on the tray.
And another one and I put it onthe tray.
Now there were like a hundredmeatballs, so it took me a
(11:39):
little.
While she comes over and shelooks at it.
Some of them were a littlebigger, a little smaller, and
everything.
She points to one that's small.
She says who's that for?
I said, well, I don't knowWhoever gets it, you know.
She said, well, what if it'sone of our guests?
Oh, and they think that we'reholding back on them and that
(12:01):
everybody else has got a bigmeatball and they got a small
meatball.
How are they going to feel?
Oh, what are they going tothink of me?
Doug (12:08):
She gave you her inner monologue there.
Chris (12:12):
So she dumped all of the meatballs back in the bowl and I
had to reshape them.
Oh my goodness.
Uniformly.
Doug (12:21):
Do you know how old you are at this point About?
Chris (12:24):
eight, nine.
Oh, nine oh yeah, and it was alesson learned you know about.
That's one of the aspects ofcooking and serving and feeding
people.
Doug (12:34):
Always thinking about the other people.
Chris (12:36):
Yes, so that training I did have, but you know there was
none of those other culinarythings out of.
You know, flip the saute pan orwhatever they do.
Doug (12:49):
You and I both I mean I always say I'm a home cook.
Yeah exactly, I've learned fromwatching people like you.
I've learned from a lot of PBSshows how to cook beyond what my
mom and my family memberstaught.
But I've also never gone toculinary training of any sort.
Chris (13:06):
I used to go down to culinary training of any sort.
I used to go down to theculinary school downtown and
sometimes they would ask mewould you like do a demo?
And I said I don't haveanything to demo for them.
I'll be glad to talk to themand I can show them some home
recipe.
Doug (13:23):
That they can convert to fancier.
Chris (13:24):
I said but you know I'm not a chef and they just, they
just couldn't get over it.
You know, they say you're,you're on TV for Pete's sake.
Of course you're a chef.
No, I'm not.
Doug (13:34):
But it's part of your accessibility.
Actually, I think all of thoseother community members that are
writing in and sending yourecipes they don't feel
intimidated to not do thatbecause you are just cooking
with them in the same way thatthey would be cooking.
Chris (13:50):
And the thing about the recipes that they send in is
they never send in their worstrecipe other than Aunt
Margaret's zucchini boats, whichthey still make.
What they're sending you arethe recipes that they are famous
for.
You know that always comes outand people go.
How do you make that?
Yes, you know, when you go to apotluck and you're bugging the
(14:15):
person for the recipe, and sothey learn and they just start
making recipe cards that theyput down next to their casserole
.
You know, those are the recipesthat they're sending us, that
we put into our books and, as Isay, it's now been hundreds and
hundreds of guests, maybe eight900 guests over these years.
That's a lot of people.
Doug (14:34):
It's incredible and I just want to point out, most
affiliates in the PBS worlddon't always have kitchens or
anything like we've had, so it'ssuch a treasure for our
community.
On the programs you guys havebrought over the years, yeah,
you have me thinking, andactually I'm thinking back to
the first time you told me thisstory.
(14:54):
Is it true?
The zucchini program?
Chris (14:58):
it wasn't even taped, no, we just did it live Right, it
was an hour and a half that wefilled and then that's it.
Doug (15:08):
And from then on, do you have any ballpark idea how many
shows you've done?
You've done two new ones thisyear Gadgets and Gizmos Sweets.
Chris (15:16):
And Sweets, yeah, and then, just before that, we had
done the when in Rome show, whenin Rome and that's when I got
to thank you so much.
I got to make meatballs withyou from Dan Mancini that's
right?
Doug (15:29):
Yes, because he puts the mortadella in the meatballs he
grinds it in.
Chris (15:34):
It's such a wonderful trick.
Yes, yeah, I'm limiting thenumber of shows that I do, which
is fine with me, and they'reall national now we don't just
do them for local, because thestations around the country were
not able to replicate what wedid, right, so they run all
(15:55):
these shows.
But other than that, I wouldsay we've done about 160 shows
Incredible, yeah.
Doug (16:03):
And do they all then have like a community cookbook?
Chris (16:07):
Oh, absolutely.
And then we started to takesegments from those cooking
shows, the marathons, because itwould be like in the old days,
we made four hour shows.
I don't know what I wasthinking.
We went from one and a halfhours to four hours and in four
hours you'd have 10 or 11demonstrations.
So with that many recipes to doon air, we were take out, and
(16:32):
now I stir it for 12 minutes,you know, and then you just cut
that down in time until theywere all about 12 minutes, and
then we would make half hourprograms with two of these
(16:54):
recipes in each program.
And we've done seven seasons ofthose.
So that's 26 shows times seven.
Oh my, I can't do that kind ofthing, it's a lot of shows, it's
a lot of shows, and that's whatthey're running.
Now is season seven of the QEDCooks morning show every
Saturday at 10 o'clock.
Doug (17:15):
For our listeners that maybe haven't been so in tuned
with you.
The national shows we now callAmerica.
Chris (17:23):
America's Home Cooking.
Doug (17:24):
That's right, and when they were more local or regional
did we call it QED Cooks.
Chris (17:29):
No, we had a title for each show.
Oh okay, Sometimes it was justwhatever the recipe was or the
ingredient, main ingredient,like we did cookies.
Doug (17:37):
Yeah, you did the alphabet almost like A to Z.
Chris (17:39):
Berries, appetizers, soups and stews, seafood.
And then we started to dothings like Grandma's Kitchen,
Wisdom, Church Lady Cooking,Church Lady Cooking.
Doug (17:51):
That's a good one.
It was a wonderful show.
Oh yes.
Chris (17:54):
Oh, my goodness, we actually did two of those,
because we did one set of themand then all these other church
ladies came and they werebanging on my door, going what?
Doug (18:02):
about us, as they should.
Chris (18:04):
So we did.
We had a whole new cookbookbecause we had all these new
recipes from new churches and soon Holiday Sides, Holiday Sides
I keep that on my counterbecause there were so many great
recipes in there that my familynow demands on Thanksgiving and
Christmas and so on and I'venoticed they still play it
(18:27):
almost every I don't knowNovember or October It'll play
again, it's classic.
Doug (18:34):
It gives you great ideas too, but along the way it still
connects you with all thosecommunity members.
And still the stories.
When the people come on, weshould say they're still telling
the story.
Oh, absolutely, You're askingthem about the story behind the
recipe.
When the people come on, weshould say they're still telling
the story.
Oh, absolutely, you're askingthem about the story behind the
recipe.
Chris (18:48):
That's what we do while we chop onions.
Doug (18:50):
It's so much better than a lot of the other food TV that's
out there truly.
Chris (18:55):
I mean I have to say that I liked the old style where you
actually learned something.
They gave enough time to theprocess and the procedure and
the ingredients for you to say,okay, I would try that, I would
try to make that.
And if it was Julia Child orMarianne Esposito or Lydia
(19:16):
Bastianich or so many SarahMoulton great cooks to learn
from, and I thought you know,even in the best cooking schools
you're not necessarily gettingsomebody with that kind of
expertise and background.
Did you know that Sarah Moultonwas Julia Child's kitchen
assistant when she did herseries?
Doug (19:38):
I just recently saw this picture of them and Sarah
Moulton looks like a little girl.
Chris (19:43):
She's not very tall to begin with, but she's very young
, oh yeah no, she looks likeshe's 16, but I don't know what
what age she actually was.
But she's a delightful lady.
I got a chance to meet her.
That, I have to say, has beenanother nice part of all of this
, because once they, you getidentified as a TV cook or
(20:05):
celebrity.
Doug (20:06):
You are a little bit of a celebrity, Chris.
Chris (20:09):
You get to meet other celebrities and to me it was a
thrill.
I'm good friends now withMarianne Esposito.
Imagine that.
She's so great, she's terrificand just a down-to-earth kind of
lady.
And Jacques Pepin came to townand he said I don't want to give
a lecture, it was a lectureseries.
(20:30):
And they said, well, what wouldyou do?
And he said, well, if you couldget somebody like Chris
Fennimore, who's a local guy, heknew about my show and if he
just asked me questions.
So I got to spend all this timeon stage with Jacques asking
him questions, mostly about hisbook the Apprentice, which I, if
(20:51):
you haven't read that, by theway, the Apprentice by Jacques
Pepin Okay, he's a brilliantwriter.
You know his language as hetalks makes it seem like maybe
he's not that good at English.
He's brilliant when he writesit and he has his master's or
his doctorate from Columbia.
So this is no slouch here andit shows in the book the
(21:15):
Apprentice and it really comesthrough.
And then we I went out to lunchwith him and his daughter,
claudine, who did a couple ofseasons with him on his cooking
show.
Doug (21:26):
Oh, yes, yeah.
Where did you take them?
In Pittsburgh.
Chris (21:29):
Oh, no, no, I didn't.
Doug (21:31):
Oh, okay, okay.
