This Is How Julia Child Used to Celebrate Valentine’s Day

Julia Child and her husband, Paul, celebrated Valentine’s Day the same way for 25 years. The tradition itself was simple but exquisitely done. The couple sent out a romantic card to friends and family, then cooked a Valentine’s Day dinner on February 14. What made this tradition special? It’s all in the details.

Sending Valentine’s Day Cards

Amusingly, the Childs’ Valentine’s Day card was originally meant to be a Christmas card—except they realized they were too late to send out cards in time to reach friends and family for the holiday. The couple decided to send out a Valentine’s card instead.

Paul dabbled in fine art photography and wanted to send something unique. The Childs had newly settled into an apartment in Paris (memorialized in the film Julie & Julia, alongside a bevy of mouth-watering French food). He also enjoyed browsing antique postcards in bookshops alongside the river Seine. Paul was especially charmed by old sentimental cards in which lovers gazed adoringly at one another against nostalgic or fantastic backgrounds.

Julia and Paul decided to recreate this antique style. Paul rented wigs, and they held up paper hearts and mooned for the camera. The result was such a hit, the Childs recreated it year after year. In one of the few cards that survived, Julia and Paul sit in a bathtub filled with bubbles, a stamp cheekily proclaiming “Wish you were here!”

Cooking Duck for Dinner

Here’s a famous fact about Julia Child: She learned to cook while living in Paris at the age of 32. Since Paul was the creative visionary for the card, Julia took charge of—what else?—the dinner. In an essay for Food & Wine, she recollects that she usually made “some kind of duck as the main course.” Given that one of Julia’s top cooking lessons was to use butter (and “if you’re afraid of butter, use cream”), it’s no surprise that she loved duck, a rich bird with a much higher fat content than chicken.

When we roast duck, we don’t even need to rub butter on its skin, as is common practice with other poultry, like chicken and turkey. The bird has plenty of flavorful oils already. If you want to try duck but prefer a brighter flavor, pair duck with oranges. The citrus will lighten up the richness of the bird.

Paul Child enjoyed his traditional Valentine’s Day meal so much that he dedicated a card to the feathery feast. He had planned a design showing him and Julia soaring over the Eiffel Tower in a hot air balloon but changed course to show them riding a duck in full plumage, carrying a red heart in its beak. Now, what could be more romantic than that?