My grandfather was a baker in the Marine Corps and was eventually in charge of the bakery at Camp Pendleton.  Although he wasn't supposed to, in Korea he would often use the bakery's ovens for preparing other items, like ham or pizza.  One of his favorite stories was about how when he was Officer of the Day, he would drive through the ration dump and the ingredients to make pizza "would just jump into the jeep."  Another time he had traded some bread to the mess sergeant for a ham and was baking it in one of the bakery's ovens when the battalion commander, a Lt. Colonel, came by for an inspection.  The CO said he could smell ham and started checking inside the ovens.  He stopped just before he got to the oven with the ham.

Even after he left the Marines, my grandfather still enjoyed baking.  His favorite recipe (and mine) was for cream puffs.  He'd take over the entire kitchen and make up a huge batch.  There would be cream puffs everywhere.

When I was in Junior High, I had a year of Home-Ec classes.  I did adequately on the sewing part, but I had the highest grade in the class in cooking, straight A's.