Chris (21:33):
They had it at this affair.
Okay, okay, that the whole dealwas you got the whatever this
was lecture, and then they had aluncheon, and so I was with him
at his table.
Doug (21:46):
Wonderful, because I would be stressed when am I taking
Sean oh?
Chris (21:48):
yeah, I know, see, and I gotta tell you, my safest bet
would be to take him home.
Yes, yeah, because he would digthat he'd get it, of course.
Doug (21:58):
Every chef I've met is so grateful to be cooked for and
they're not gonna be judging.
Judging you?
No, not at all.
Chris (22:07):
Um if you go to a chef's house and look in their
refrigerator, first of all it'spretty empty.
That's right.
There might be a bottle of winein there, but they don't have
anything to cook at home, andthey love home cooking it's not
what you do in the restaurant.
Doug (22:23):
It's very different, it's very production, and I think
that's why I've never gravitatedto wanting to work in a
restaurant, because there's sucha rigor and a monotony to
getting it right, and again andagain, and again Exactly.
Chris (22:37):
That's the chef's talent or specialty, and that is that
they make a dish on Tuesday.
And that is that they make adish on Tuesday.
They make 40 of them on Tuesday, and they make 40 more on
Wednesday, and they're exactlythe same, all 80.
How do you do that?
I couldn't.
Doug (22:56):
And that's what people want.
Chris (23:08):
It is because when they go back and tell their friends,
oh, I had the chicken, limon,you got to have it, and all of a
sudden it's not the same, youknow, then it would be very
disappointing.
Doug (23:11):
No, I mean, they count the number of capers they put on
the darn dish, you know beforewe get too far away from talking
about the show in thesememorable moments, you've done
all of the cookbooks for thepledge drives, but there are two
books that you've writtenyourself Right, simple Pleasures
, right and you had a co-author,yeah.
Chris (23:30):
Daniel Aguera.
Doug (23:31):
And he's local as well.
Oh yeah, how did that comeabout?
It's a little different thanthe other books.
Chris (23:37):
It's very different.
I had him.
It was for a short documentarythat I did.
Well, it was the Fat Club, andthe Fat Club is a group of chefs
, local, who come together everyonce in a while.
They used to do it at leasttwice a year, but now it's sort
of dropped off and they try tokill each other with food.
(23:59):
What they're doing is they'retrying out new recipes and they
want sophisticated palates andwhatnot.
To see what they're doing isthey're trying out new recipes
and they want sophisticatedpalates and whatnot.
To see what they're doing andto critique it, tell them how
they might change it and so on.
And they invited me to one ofthese.
So I brought a film crew and wefilmed this thing.
(24:19):
I could watch that darn thingover and over again.
Anyway, Daniel was there.
He's never done restaurants.
He's done more institutionalcooking, okay, but he made this
soup that was so delicious andmaybe it was soups and stews
that we were doing and I said,would you come on and do that?
And that's how we met.
He came onto the show and hedid this soup.
(24:41):
That was from his familyorigins.
He's from Spain.
Doug (24:47):
What I really like about that cookbook is it's almost
every other page is a recipefrom you and a recipe from him.
They are simple.
I mean they're veryapproachable.
Chris (24:57):
Yes.
Doug (24:57):
And yet you both give your family spin on, as it would be
a soup or some kind of casseroleor something.
Chris (25:06):
It's a great book?
Oh, it is, and the recipes aresimple.
You don't have to go to aspecialty store to get the
ingredients or these are thingswe all have and that we're all
capable of the directions for.
You don't have to souffle anyeggs.
Do you souffle an egg?
Is that what you do?
Doug (25:24):
No, I don't I have it, and this was around 2017.
And then you did another, afollow-up, and I think this is
yours solely.
It's Stuffed.
Chris (25:34):
Yes, stuffed.
Well, because the publishersaid when's the next one, of
course.
And so I thought what would beinteresting?
What's a thing, first of all,that I haven't done with WQED
Right?
And then I thought through allthe dishes that my mother and my
grandmother made, and you knowlike 60% of them were stuffed,
(25:56):
meaning something insidesomething else, whether it was a
cream puff or a manigatta or abrajol.
Grandmother made brajol withbeef.
She made it with pork,different fillings, you know,
but everything was wrapped up insomething else.
So I said, okay, stuffed.
Doug (26:13):
I love it.
I actually thought you drew alot of inspiration even from
Pittsburgh, because we lovepierogi and you know stuffed
cabbage rolls and all of thethings.
They're all in the book.
They're in the book too.
So I think you drew from alittle bit of both family.
Chris (26:26):
Oh yeah, but that's.
I started thinking about that.
And then you know, I, my mother, also made stuffed cabbage and
she made pierogies and and whenit?
Because my dad grew up in aPolish neighborhood.
He was in an Italian family butall of his friends, he would go
and he enjoyed having theirfood and that's what he wanted
(26:47):
to have.
So my mother said, I'll learnhow to make it.
Heck, my mom used to make chowmein.
This little Sicilian girl andshe's there in Brooklyn making
chow mein and egg rolls.
Doug (27:01):
She's very similar to my grandmother, who was sort of
English and German descent buthad 10 kids learned how to make
tacos, what we called Italianspaghetti through the seventies.
I don't know why we didn't justcall it spaghetti.
She just she incorporated allof these.
You know, these kuchina palvadathe food of the poor.
Chris (27:20):
Yeah, but that was soul food.
Soul food, that's right.
Doug (27:22):
And so she made all that.
But that was her Soul food.
Soul food, that's right, and soshe made all that, and I think
that's any wise woman with a bigfamily in that era would do the
same thing, oh yeah.
Chris (27:29):
Yeah, and also we kids were influenced by what we saw
on television, and in a way thatprior generations might not
have been.
So I'm looking at the ChungkingChow Mein commercials and going
can we get that?
Can we get TV dinners?
Can we get pot?
Doug (27:48):
pies.
Chris (27:50):
My mother made the most delicious chicken pot pie you
could ever imagine putting inyour mouth, and we were bugging
her, can we have the ones in thelittle tin?
And so finally she bought them.
They weren't that expensive butthere wasn't a lot of space in
my mother's budget.
But she relented and uh, and wetaste and we go, that's
(28:13):
supposed to be pot pie awful itwas awful.
There was no chicken in it.
No, there was no pot, it wasjust a pie, that's all well, you
learned your lesson I did food.
And I'm glad you did.
Doug (28:29):
Hi, this is Chris Fennimore, the host of QED Cooks
, and I'm here with you on ThePittsburgh Dish if you don't
mind, I would love to talk aboutfamily a little bit more, but
I'd love to go back and talkabout the zucchini story and
your wife.
Chris (28:46):
Oh yeah.
Well, my wife played a big partin that whole zucchini thing,
because the reason why I was inthe garden was that I was in a
church choir and going through atough period in my life.
My first marriage hadn't workedout as they can happen.
(29:09):
So I was feeling depressed alittle bit and I went to it.
Actually I went to apsychiatrist.
He says he said, mr Fenimore,you're not depressed, you're sad
With.
That was in some ways veryenlightening.
So I joined this choir and wewould practice every Thursday
(29:30):
and we sang at church everySunday.
And one of the members of theHigh Sopranos, when we were
getting ready to wrap up theseason because we didn't sing
through the summer, she said youknow, I've got a little garden
right off of Forbes Avenue andit's part of the Homewood
Cemetery and I've got a plot,but I'll never use it all.
(29:50):
And she said I travel and Iwon't be able to tend to it all
the time that it might need.
So would you be interested?
So I said, well, yeah okay, Iwas living in an apartment.
Doug (30:03):
And how long had you been in Pittsburgh at this point?
Just a couple of years.
Chris (30:07):
No, no, no, no, no.
I came here in 85.
Oh, okay, I was here like eightyears, okay.
And so I put in what you wouldthink of some tomatoes, I put
basil and I put zucchini.
I put the zucchini in hisbushes because I didn't want
(30:27):
those long, stringy vinezucchini.
I thought it'd be easier tofind them and harvest them and
all that jazz.
Well, I was going to the gardenand it started to be like every
single night and I came home.
I remember I was living in anapartment with my daughter,
Marianne, and I said, boy, Isaid there's something wonderful
about this gardening.
(30:47):
It's making me feel so muchbetter about myself and life and
everything.
And of course, she's 13 yearsold, so she goes.
Was Laura there?
In her teenage voice?
And I said, yeah, she goes,uh-huh.
In her teenage voice.
And I said, yeah, she goes,uh-huh.
So my daughter was onto thewhole thing before I was,
because the fact of the matteris that I was starting to feel
(31:08):
good about myself in every way.
Yeah, and being with Laura was abig part of that.
So what happened with all ofthis attention given to the
garden?
As I said, the garden wasbooming, booming with zucchini,
and I went in and did the wholething about send the recipes in
(31:30):
At QED, at QED, and it was verysuccessful.
