When Sally Ekus was 4 years old, she had dinner with Julia Child. Technically, the already legendary chef was a guest of her parents, who were running a culinary agency in Hatfield, Massachusetts. And before they plated an elaborate Chinese feast, it should be noted that Sally was supposed to be sleeping.

But the smell of the meal wafted up the stairs to her bedroom, and soon Sally could hear Child’s distinctively loud, high-pitched voice mingling with her mother’s.

“I wish I could say I understood the gravitas of the situation,” she says now. “I had tremendous FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) as a kid, and I knew enough to know that she was someone very special.”