John Ferrone was James Beard’s longtime friend and editor. He worked closely with Beard on a memoir, five cookbooks, and over a hundred newspaper and magazine articles. Here, Ferrone talks about what it was like to collaborate with James Beard on his magnum opus, James Beard’s American Cookery.

        Q. You worked closely with Beard on several cookbooks, including American Cookery. Did you have a chance to test many of the recipes for this book while it was in development? Are there any you still make now?

        A. During the years I worked with James Beard on cookbooks and articles I frequently kitchen-tested recipes. Each new Beard cookbook enlarged my culinary repertoire. American Cookery was a major contributor. Beard on Bread turned me into a confirmed baker. Menus for Entertaining made me a better party giver. I tested either because I was intrigued by a recipe I was editing or because Beard was away from his kitchen and asked for help, as he did here: “John, I wish you would try [my] recipe for Brownies...and use a few more nuts and use half walnuts and half filberts and see how it goes.”

        I cook quite simply these days and draw on the bounty of American Cookery less than I used to, but I can think of one dish that lingers on. It’s Piquant Crab Salad (p. 59), an elevated version of cole slaw, which I have used as a stimulating first course for rich holiday meals.

        Q. What was your working relationship like? Did he teach you a thing or two about your job? Vice versa?

        A. I began working with Beard on a regular basis in the 1960s, succeeding his Portland friend Isabel Callvert as a freelance editor (not as ghostwriter, as some people believed). In the earlier years he banged out manuscripts on his portable typewriter, not bothering to correct typos or polish his prose. What he presented for editing had the essential information and authority, and plenty of Beard, but needed refining and organization. The trick was to tidy him up while letting his distinctive voice come through. Beard wasn’t the least bit vain about his writing and accepted editing without a protest. A rare author, indeed. When he became more affluent and could afford a full-time secretary, he taped his material, and I was given an impeccably transcribed first draft to work with. This might include instructions on the point he was trying to make: “Try to get some of my feeling into the piece....It should start with ‘I grew up in the Iron Age [of cookery].’”

        Part of American Cookery was composed at Julia Child’s house in the South of France. Beard had rented the place for an extended stay. I was there for a two-week working vacation. I would get Beard’s manuscript straight from the typewriter. I can still see him sitting there each morning in a kimono, poking away on his portable.

        Beard taught me everything I know about cooking, American and otherwise. I’m not sure I taught him anything about the use of the English language. There wasn’t much feedback for my efforts, but occasionally he would toss me a compliment: “The manuscript arrived yesterday,” he once wrote me from Provence, “and it seems in much better shape than I thought it could be. I am more than pleased with what you have done and I have done.”

        Q. Among many classic dishes that remain popular today, American Cookery features a few odd and antiquated foods—like preparations for calf’s brains and “Blushing Bunny” (not a meat dish). Is there anything in the book that has since gone out of fashion that you think ought to be revived? Anything you think Beard would have fought to keep in vogue?

        A. Beard’s documentary approach to American food allowed him to include dishes such as Asparagus in Ambush and Tipsy Parson that would hardly be found at his own table. He stopped short of treating readers to Flapper Salad (half a peach or pear garnished with shredded carrot and other bits to make a flapper’s face) or Candlestick Salad (half a banana upright on a slice of pineapple, dribbled with mayonnaise). Apart from a few “grotesqueries,” as Beard called them, the recipes in American Cookery are meant to be taken seriously, although many have gone out of fashion, victims of the ban on excess butter and cream or upstaged by ethnic newcomers. But wouldn’t it be heartwarming to see that old party favorite Beef Stroganoff again, maybe with a new twist? Or a grand presentation of a Crown Roast of Pork or Lamb, with an inventive filling for the hollow of the crown? What would Beard have wanted to resurrect? Well, he liked all parts of the pig. He might have sent up a cheer for that rarity, pig’s feet, or put in a good word for an unloved root vegetable, the parsnip, for which he provides a lavish recipe in American Cookery that calls for dollops of Madeira and heavy cream. I’ve served it many a time as an accompaniment to roast lamb.

        Q. What did Beard tend to eat for breakfast?

        A. Although Beard championed the Great American Breakfast in his writing, his own morning diet was slim—tea and toast. That was all. Naturally the quality of the bread for toast was important. At home in New York, he settled for an Italian or French bread from Balducci’s or the former Jefferson Market. In St-Rémy-de-Provence he tracked down a loaf to his liking, which he described thus to his food colleague Helen Evans Brown: “It is rough and slightly off-white and has a wonderful crust—not the refined bread that everyone seems crazy for these days, which only lasts about an hour.” That became the bread for my toast, too, during a visit with Beard in St-Rémy.

        Q. At nearly 900 pages, American Cookery is comprehensive. It’s hard to imagine, but was there more that Beard wanted to include in the book?

         A. American Cookery was written in no particular order, as Beard continued his investigation of early cookbooks and the compilations of Ladies Aid societies. It just grew, chapter by chapter, and was not assembled into a cohesive book until the end. Each time Beard believed we had reached that point, he or I would think of a missing chapter, and we’d start up all over again. This went on for nearly four years, by which time we were both exhausted and couldn’t squeeze out another word. When it came time to put the mass of material in some order, Beard decided to follow more or less the sequence of a meal, starting with cocktail food. If later he had been asked to fill in any gaps in what one reviewer called his “magisterial epic cookbook,” he might have chosen to enlarge the pasta section, which for Americans in the early seventies was still in the spaghetti and macaroni stage.

        Q. If there is one recipe or anecdote that you think sums up Beard’s genius, and the mission of this book, which would it be?

        A. It’s not possible to sum up Beard’s contribution to America’s eating habits with a single achievement. His influence was felt in so many ways. He not only wrote cookbooks and countless food pieces, including a syndicated column, but he conducted cooking classes on both coasts, did food demonstrations throughout the country, appeared on television, developed new products for companies like Green Giant and French’s mustard (for which he has been repeatedly criticized), advised restaurateurs, held seminars on wines, and encouraged up-and-coming chefs. I can’t think of another culinary figure who could begin to match that record. He deserves credit, too, for his skill as a host. His dinner parties and cocktail buffets were legendary and set an example for entertaining in a hearty but elegant style. The cast of characters at these events was made up of food people and old friends. I can remember one such holiday celebration when Beard was eighty and had lost a good deal of weight. A guest handed him a Christmas gift, and as he stood up to accept it, his trousers fell to his ankles. After a second of shock, Beard roared with laughter, and so did all his guests. He was a showman to the end.

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