So then they said now we've gotto have another show.
And I said cookies.
And the first show was in somedate in August was when we did
the zucchinis, and December, the4th was the day that we did the
cookie show.
And I know the date becausethat's the day that I married
(31:51):
the girl from the garden, Laura,and I got married.
We did the show in the morningand I got married in the
afternoon, just so you knowwhere the priorities are.
And I got married in theafternoon, just so you know
where the priorities are.
Oh, my goodness.
But the advantage was that mymother was in town for the
wedding and she got to come onthe cookie show with me and she
made her Vienna tarts, which areoutstanding, especially with
(32:11):
the apricot filling.
Doug (32:13):
What a special day.
Oh yeah, All around.
All around, and so everybody mywhole family was sitting in
their motels and hotels orhouses and watching my mom and I
cook on TV, and that's amazing.
And so you mentioned your firstdaughter.
Chris (32:32):
You have two daughters from your first marriage, and
then you ultimately had a sonwith Laura and he's grown up on
the show.
I think he came on the showfirst as a as almost as an
infant and I'm holding him in myarms.
Uh, then he was a toddler and weput him up on a stack of uh
crates and I was kept wonderingif he's gonna fall over and
(32:53):
whatnot.
And then, before you know it,he's taller than I am and he's
standing there and I just sawhim on the show this past
saturday and I forget what wewere making.
But he said yeah, I'm going togo to Case Western start next
year.
So this is him as a senior.
Yeah, he's a Central Catholic.
He's documented on the cookingshows and I can't tell you how
(33:15):
many people come up to me andthey'll say, oh, I'd like to
enjoy your show, how's your sonme?
And they'll say, oh, I'd liketo enjoy your show.
How's your son?
Yeah, they want to know, and soI'm always happy to tell them.
And Joe's back here in town.
After he graduated he worked ina couple of different places,
but he ended up back here.
He works for Dick's SportingGoods as a software engineer.
(33:36):
I didn't know that sportinggoods stores needed software
engineers, but apparently theydo apparently we all do.
Doug (33:44):
You sparked my mind on a couple of other things, so I
would love to go back and talk alittle bit more about.
You mentioned you joined thechoir and that's where you met
laura.
Chris (33:53):
Music is actually kind of a big deal in your family life,
oh yeah well, that was what Ithought I was going to do when I
was in early college andwhatnot.
I was a folk singer and I usedto go down to the village and
sing in the village square therein lower Manhattan.
Oh okay, yes, and so I would goover there.
(34:16):
Never panned out to be a famousfolk singer, but I enjoyed it.
I still enjoy it.
I still have my same guitarthat I've had since senior year
in high school.
Doug (34:28):
I've had the privilege of seeing you play that guitar in
your house during Christmas.
Carols, oh Christmas carolsright.
Chris (34:34):
Well then, what happened was I was at Fordham and I had
two years down and I hadcompletely run out of money.
My tuition was covered, I had ascholarship, but I had no money
to buy tokens, to get on thesubway, to go home, nothing to
eat.
I couldn't afford the room thatI was in, which was $7 a week.
(34:55):
Oh boy, at Mrs Selbreed's up inthe Bronx I have to go look for
a job and I think if I can makesave $200, I can make it
through the next semester.
So a bunch of the guys saidcome down with us.
There's a club down in theclose to the village, 10th
Street, and they, we're waitersthere and we make sometimes $30
(35:19):
a night.
I went get out of here $30 inone night, yep.
So I go down and I go up to themanager and say I'd love to
apply for a job as a waiter.
And he looked at me and he sayswe are up to our armpits in
waiters, we don't need anotherwaiter.
He says if you could play thebanjo.
(35:39):
I said I play the banjo.
I lied, we don't need anotherwaiter.
He says if you could play thebanjo.
I said I play the banjo.
I lied I didn't.
But you played the guitar.
But I played guitar, I figuredhow hard could it be.
So he says, all right, go up onthe stand, play something.
And I said I didn't bring mybanjo and he goes.
They have extras Now I'm doomed.
So I went up on stage and I'mwatching the guy next to me, the
(36:02):
lead banjo player, a guy namedRon Beisel, and when he moved
his hand up the strings, I movedmy hands up, but I wasn't
hitting the strings with thepick, I wasn't making any noise
at all.
And I'm singing these songsbecause I knew all these songs
my dad used to.
We would always sing these inthe car Five Foot Two, Heart of
My Heart, Darktown StruttersBall.
(36:22):
And it came in handy becausewhen we finished the manager
said to him how does the kid do?
And Ron wasn't paying anyattention to me at all and he
said, yeah, he knows the songs.
Doug (36:38):
And that was it.
Chris (36:39):
They hired me.
Now I have to run home, get aMel Bay chord book and a banjo,
and, and that's how I started mybanjo career, which then lasted
, you know for Well, I was goingto say you're.
Doug (36:53):
You're sort of leading us to say your banjo career is over
, non-existent, but but Peoplecan go to the Elks on the North
side and find you with thePittsburgh Banjo Club.
That's where you guys do all ofthe rehearsing and a lot of
singing.
Chris (37:08):
Oh yeah.
Oh no we do like two shows, iffolks are interested, every
Wednesday yeah.
Doug (37:13):
You should come by the Elks.
It's a good place, it is areally good place.
Another local treasure, yeah,and we should say too your
daughter is a pretty successfulsinger, but she doesn't live
here.
Chris (37:26):
No, Marianne lives in Rome.
Doug (37:29):
And you leave Pittsburgh a little bit every year.
Chris (37:32):
Well, she's got two boys I got.
My grandsons are over there,you know, so I'm not going to
leave them just sitting aroundover there.
Doug (37:40):
It doesn't make it hard.
Do I get this right?
You escape the winteressentially.
You go over right afterChristmas.
Well, here's the thing.
Chris (37:47):
Yeah, I go right after Christmas and stay for a couple
of months.
The winter temperature in Romeaverage, you know, 55.
So you can just wear like awindbreaker or a light jacket
and you're good for the winter.
Now don't look at the Italianpeople.
They are scarfed covered,leggings down, vests and coats,
(38:13):
and you would think it was theArctic.
That's the way they dress whenit's 50.
I don't know what.
What is?
It's something about?
Doug (38:21):
maybe their blood is very thin, maybe or maybe they're
trying to just get the italianfashions out, and I'm sure the
food isn't bad over there.
Does it re-energize you in anyway?
Chris (38:31):
it does absolutely.
Um.
The access to daily freshfruits and vegetables, hand
hand-cut meats to order to yourpreference in every way, and
everything fresh, fresh, freshthat's all they think of, and
the assortment of cheeses whichthey think is normal.
(38:54):
Where can you go on a dailybasis and get fresh regatta?
I mean, you can make ityourself.
I often make my own ricotta,yes, but when they make it,
they're making it with sheep'smilk or they're making it with
cow's milk, and they also makeit with buffalo, like buffalo
(39:16):
mozzarella.
They make the buffalo ricottaand they all have different
textures and curd structure andso on.
So yeah, it's fun.
Nothing like it.
Doug (39:28):
Bringing us back to Pittsburgh.
Number one.
I just want to thank you forsharing so much today and
wandering.
I know you're not doing as manyshows on QED as you used to,
but what is on the horizon?
Do you have any shows or evendemos or anything coming up in
(39:48):
the near term?
Chris (39:49):
One of the things that I've been talking with folks
about is making the inventorymore accessible Because, as we
have talked about, there'shundreds of segments with people
from the community.
Occasionally I'll have somebodycome up to me and go you know
my grandmother.
She was on that show when youdid tomatoes and she made her
(40:14):
favorite tomato casserole and mygrandmother just passed away.
Is there any way I could get acopy of that?
If I can, I go back in, I gointo the archives and find the
tape and transfer it and make aCD for them.
But that's old fashioned Now.
There should be some way todigitize the entire thing, yes,
(40:39):
and then have it accessible bythe person, by the show, by the
recipe, by the ingredient.
That would be amazing.
So this is a little bit of.
If I could hire my son, hecould probably do this and make
a spreadsheet that gets you inand out of all of those
variables.
But I'm sure that they havepeople at WQED who can do this
(41:03):
too.
So that's one of the things I'dlike to do, and the other thing
is to make them accessible forthe younger people, who are
accustomed to getting videomaterial directly.
Doug (41:16):
At different platforms too , whether that's short form,
other social media platforms orwhatever.
How do you get to it where it'snot just a rerun or maybe
somewhere on the website whereyou have to dig for it?
Chris (41:29):
Yeah, yeah.
So that's what I'm exploringnow.
I'm trying to be modern.
Doug (41:34):
I love it.
We never stop learning in foodanyway, and this is part of it
for you.
We never stop learning in foodanyway, and this is part of it
for you.
Chris (41:40):
I'm not sure if and when we might do another giant show,
because they take a lot of time,a lot of planning.
