Fit for a Queen

   Originally written for the St. Petersburg Times in 2009 but never published.         

          Jill Simpson Cooper (46), now of Dade City, was born and raised in unpronounceable towns in Wales, like Cwm and Ebbw Vale before ending up at the crossroads of the Kingsway and Queensway Highways in Scunthorpe, England, about two and a half hours north of London by car.  Her father was a steelworker who followed the job trail to Scunthorpe in 1977, which is where and when Jill began setting down roots and settling into the life that saw her in seven short years become Queen Elizabeth’s chef.  Or one of them.

            Her first job as a thirteen-year-old in Scunthorpe was at a bakery, where she worked every morning from six to eight, and then trotted off to school, where she took cooking classes and miscellaneous Home Ec courses until she graduated in 1982 and became the chief cook and bottle washer at an assisted living facility her retired parents had bought and then moved into.

            For a while 19-year-old Jill ran the place, cooking, of course, but also supervising the transformation of the house into a health-care facility.  She dealt with  health department regulators and local building inspectors, getting the place ready for what we would call a certificate of occupancy.

She was also in charge of scheduling fire inspections.  Which is how she met her husband, Alan Cooper, who was the Chief Fire Prevention Officer of Scunthorpe.

After they were married in 1984, Alan volunteered his bride and talented cook for several “fire brigade” events sponsored by North Lincolnshire County.  Jill’s talents were noticed at once.  After she rose quickly up the ranks from vegetable helper to event planner to unofficial chef, town officials decided to send her to the local culinary college for a formal education.        

When she graduated, Jill helped plan and prepare meals for events all throughout North Lincolnshire, most grandly at Normanby Hall, a classic English mansion on a 350-acre estate that had passed into public hands in 1963 and been transformed into an all-purpose facility that would now and then receive members of the Royal Family, and up to forty of their specially-invited guests.  Jill was regularly one of the chefs  in charge of a select staff that served either lunch or dinner to Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip, or to Prince Charles, say, or Sarah Ferguson, the Duchess of York.

Of course whenever the Queen stopped at Normanby Hall, the entire county went on high alert for months.  Newspaper and television coverage was constant, and the water-cooler buzz shifted from soccer to the Royal Family.  On the day of the dinner, “people lined the streets to see the Queen pass in her bullet-proof car,” Jill recalls. 

Of course, Jill and the entire staff were on high alert too.  The menu had to be planned carefully well in advance, and the day before the Queen’s arrival, there was a soup-to-nuts dress rehearsal.  Everything had to be perfect.  “By the time the Queen actually arrived,” Jill says, “we were mostly just relieved.”

Of all the meals she served the Queen, Jill remembers one disastrous dessert most, “Baked Pears and Chocolate Sauce,” because the sauce didn’t set properly.  There was a general kitchen panic, but in the end, she says, “I served it anyway.” 

It isn’t generally known, Jill says, but  it’s true that “when the Queen stops eating, everyone stops eating.”  Fortunately for the invited guests, Jill adds, “She’s a slow eater.”  It isn’t known, however, if the Queen stopped sooner than usual when the unset chocolate sauce was placed before her.

After several years of being in the culinary spotlight, Jill retired with Alan to Sarasota, where they spent a very profitable decade in a pool business before retiring again in 2007 to Dade City, not quite midway between their grown children living in Sarasota and Jacksonville. 

And now Jill Cooper is preparing a cookbook for American moms, perhaps to be titled Fit for a Queen.  It’s a project Jill’s had in mind for several years but has only just begun in earnest during the last several months.  Alan’s favorite is “Toad in the Hole,” a sausage and Yorkshire Pudding dish, while Jill prefers Salmon En Croute, which is salmon in a puff pastry.  They also list “fish and chips,” “Roast Lamb with Garlic and Rosemary,” and all manner of soups among their favorites.

When she isn’t working at her part-time job at Publix or traveling with Alan in their RV, Jill fine-tunes the 1500 recipes she’s collected through the years and brings trial samples to discriminating neighbors like Judy and Tom Moon who are happy Jill’s returned at long last to the culinary arts.  “Delicious,” Judy says of the most recent recipe, “Panini with Pesto Parmesan Ham.”  “I can’t wait to see the cookbook!”

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Roasted Herb and Garlic Chicken

4 chicken portions

1 clove garlic

2 teaspoons rosemary

1 teaspoon sage

1 teaspoon thyme

2 tablespoons oil.

Mix rub ingredients together and coat chicken portions.  Roast in a 400 degree oven until golden brown and crispy.

Apple and Walnut Maple Mustard Salad

1 bag spring greens

1 cup sour cream

2 tablespoons mustard

1 tablespoon maple syrup

1 green apple chopped

½ cup walnuts

Combine dressing ingredients, mix in apple and walnuts.  Chill.

When ready to eat, toss the dressing with the spring greens.

Peach and Blueberry Cornbread

4 peaches cut in 6’s

4 tablespoons good blueberry preserves

1 packet corn muffin mix

1 egg

One third cup milk

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Spread preserve over the bottom of 9-inch iron pan.  Arrange peach lices to cover preserve.  Mix cornbread according to package adding vanilla.  Bake at 375 degrees for 25-30 minutes.