The Man with a Pan

Maybe ten minutes into my interview with John Donohue, author of “Man with a Pan, Culinary Adventures of Fathers Who Cook for Their Families,” I found myself envying his wife.

I mean, this guy not only prepares breakfast, lunch and dinner, but he shops for the groceries, too.

Donohue, who has lived in Park Slope for 15 years and used to live across the street from the Park Slope Food Coop (and is, of course, a member), loves to think about food, write about food and, most importantly, prepare food for his wife and daughters, Aurora, 7, and Isis, 4.

Donohue, a cartoonist and editor at The New Yorker, worked at a retail fish market while in college and was a short-order cook on Block Island after his graduation. But it was becoming a parent that transformed him into the family cook and what inspired his wonderful blog, Stay at Stove Dad.

 “Life with children is chaotic and the kitchen is so orderly. There’s a sense of control,” he told me over morning lattes at , which is across the street from PS 107, where his daughter goes to school. But it’s also, he says, cheaper, healthier and more enjoyable to cook and eat at home.

Soon after his first child was born he and his wife realized that restaurants were out of the question. “Dining out was supposed to be rewarding and convenient, but I was still hungry, short on cash, and miles from home,” he writes in the book. “Looking down at the cold bluestone of the Brooklyn sidewalk I realized that if I wanted a good dinner when I got home from work, it was going to be up to me.” 

In Donohue’s opening essay, he lays out some interesting sociological details about why more fathers are cooking now than in the past.

“Over the past 40 years the percentage of working mothers has doubled, hitting nearly 40 percent of all mothers this decade. With more moms working someone else has to do the cooking.”

Dinner at Chez Donohue is usually simple, abundant and served family style.

“I let the kids choose what they want to eat. They like Bolognese sauce,” he told me. I wondered if he has stringent rules about what they can and can’t eat.

“It doesn’t make sense to be a dictator. I make healthy, great food so that they’ll know what that is.”

With “Man With a Pan,” Donohue wanted to demystify cooking for men. A collection of recipes and essays by men who cook, the book contains contributions by 22 both famous and not famous dads, and delicious sounding recipes from the basic (Really Good Chicken) to the complex (Bacon Wrapped Duck Breast Stuffed with Apple and Chesnuts) and the in-between like Applesauce Meatloaf, Miso Cod adapted from a recipe by Nobu Matsuhisa, and Tofu Bolognese.

“It’s a big story told in different voices,” he told me.

In the book, journalist Jesse Green, writes about his two-dad family and what he learned from his mother about feeding a family.

Author Stephen King writes about gentle cooking, ‘Turning down the heat is always a wonderful idea, I think. Whether I’m frying hamburgers, making breakfast omelets, or doing pancakes for a pickup supper, the best rule is to be gentle.”

And novelist Thomas Beller observes that his daughter likes to sit near him on the kitchen counter when he cooks.

“Often I let her hold the fork or knife. I put my hand over hers and we do things together that way.”

Celebrity chef Mario Batali, who is also included in the collection, reveals that his son’s favorite dish is duck testicles.

“He’s eleven, and in fact, I think he’s only eaten them maybe four times. But he was fascinated by the idea that we were eating duck testicles.”

I asked Donohue about his upbringing and he told me that his father’s favorite dish was “over-tipping.” His mother, who was born in Ireland, was an excellent chef who cooked healthy meals.

“As a kid I ate romaine lettuce. We never ate anything fried. And no Kool-Aid.”  

Donohue, who includes his own recipes for Weeknight Chicken Parmigiana and Not So Basic Black Beans in the book, believes that family cooking is very important “Men can see how they can make a bigger contribution to their family and how rewarding it is.”

It seems that Donohue is not alone. He knows quite a few dads in Park Slope, who like to cook.

“It’s a generational thing, men in their forties consider it normal to cook. It’s an assumption we make now,” he told me.