I've noticed Because you'vebeen part of those A little bit.
But you've got to collect therecipes and then get the cooks
that you're going to have on andbook time to shoot them.
(42:01):
It's easier now because wedon't do them live.
Doug (42:04):
Man, I can't imagine Chris .
Chris (42:06):
Live was so crazy.
Doug (42:08):
It's part of the element, though, that it's fun Even when
they are not live.
They're still pretty true toform.
Chris (42:14):
Oh, they're live to tape.
They are live to tape.
Yeah, we may edit somethinglater on and we can stop.
Doug (42:21):
When I put the food processor on backwards for you
Exactly, and we couldn't stop.
Chris (42:29):
No, in those days we just said, oh well, we'll clean this
up later.
Keep going.
Poor Mary Irwin Scott and JoeCerto and folks like you who
would come in and help us onthat side of the camera cleaning
up in the kitchen and settingthings out.
People don't realize everythingthat goes on.
They see what goes on on thecountertop?
(42:51):
Yeah, but to the left stage,left of the countertop, there's
all kinds of stuff going on Alot happening All the time.
Doug (42:58):
Yeah, there's a lot to it.
Yeah, so it takes a small army.
Um, they're fun to do, butthere's a lot of work.
Oh yeah, we're wrapping to theend of our time and I always
have a a sign-off question forour guests okay the name of the
best dishes you've eaten thispast week Ooh, hmm.
Chris (43:26):
Well, I cooked myself all this week and I have to say the
thing that I made and once Imake it I know why I don't make
this every week I made somearborio rice risotto with a ton
of mushrooms in them.
(43:46):
Now I used to make it withdried mushrooms and I would
rehydrate the mushrooms.
They have a lot of flavor andwhatnot, and that's not a bad
idea.
But this time I just boughtbaby bella mushrooms but I mean
a lot, yes, maybe a quart sizebasket and chopped them up and
fried them with a little bit ofonion and not much, just a dash
(44:11):
of salt, a little bit of parsley.
And then I made the rice.
Oh, I made it in my Instapot,which I found makes arborio rice
, makes risotto better than Ican with all that stirring.
So I put the rice in theInstapot one cup of rice with
(44:32):
one and a half cups of water anda half cup of white wine and
some butter, about a quarter ofa stick, it's nothing.
And then I put all themushrooms that I had served for
something else that were left, Iput them in there and put the
thing on.
It's 10 minutes on low pressureand Laura and I were sitting
(44:55):
there going.
Where did this come from?
You know?
No strange ingredients, no,nothing.
But it was so flavorful and themouthfeel was great and if I
had gotten this in a restaurantI would be raving about it.
Doug (45:09):
That's the best sounding mushroom risotto I've heard in a
long while.
Chris (45:14):
Easy peasy, as they say.
Now next time?
Would it be the same?
Probably not, because I'm not achef and I'm always tempted to
tweak it one way or another, butI remember it well enough that
I could go back and try to makeit the same.
You have to jot it down.
Doug (45:30):
I'm the same way.
I'm a tinkerer.
I'm always fiddling.
I need to write my stuff down,Chris Fennimore.
Chris (45:39):
Thank you so much, Doug I didn't let you get a word in
edgewise.
Doug (45:42):
here it was amazing, and I'm looking at all of my
questions.
You just kept answering them,so it couldn't be better.
Chris (45:54):
Chris Fennimore.
Thank you so much for being onThe Pittsburgh Dish.
Well.
Thank you, Doug, for all ofyour support of what I do and
for giving me this chance.
Of course, Thank you.
Doug (46:03):
Be sure to catch Chris Saturday mornings on our local
PBS station,WQED, for QED Cooks,as well as their other great
programming.
You can also follow Chris onthe Facebook page QED Cooks.
And finally, we thought thatmushroom risotto recipe sounded
so delicious.
We're leaving a version up onthe blog as our recipe of the
(46:25):
week.
We have instructions forChris's Instapot method as well
as a traditional stovetopversion.
Hope you enjoy it.
That's our show for this week.
We'd like to thank all of ourguests and contributors, and to
Kevin Solecki of CarnegieAccordion Company for providing
the music to our show.
We'll be back again next weekwith another fresh episode.
(46:47):
Stay tuned.
Welcome to the Pittsburgh Dish.
I'm your host, Doug Heilman.
How did a bountiful summergarden lead to over 30 years of
local food television that otherpublic broadcast stations just
can't replicate?
We talk tales of cooking,family romance and banjos From
(00:22):
Brooklyn to Pittsburgh to Romeand back again, all with this
week's guest.
Stay tuned.
Thanks for listening to thePittsburgh Dish.
Check out our website atwwwpittsburghdishcom for past
episodes, our recipe blog or ifyou'd like to support the show,
(00:44):
that's wwwpittsburghdishcom.
Now on to the show.
Thank you so much for comingover and for being on the show.
I'm glad to be here.
Would you introduce yourself toour listeners?
Chris (00:59):
Well, I'm Chris Fennimore .
A lot of people think of me asthat cooking guy.
That's right, because for thelast 31 years we have been doing
cooking shows on WQED here inPittsburgh, and the thing about
the shows is that they are notlike Julia Child or Jacques
(01:20):
Pepin, where you have somebodywho is a culinary genius and a
wizard in the kitchen.
All of the guests on our showare people in our broadcast area
.
The first one I did was Z isfor zucchini, and it was so
(01:42):
strange because I had a gardenfilled with zucchini right up
here at the Homewood Cemetery.
Doug (01:47):
Oh yeah.
Chris (01:49):
And the zucchini were so plentiful that summer that you
could stand at the edge of thegarden and zucchinis would jump
into a basket.
I didn't know what to do withall of these.
So I went back to the office Iwas also the director of
programming there and I said tomy director of continuity, Nancy
(02:09):
Polinsky.
I said, nancy, would you pleasemake a promo on a little thing,
asking people to send theirrecipes for zucchini?
She said is that legal?
You're crazy.
I said, well, I need a lot ofrecipes for zucchini.
She said is that legal?
You're crazy.
I said, well, I need a lot ofrecipes for zucchini.
(02:31):
Yes, and she goes.
But but are we allowed to dothat, can you know?
And I said, yeah, sure, I meanyou know it's in our budget.
We can make little promos.
Yes and uh, so she did.
And she said if you haverecipes for zucchinis, send them
to this address.
And all of a sudden it was likepandemonium at the station
because the letters came pouringin.
(02:54):
The response was overwhelming,to say the least.
Now I'm reading through these,trying to figure out what would
be good recipes for me to make.
And they're not just recipes,they're family stories and I'm
sure I've told you that you,this story, yes, uh, that they,
they would be like this.
(03:15):
Um, this is my aunt margaret'srecipe for stuffed zucchini
boats.
My aunt margaret never so we'realready on a tangent here and
she used to come to our houseevery Thanksgiving because she
didn't have any other place togo and she always brought these
(03:38):
zucchini boats because shewanted to feel like she was
participating in the meal.
Um, we never liked the zucchiniboats you're getting a lot of
story.
I know, so I'm here's thismaiden aunt, you know, uh, but
they love her, so they don't sayanything about how terrible
(03:59):
these zucchini boats are oh and,by the way, here they are for
your cookbook or your show orwhatever.
Doug (04:04):
Right exactly.
Chris (04:07):
But then the story goes on and it says now that my Aunt
Margaret is gone, we still makethese every year.
And what I realized was thatrecipes, our kinds of recipes
not the fancy-dancy ones, butour kinds of recipes are all
about family history.
But our kinds of recipes areall about family history, the
promulgation of family ethicsand traditions, and it's all
(04:33):
conveying stories.
And you relive those storiesevery time you make whatever
that dish is.
And so many of the recipes inall of our cookbooks are Aunt
So-and-So's, this, uncleRonnie's, that, my grandma's,
this.
We did a whole cookbook ongrandma's kitchen wisdom Only
(04:54):
recipes from grandmas.
If you weren't a grandma, don'tbother sending it in.
And that one is still one of myfavorite cookbooks because the
stories in there wereunbelievable.
And in our old cookbooks weused to actually put a lot of
these stories Right, not justthe recipe but as much of the
stories as I could fit in there.
And so I got all these recipesand I thought you know, this is
(05:19):
something unique, I'm also aprogram producer, right?
You?
Doug (05:23):
really had something here.
Chris (05:25):
I am.
And so I said to the person whowas the station manager.
I said could I have a littletime during the next pledge
period Because I would love todo a demonstration of a couple
of recipes and I'll type upthese recipes and offer them as
a thank you gift, like the totebag or the coffee mug or
(05:45):
whatever people use.
And so he said sure, knockyourself out.
Well, we didn't have a kitchen.
Doug (05:52):
What year is this, Chris?
Chris (05:54):
93.
Yes, 93.
It was the summer of 93.
