For Shepparton’s Debbie Quinn, cooking has been a part of her life for as long as she can remember.
As the daughter of Lorna and Jack Marsden, owners of former Shepparton restaurants Big Valley and Maisies, Debbie’s passion in the kitchen was nurtured from a young age.
“All my life, I was watching Mum and just took an interest in it,” she said.
“It’s a family thing — we’ve grown up with it and so I guess I just really enjoy it, it’s something I love to do.”
While Debbie went on to own her own hairdressing business and later took to administration work, her love for whipping up a meal never faded — in fact, it’s only grown.
Each fortnight, Debbie will bring her cooking expertise to the McPherson Media Group table and give her best tips, tricks and recipes, catering to all different dietary requirements.
She said her column’s aim was to help anyone in the kitchen create “easy and simple” meals — with the occasional trickier recipe thrown in the mix too — following one common theme: tastiness.
Featuring family favourites, from fish pie or lasagne to making the perfect roast, through to more exotic meals of yellow curry lamb shanks, Debbie will also dip into Italian, Asian and Greek recipes.
Readers will soon be able to join in Debbie’s favourite part of cooking — bringing people together.
“It’s just about sharing a lovely meal together; I enjoy making nice things for people,” she said.