So Nancy and I set up twotables and I cooked the five or
six recipes that I picked out ofthe book Ahead of time, ahead
of time.
And then I had all theingredients, and so the
ingredients were on the fronttable and the finished dishes
(06:16):
were on the table behind me, andso I would say so.
Then you chop this up, and thenyou put the onion in there, and
then you slice that and blah,blah, blah and put it in the
oven for 45 minutes, and itcomes out like this, and then we
would taste it.
Well, the phones rang off thehook, people wanted these and we
(06:37):
were reading, while I'm cooking, while I'm making believe I'm
cooking, nancy is reading theletters from everybody who sent
in their recipes.
So it was very heartwarming andit was, I thought, particularly
appropriate for publicbroadcasting, right, because
this was our way of sharing, forthem to share with us and for
(06:58):
us to share back with them.
And to me that's what publicbroadcasting is all about, and
to me that's what publicbroadcasting is all about, Aside
from keeping all these lovedones' stories alive through the
cooking you're bringing thecommunity into the station.
Well, on the next show, becausewhat happened was immediately
the people in the pledgedepartment said when's the next
one?
And I said I have no idea.
(07:20):
I didn't know this was going tohappen we picked cookies as the
topic.
Then we decided that I wasn'tgoing to make all the cookies.
We were going to have peoplecome in and make their cookies.
And that was the beginning ofthe format that we have now
followed for the last 31 years,and that is that people send in
their recipes.
(07:41):
We get usually a couple ofhundred recipes.
We select four or five peopleto come on the show.
I usually make one recipe,nancy usually makes one recipe,
and that is not so much a matterof our egos involved in you
know, we've got to be part ofthis but it's a timing matter in
terms of production.
So I usually do the first orthe last and Nancy does the
(08:03):
first or the last, and that wayif I need to do it all in five
minutes instead of 12,.
Doug (08:10):
I can do it, yes, smart.
Chris (08:12):
And also, if we're stuck for time, I can just stand there
and talk.
It works out.
It works out that way.
So that's why I've been doingsome of my recipes on that show.
Anyway, that's how the cookingthing got started.
But because I'm not a peoplealways say oh, chef Fennimore,
you know, chef Chris?
And I said no, no, no, I'm nota chef, I'm just a cook.
(08:36):
The only cooking that I learnedwas from my mother and my
grandmother, who we lived withmy grandmother, and this is in
Brooklyn.
This is in Brooklyn, new York.
I was born there in the 19thcentury and it's not a secret,
I'm 77 years old, so you know,you do the math.
(08:58):
But, and we lived in the BayRidge section of Brooklyn, which
was an interesting combinationof ethnic influences, because
right in my few blocks aroundour local church, it was all
Italian.
Then the next group was theIrish, and then there were the
(09:19):
Greeks and we had a Jewishcommunity.
So it was really you could walka few blocks and get a.
Well, the Norwegians I forgotabout the Norwegians.
Oh, my goodness they were.
It was wonderful to go overthere.
Doug (09:31):
So you could get all these food influences as a young
person Exactly, and I did youknow.
Chris (09:37):
So that's where I grew up and my grandmother being the
oldest of eight sisters, she wasthe one who had the Sunday
dinner and everybody who couldcome came, so we were somewhere
between 15 and 25 people everySunday around our table.
Doug (09:55):
Amazing, and didn't she make like dozens of dishes?
Chris (09:57):
Oh yeah, you know appetizers, then there was the
pasta course, then there was themain course, then there was the
dessert, then there was thewine and the fruit was the main
course, then there was thedessert, then there was the wine
and the fruit.
You know, it just went on allday.
Could you?
Doug (10:09):
imagine cooking for 30 people every weekend.
Chris (10:12):
No, but she just did it.
She just did it and she was aseamstress.
So she was at work every daybecause she had to take the
subway to Manhattan.
She worked on 34th Street inthe Garment District, so she
would leave the house at 6.30 inthe morning, get home at 7.30
(10:32):
at night and she would missdinner because my dad insisted
on having his nightly dinner atfive o'clock.
So she would always have herlittle soup and greens, beans
and greens or just escaroles.
She would just do escarole andwhatnot.
Anyway, back to the Sundaydinner.
As soon as you were old enough,they would start giving you jobs
(10:54):
that they thought you would becapable of, like okay, here's
how you shell peas.
And they would give you abushel basket full of peas and
you'd go there and that's whatyou did after you went to church
in the morning.
So we would come home and wewould just start working on this
dinner.
And I remember the time that Igraduated she says, all right,
(11:15):
here's the meatball mixture.
She didn't trust me to mix it.
Oh, no, no, no.
But she thought I could shapethem.
So I thought, okay, I couldshape a ball.
And you know I'm just, I took alittle bit.
It's like Play-Doh, you know.
You just roll it around in myhand and I put it on the tray.
And another one and I put it onthe tray.
Now there were like a hundredmeatballs, so it took me a
(11:39):
little.
While she comes over and shelooks at it.
Some of them were a littlebigger, a little smaller, and
everything.
She points to one that's small.
She says who's that for?
I said, well, I don't knowWhoever gets it, you know.
She said, well, what if it'sone of our guests?
Oh, and they think that we'reholding back on them and that
(12:01):
everybody else has got a bigmeatball and they got a small
meatball.
How are they going to feel?
Oh, what are they going tothink of me?
Doug (12:08):
She gave you her inner monologue there.
Chris (12:12):
So she dumped all of the meatballs back in the bowl and I
had to reshape them.
Oh my goodness.
Uniformly.
Doug (12:21):
Do you know how old you are at this point About?
Chris (12:24):
eight, nine.
Oh, nine oh yeah, and it was alesson learned you know about.
That's one of the aspects ofcooking and serving and feeding
people.
Doug (12:34):
Always thinking about the other people.
Chris (12:36):
Yes, so that training I did have, but you know there was
none of those other culinarythings out of.
You know, flip the saute pan orwhatever they do.
Doug (12:49):
You and I both I mean I always say I'm a home cook.
Yeah exactly, I've learned fromwatching people like you.
I've learned from a lot of PBSshows how to cook beyond what my
mom and my family memberstaught.
But I've also never gone toculinary training of any sort.
Chris (13:06):
I used to go down to culinary training of any sort.
I used to go down to theculinary school downtown and
sometimes they would ask mewould you like do a demo?
And I said I don't haveanything to demo for them.
I'll be glad to talk to themand I can show them some home
recipe.
Doug (13:23):
That they can convert to fancier.
Chris (13:24):
I said but you know I'm not a chef and they just, they
just couldn't get over it.
You know, they say you're,you're on TV for Pete's sake.
Of course you're a chef.
No, I'm not.
Doug (13:34):
But it's part of your accessibility.
Actually, I think all of thoseother community members that are
writing in and sending yourecipes they don't feel
intimidated to not do thatbecause you are just cooking
with them in the same way thatthey would be cooking.
Chris (13:50):
And the thing about the recipes that they send in is
they never send in their worstrecipe other than Aunt
Margaret's zucchini boats, whichthey still make.
What they're sending you arethe recipes that they are famous
for.
You know that always comes outand people go.
How do you make that?
Yes, you know, when you go to apotluck and you're bugging the
(14:15):
person for the recipe, and sothey learn and they just start
making recipe cards that theyput down next to their casserole
.
You know, those are the recipesthat they're sending us, that
we put into our books and, as Isay, it's now been hundreds and
hundreds of guests, maybe eight900 guests over these years.
That's a lot of people.
Doug (14:34):
It's incredible and I just want to point out, most
affiliates in the PBS worlddon't always have kitchens or
anything like we've had, so it'ssuch a treasure for our
community.
On the programs you guys havebrought over the years, yeah,
you have me thinking, andactually I'm thinking back to
the first time you told me thisstory.
(14:54):
Is it true?
The zucchini program?
Chris (14:58):
it wasn't even taped, no, we just did it live Right, it
was an hour and a half that wefilled and then that's it.
Doug (15:08):
And from then on, do you have any ballpark idea how many
shows you've done?
You've done two new ones thisyear Gadgets and Gizmos Sweets.
Chris (15:16):
And Sweets, yeah, and then, just before that, we had
done the when in Rome show, whenin Rome and that's when I got
to thank you so much.
I got to make meatballs withyou from Dan Mancini that's
right?
Doug (15:29):
Yes, because he puts the mortadella in the meatballs he
grinds it in.
Chris (15:34):
It's such a wonderful trick.
Yes, yeah, I'm limiting thenumber of shows that I do, which
is fine with me, and they'reall national now we don't just
do them for local, because thestations around the country were
not able to replicate what wedid, right, so they run all
(15:55):
these shows.
But other than that, I wouldsay we've done about 160 shows
Incredible, yeah.
Doug (16:03):
And do they all then have like a community cookbook?
Chris (16:07):
Oh, absolutely.
And then we started to takesegments from those cooking
shows, the marathons, because itwould be like in the old days,
we made four hour shows.
I don't know what I wasthinking.
We went from one and a halfhours to four hours and in four
hours you'd have 10 or 11demonstrations.
So with that many recipes to doon air, we were take out, and
(16:32):
now I stir it for 12 minutes,you know, and then you just cut
that down in time until theywere all about 12 minutes, and
then we would make half hourprograms with two of these
(16:54):
recipes in each program.
And we've done seven seasons ofthose.
So that's 26 shows times seven.
Oh my, I can't do that kind ofthing, it's a lot of shows, it's
a lot of shows, and that's whatthey're running.
Now is season seven of the QEDCooks morning show every
Saturday at 10 o'clock.
Doug (17:15):
For our listeners that maybe haven't been so in tuned
with you.
The national shows we now callAmerica.
Chris (17:23):
America's Home Cooking.
Doug (17:24):
That's right, and when they were more local or regional
did we call it QED Cooks.
Chris (17:29):
No, we had a title for each show.
Oh okay, Sometimes it was justwhatever the recipe was or the
ingredient, main ingredient,like we did cookies.
Doug (17:37):
Yeah, you did the alphabet almost like A to Z.
Chris (17:39):
Berries, appetizers, soups and stews, seafood.
And then we started to dothings like Grandma's Kitchen,
Wisdom, Church Lady Cooking,Church Lady Cooking.
Doug (17:51):
That's a good one.
It was a wonderful show.
Oh yes.
Chris (17:54):
Oh, my goodness, we actually did two of those,
because we did one set of themand then all these other church
ladies came and they werebanging on my door, going what?
Doug (18:02):
about us, as they should.
Chris (18:04):
So we did.
We had a whole new cookbookbecause we had all these new
recipes from new churches and soon Holiday Sides, Holiday Sides
I keep that on my counterbecause there were so many great
recipes in there that my familynow demands on Thanksgiving and
Christmas and so on and I'venoticed they still play it
(18:27):
almost every I don't knowNovember or October It'll play
again, it's classic.
Doug (18:34):
It gives you great ideas too, but along the way it still
connects you with all thosecommunity members.
And still the stories.
When the people come on, weshould say they're still telling
the story.
Oh, absolutely, You're askingthem about the story behind the
recipe.
When the people come on, weshould say they're still telling
the story.
Oh, absolutely, you're askingthem about the story behind the
recipe.
Chris (18:48):
That's what we do while we chop onions.
Doug (18:50):
It's so much better than a lot of the other food TV that's
out there truly.
Chris (18:55):
I mean I have to say that I liked the old style where you
actually learned something.
They gave enough time to theprocess and the procedure and
the ingredients for you to say,okay, I would try that, I would
try to make that.
And if it was Julia Child orMarianne Esposito or Lydia
(19:16):
Bastianich or so many SarahMoulton great cooks to learn
from, and I thought you know,even in the best cooking schools
you're not necessarily gettingsomebody with that kind of
expertise and background.
Did you know that Sarah Moultonwas Julia Child's kitchen
assistant when she did herseries?
Doug (19:38):
I just recently saw this picture of them and Sarah
Moulton looks like a little girl.
Chris (19:43):
She's not very tall to begin with, but she's very young
, oh yeah no, she looks likeshe's 16, but I don't know what
what age she actually was.
But she's a delightful lady.
I got a chance to meet her.
That, I have to say, has beenanother nice part of all of this
, because once they, you getidentified as a TV cook or
(20:05):
celebrity.
Doug (20:06):
You are a little bit of a celebrity, Chris.
Chris (20:09):
You get to meet other celebrities and to me it was a
thrill.
I'm good friends now withMarianne Esposito.
Imagine that.
She's so great, she's terrificand just a down-to-earth kind of
lady.
And Jacques Pepin came to townand he said I don't want to give
a lecture, it was a lectureseries.
(20:30):
And they said, well, what wouldyou do?
And he said, well, if you couldget somebody like Chris
Fennimore, who's a local guy, heknew about my show and if he
just asked me questions.
So I got to spend all this timeon stage with Jacques asking
him questions, mostly about hisbook the Apprentice, which I, if
(20:51):
you haven't read that, by theway, the Apprentice by Jacques
Pepin Okay, he's a brilliantwriter.
You know his language as hetalks makes it seem like maybe
he's not that good at English.
He's brilliant when he writesit and he has his master's or
his doctorate from Columbia.
So this is no slouch here andit shows in the book the
(21:15):
Apprentice and it really comesthrough.
And then we I went out to lunchwith him and his daughter,
claudine, who did a couple ofseasons with him on his cooking
show.
Doug (21:26):
Oh, yes, yeah.
Where did you take them?
In Pittsburgh.
Chris (21:29):
Oh, no, no, I didn't.
Doug (21:31):
Oh, okay, okay.
Chris (21:33):
They had it at this affair.
Okay, okay, that the whole dealwas you got the whatever this
was lecture, and then they had aluncheon, and so I was with him
at his table.
Doug (21:46):
Wonderful, because I would be stressed when am I taking
Sean oh?
Chris (21:48):
yeah, I know, see, and I gotta tell you, my safest bet
would be to take him home.
Yes, yeah, because he would digthat he'd get it, of course.
Doug (21:58):
Every chef I've met is so grateful to be cooked for and
they're not gonna be judging.
Judging you?
No, not at all.
Chris (22:07):
Um if you go to a chef's house and look in their
refrigerator, first of all it'spretty empty.
That's right.
There might be a bottle of winein there, but they don't have
anything to cook at home, andthey love home cooking it's not
what you do in the restaurant.
Doug (22:23):
It's very different, it's very production, and I think
that's why I've never gravitatedto wanting to work in a
restaurant, because there's sucha rigor and a monotony to
getting it right, and again andagain, and again Exactly.
Chris (22:37):
That's the chef's talent or specialty, and that is that
they make a dish on Tuesday.
And that is that they make adish on Tuesday.
They make 40 of them on Tuesday, and they make 40 more on
Wednesday, and they're exactlythe same, all 80.
How do you do that?
I couldn't.
Doug (22:56):
And that's what people want.
Chris (23:08):
It is because when they go back and tell their friends,
oh, I had the chicken, limon,you got to have it, and all of a
sudden it's not the same, youknow, then it would be very
disappointing.
Doug (23:11):
No, I mean, they count the number of capers they put on
the darn dish, you know beforewe get too far away from talking
about the show in thesememorable moments, you've done
all of the cookbooks for thepledge drives, but there are two
books that you've writtenyourself Right, simple Pleasures
, right and you had a co-author,yeah.
Chris (23:30):
Daniel Aguera.
Doug (23:31):
And he's local as well.
Oh yeah, how did that comeabout?
It's a little different thanthe other books.
Chris (23:37):
It's very different.
I had him.
It was for a short documentarythat I did.
Well, it was the Fat Club, andthe Fat Club is a group of chefs
, local, who come together everyonce in a while.
They used to do it at leasttwice a year, but now it's sort
of dropped off and they try tokill each other with food.
(23:59):
What they're doing is they'retrying out new recipes and they
want sophisticated palates andwhatnot.
To see what they're doing isthey're trying out new recipes
and they want sophisticatedpalates and whatnot.
To see what they're doing andto critique it, tell them how
they might change it and so on.
And they invited me to one ofthese.
So I brought a film crew and wefilmed this thing.
(24:19):
I could watch that darn thingover and over again.
Anyway, Daniel was there.
He's never done restaurants.
He's done more institutionalcooking, okay, but he made this
soup that was so delicious andmaybe it was soups and stews
that we were doing and I said,would you come on and do that?
And that's how we met.
He came onto the show and hedid this soup.
(24:41):
That was from his familyorigins.
He's from Spain.
Doug (24:47):
What I really like about that cookbook is it's almost
every other page is a recipefrom you and a recipe from him.
They are simple.
I mean they're veryapproachable.
Chris (24:57):
Yes.
Doug (24:57):
And yet you both give your family spin on, as it would be
a soup or some kind of casseroleor something.
Chris (25:06):
It's a great book?
Oh, it is, and the recipes aresimple.
You don't have to go to aspecialty store to get the
ingredients or these are thingswe all have and that we're all
capable of the directions for.
You don't have to souffle anyeggs.
Do you souffle an egg?
Is that what you do?
Doug (25:24):
No, I don't I have it, and this was around 2017.
And then you did another, afollow-up, and I think this is
yours solely.
It's Stuffed.
Chris (25:34):
Yes, stuffed.
Well, because the publishersaid when's the next one, of
course.
And so I thought what would beinteresting?
What's a thing, first of all,that I haven't done with WQED
Right?
And then I thought through allthe dishes that my mother and my
grandmother made, and you knowlike 60% of them were stuffed,
(25:56):
meaning something insidesomething else, whether it was a
cream puff or a manigatta or abrajol.
Grandmother made brajol withbeef.
She made it with pork,different fillings, you know,
but everything was wrapped up insomething else.
So I said, okay, stuffed.
Doug (26:13):
I love it.
I actually thought you drew alot of inspiration even from
Pittsburgh, because we lovepierogi and you know stuffed
cabbage rolls and all of thethings.
They're all in the book.
They're in the book too.
So I think you drew from alittle bit of both family.
Chris (26:26):
Oh yeah, but that's.
I started thinking about that.
And then you know, I, my mother, also made stuffed cabbage and
she made pierogies and and whenit?
Because my dad grew up in aPolish neighborhood.
He was in an Italian family butall of his friends, he would go
and he enjoyed having theirfood and that's what he wanted
(26:47):
to have.
So my mother said, I'll learnhow to make it.
Heck, my mom used to make chowmein.
This little Sicilian girl andshe's there in Brooklyn making
chow mein and egg rolls.
Doug (27:01):
She's very similar to my grandmother, who was sort of
English and German descent buthad 10 kids learned how to make
tacos, what we called Italianspaghetti through the seventies.
I don't know why we didn't justcall it spaghetti.
She just she incorporated allof these.
You know, these kuchina palvadathe food of the poor.
Chris (27:20):
Yeah, but that was soul food.
Soul food, that's right.
Doug (27:22):
And so she made all that.
But that was her Soul food.
Soul food, that's right, and soshe made all that, and I think
that's any wise woman with a bigfamily in that era would do the
same thing, oh yeah.
Chris (27:29):
Yeah, and also we kids were influenced by what we saw
on television, and in a way thatprior generations might not
have been.
So I'm looking at the ChungkingChow Mein commercials and going
can we get that?
Can we get TV dinners?
Can we get pot?
Doug (27:48):
pies.
Chris (27:50):
My mother made the most delicious chicken pot pie you
could ever imagine putting inyour mouth, and we were bugging
her, can we have the ones in thelittle tin?
And so finally she bought them.
They weren't that expensive butthere wasn't a lot of space in
my mother's budget.
But she relented and uh, and wetaste and we go, that's
(28:13):
supposed to be pot pie awful itwas awful.
There was no chicken in it.
No, there was no pot, it wasjust a pie, that's all well, you
learned your lesson I did food.
And I'm glad you did.
Doug (28:29):
Hi, this is Chris Fennimore, the host of QED Cooks
, and I'm here with you on ThePittsburgh Dish if you don't
mind, I would love to talk aboutfamily a little bit more, but
I'd love to go back and talkabout the zucchini story and
your wife.
Chris (28:46):
Oh yeah.
Well, my wife played a big partin that whole zucchini thing,
because the reason why I was inthe garden was that I was in a
church choir and going through atough period in my life.
My first marriage hadn't workedout as they can happen.
(29:09):
So I was feeling depressed alittle bit and I went to it.
Actually I went to apsychiatrist.
He says he said, mr Fenimore,you're not depressed, you're sad
With.
That was in some ways veryenlightening.
So I joined this choir and wewould practice every Thursday
(29:30):
and we sang at church everySunday.
And one of the members of theHigh Sopranos, when we were
getting ready to wrap up theseason because we didn't sing
through the summer, she said youknow, I've got a little garden
right off of Forbes Avenue andit's part of the Homewood
Cemetery and I've got a plot,but I'll never use it all.
(29:50):
And she said I travel and Iwon't be able to tend to it all
the time that it might need.
So would you be interested?
So I said, well, yeah okay, Iwas living in an apartment.
Doug (30:03):
And how long had you been in Pittsburgh at this point?
Just a couple of years.
Chris (30:07):
No, no, no, no, no.
I came here in 85.
Oh, okay, I was here like eightyears, okay.
And so I put in what you wouldthink of some tomatoes, I put
basil and I put zucchini.
I put the zucchini in hisbushes because I didn't want
(30:27):
those long, stringy vinezucchini.
I thought it'd be easier tofind them and harvest them and
all that jazz.
Well, I was going to the gardenand it started to be like every
single night and I came home.
I remember I was living in anapartment with my daughter,
Marianne, and I said, boy, Isaid there's something wonderful
about this gardening.
(30:47):
It's making me feel so muchbetter about myself and life and
everything.
And of course, she's 13 yearsold, so she goes.
Was Laura there?
In her teenage voice?
And I said, yeah, she goes,uh-huh.
In her teenage voice.
And I said, yeah, she goes,uh-huh.
So my daughter was onto thewhole thing before I was,
because the fact of the matteris that I was starting to feel
(31:08):
good about myself in every way.
Yeah, and being with Laura was abig part of that.
So what happened with all ofthis attention given to the
garden?
As I said, the garden wasbooming, booming with zucchini,
and I went in and did the wholething about send the recipes in
(31:30):
At QED, at QED, and it was verysuccessful.
So then they said now we've gotto have another show.
And I said cookies.
And the first show was in somedate in August was when we did
the zucchinis, and December, the4th was the day that we did the
cookie show.
And I know the date becausethat's the day that I married
(31:51):
the girl from the garden, Laura,and I got married.
We did the show in the morningand I got married in the
afternoon, just so you knowwhere the priorities are.
And I got married in theafternoon, just so you know
where the priorities are.
Oh, my goodness.
But the advantage was that mymother was in town for the
wedding and she got to come onthe cookie show with me and she
made her Vienna tarts, which areoutstanding, especially with
(32:11):
the apricot filling.
Doug (32:13):
What a special day.
Oh yeah, All around.
All around, and so everybody mywhole family was sitting in
their motels and hotels orhouses and watching my mom and I
cook on TV, and that's amazing.
And so you mentioned your firstdaughter.
Chris (32:32):
You have two daughters from your first marriage, and
then you ultimately had a sonwith Laura and he's grown up on
the show.
I think he came on the showfirst as a as almost as an
infant and I'm holding him in myarms.
Uh, then he was a toddler and weput him up on a stack of uh
crates and I was kept wonderingif he's gonna fall over and
(32:53):
whatnot.
And then, before you know it,he's taller than I am and he's
standing there and I just sawhim on the show this past
saturday and I forget what wewere making.
But he said yeah, I'm going togo to Case Western start next
year.
So this is him as a senior.
Yeah, he's a Central Catholic.
He's documented on the cookingshows and I can't tell you how
(33:15):
many people come up to me andthey'll say, oh, I'd like to
enjoy your show, how's your sonme?
And they'll say, oh, I'd liketo enjoy your show.
How's your son?
Yeah, they want to know, and soI'm always happy to tell them.
And Joe's back here in town.
After he graduated he worked ina couple of different places,
but he ended up back here.
He works for Dick's SportingGoods as a software engineer.
(33:36):
I didn't know that sportinggoods stores needed software
engineers, but apparently theydo apparently we all do.
Doug (33:44):
You sparked my mind on a couple of other things, so I
would love to go back and talk alittle bit more about.
You mentioned you joined thechoir and that's where you met
laura.
Chris (33:53):
Music is actually kind of a big deal in your family life,
oh yeah well, that was what Ithought I was going to do when I
was in early college andwhatnot.
I was a folk singer and I usedto go down to the village and
sing in the village square therein lower Manhattan.
Oh okay, yes, and so I would goover there.
(34:16):
Never panned out to be a famousfolk singer, but I enjoyed it.
I still enjoy it.
I still have my same guitarthat I've had since senior year
in high school.
Doug (34:28):
I've had the privilege of seeing you play that guitar in
your house during Christmas.
Carols, oh Christmas carolsright.
Chris (34:34):
Well then, what happened was I was at Fordham and I had
two years down and I hadcompletely run out of money.
My tuition was covered, I had ascholarship, but I had no money
to buy tokens, to get on thesubway, to go home, nothing to
eat.
I couldn't afford the room thatI was in, which was $7 a week.
(34:55):
Oh boy, at Mrs Selbreed's up inthe Bronx I have to go look for
a job and I think if I can makesave $200, I can make it
through the next semester.
So a bunch of the guys saidcome down with us.
There's a club down in theclose to the village, 10th
Street, and they, we're waitersthere and we make sometimes $30
(35:19):
a night.
I went get out of here $30 inone night, yep.
So I go down and I go up to themanager and say I'd love to
apply for a job as a waiter.
And he looked at me and he sayswe are up to our armpits in
waiters, we don't need anotherwaiter.
He says if you could play thebanjo.
(35:39):
I said I play the banjo.
I lied, we don't need anotherwaiter.
He says if you could play thebanjo.
I said I play the banjo.
I lied I didn't.
But you played the guitar.
But I played guitar, I figuredhow hard could it be.
So he says, all right, go up onthe stand, play something.
And I said I didn't bring mybanjo and he goes.
They have extras Now I'm doomed.
So I went up on stage and I'mwatching the guy next to me, the
(36:02):
lead banjo player, a guy namedRon Beisel, and when he moved
his hand up the strings, I movedmy hands up, but I wasn't
hitting the strings with thepick, I wasn't making any noise
at all.
And I'm singing these songsbecause I knew all these songs
my dad used to.
We would always sing these inthe car Five Foot Two, Heart of
My Heart, Darktown StruttersBall.
(36:22):
And it came in handy becausewhen we finished the manager
said to him how does the kid do?
And Ron wasn't paying anyattention to me at all and he
said, yeah, he knows the songs.
Doug (36:38):
And that was it.
Chris (36:39):
They hired me.
Now I have to run home, get aMel Bay chord book and a banjo,
and, and that's how I started mybanjo career, which then lasted
, you know for Well, I was goingto say you're.
Doug (36:53):
You're sort of leading us to say your banjo career is over
, non-existent, but but Peoplecan go to the Elks on the North
side and find you with thePittsburgh Banjo Club.
That's where you guys do all ofthe rehearsing and a lot of
singing.
Chris (37:08):
Oh yeah.
Oh no we do like two shows, iffolks are interested, every
Wednesday yeah.
Doug (37:13):
You should come by the Elks.
It's a good place, it is areally good place.
Another local treasure, yeah,and we should say too your
daughter is a pretty successfulsinger, but she doesn't live
here.
Chris (37:26):
No, Marianne lives in Rome.
Doug (37:29):
And you leave Pittsburgh a little bit every year.
Chris (37:32):
Well, she's got two boys I got.
My grandsons are over there,you know, so I'm not going to
leave them just sitting aroundover there.
Doug (37:40):
It doesn't make it hard.
Do I get this right?
You escape the winteressentially.
You go over right afterChristmas.
Well, here's the thing.
Chris (37:47):
Yeah, I go right after Christmas and stay for a couple
of months.
The winter temperature in Romeaverage, you know, 55.
So you can just wear like awindbreaker or a light jacket
and you're good for the winter.
Now don't look at the Italianpeople.
They are scarfed covered,leggings down, vests and coats,
(38:13):
and you would think it was theArctic.
That's the way they dress whenit's 50.
I don't know what.
What is?
It's something about?
Doug (38:21):
maybe their blood is very thin, maybe or maybe they're
trying to just get the italianfashions out, and I'm sure the
food isn't bad over there.
Does it re-energize you in anyway?
Chris (38:31):
it does absolutely.
Um.
The access to daily freshfruits and vegetables, hand
hand-cut meats to order to yourpreference in every way, and
everything fresh, fresh, freshthat's all they think of, and
the assortment of cheeses whichthey think is normal.
(38:54):
Where can you go on a dailybasis and get fresh regatta?
I mean, you can make ityourself.
I often make my own ricotta,yes, but when they make it,
they're making it with sheep'smilk or they're making it with
cow's milk, and they also makeit with buffalo, like buffalo
(39:16):
mozzarella.
They make the buffalo ricottaand they all have different
textures and curd structure andso on.
So yeah, it's fun.
Nothing like it.
Doug (39:28):
Bringing us back to Pittsburgh.
Number one.
I just want to thank you forsharing so much today and
wandering.
I know you're not doing as manyshows on QED as you used to,
but what is on the horizon?
Do you have any shows or evendemos or anything coming up in
(39:48):
the near term?
Chris (39:49):
One of the things that I've been talking with folks
about is making the inventorymore accessible Because, as we
have talked about, there'shundreds of segments with people
from the community.
Occasionally I'll have somebodycome up to me and go you know
my grandmother.
She was on that show when youdid tomatoes and she made her
(40:14):
favorite tomato casserole and mygrandmother just passed away.
Is there any way I could get acopy of that?
If I can, I go back in, I gointo the archives and find the
tape and transfer it and make aCD for them.
But that's old fashioned Now.
There should be some way todigitize the entire thing, yes,
(40:39):
and then have it accessible bythe person, by the show, by the
recipe, by the ingredient.
That would be amazing.
So this is a little bit of.
If I could hire my son, hecould probably do this and make
a spreadsheet that gets you inand out of all of those
variables.
But I'm sure that they havepeople at WQED who can do this
(41:03):
too.
So that's one of the things I'dlike to do, and the other thing
is to make them accessible forthe younger people, who are
accustomed to getting videomaterial directly.
Doug (41:16):
At different platforms too , whether that's short form,
other social media platforms orwhatever.
How do you get to it where it'snot just a rerun or maybe
somewhere on the website whereyou have to dig for it?
Chris (41:29):
Yeah, yeah.
So that's what I'm exploringnow.
I'm trying to be modern.
Doug (41:34):
I love it.
We never stop learning in foodanyway, and this is part of it
for you.
We never stop learning in foodanyway, and this is part of it
for you.
Chris (41:40):
I'm not sure if and when we might do another giant show,
because they take a lot of time,a lot of planning.
I've noticed Because you'vebeen part of those A little bit.
But you've got to collect therecipes and then get the cooks
that you're going to have on andbook time to shoot them.
(42:01):
It's easier now because wedon't do them live.
Doug (42:04):
Man, I can't imagine Chris .
Chris (42:06):
Live was so crazy.
Doug (42:08):
It's part of the element, though, that it's fun Even when
they are not live.
They're still pretty true toform.
Chris (42:14):
Oh, they're live to tape.
They are live to tape.
Yeah, we may edit somethinglater on and we can stop.
Doug (42:21):
When I put the food processor on backwards for you
Exactly, and we couldn't stop.
Chris (42:29):
No, in those days we just said, oh well, we'll clean this
up later.
Keep going.
Poor Mary Irwin Scott and JoeCerto and folks like you who
would come in and help us onthat side of the camera cleaning
up in the kitchen and settingthings out.
People don't realize everythingthat goes on.
They see what goes on on thecountertop?
(42:51):
Yeah, but to the left stage,left of the countertop, there's
all kinds of stuff going on Alot happening All the time.
Doug (42:58):
Yeah, there's a lot to it.
Yeah, so it takes a small army.
Um, they're fun to do, butthere's a lot of work.
Oh yeah, we're wrapping to theend of our time and I always
have a a sign-off question forour guests okay the name of the
best dishes you've eaten thispast week Ooh, hmm.
Chris (43:26):
Well, I cooked myself all this week and I have to say the
thing that I made and once Imake it I know why I don't make
this every week I made somearborio rice risotto with a ton
of mushrooms in them.
(43:46):
Now I used to make it withdried mushrooms and I would
rehydrate the mushrooms.
They have a lot of flavor andwhatnot, and that's not a bad
idea.
But this time I just boughtbaby bella mushrooms but I mean
a lot, yes, maybe a quart sizebasket and chopped them up and
fried them with a little bit ofonion and not much, just a dash
(44:11):
of salt, a little bit of parsley.
And then I made the rice.
Oh, I made it in my Instapot,which I found makes arborio rice
, makes risotto better than Ican with all that stirring.
So I put the rice in theInstapot one cup of rice with
(44:32):
one and a half cups of water anda half cup of white wine and
some butter, about a quarter ofa stick, it's nothing.
And then I put all themushrooms that I had served for
something else that were left, Iput them in there and put the
thing on.
It's 10 minutes on low pressureand Laura and I were sitting
(44:55):
there going.
Where did this come from?
You know?
No strange ingredients, no,nothing.
But it was so flavorful and themouthfeel was great and if I
had gotten this in a restaurantI would be raving about it.
Doug (45:09):
That's the best sounding mushroom risotto I've heard in a
long while.
Chris (45:14):
Easy peasy, as they say.
Now next time?
Would it be the same?
Probably not, because I'm not achef and I'm always tempted to
tweak it one way or another, butI remember it well enough that
I could go back and try to makeit the same.
You have to jot it down.
Doug (45:30):
I'm the same way.
I'm a tinkerer.
I'm always fiddling.
I need to write my stuff down,Chris Fennimore.
Chris (45:39):
Thank you so much, Doug I didn't let you get a word in
edgewise.
Doug (45:42):
here it was amazing, and I'm looking at all of my
questions.
You just kept answering them,so it couldn't be better.
Chris (45:54):
Chris Fennimore.
Thank you so much for being onThe Pittsburgh Dish.
Well.
Thank you, Doug, for all ofyour support of what I do and
for giving me this chance.
Of course, Thank you.
Doug (46:03):
Be sure to catch Chris Saturday mornings on our local
PBS station,WQED, for QED Cooks,as well as their other great
programming.
You can also follow Chris onthe Facebook page QED Cooks.
And finally, we thought thatmushroom risotto recipe sounded
so delicious.
We're leaving a version up onthe blog as our recipe of the
(46:25):
week.
We have instructions forChris's Instapot method as well
as a traditional stovetopversion.
Hope you enjoy it.
That's our show for this week.
We'd like to thank all of ourguests and contributors, and to
Kevin Solecki of CarnegieAccordion Company for providing
the music to our show.
We'll be back again next weekwith another fresh episode.
(46:47):
Stay tuned.
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