I am waiting for something which was supposed to be today’s post but it’s not here. So, a different direction.
Anyway, Saturday (Valentine’s Day for those who mark it) was our first really nice (ie, fully sunny and dry) day since last year. In fact, it has rained every day since the turn of the year and it’s raining today (Sunday) yet again as I finish up this post. To say I am sad and fed up is an understatement. Pitter pat, split splat, drip drip drip. If you need some of our wet you are welcome to it.
But, food. I had a back and forth with a friend for whom health issues have caused a change in diet but who still feels very nostalgic for certain things that stood out of her childhood diet as actually pleasurable. And that set me off thinking about foods we were given in child/teen hood vs things we eat now.
I expect for most of us the mother did most or all the cooking. That’s certainly the case for me and while I grew up in suburban Philadelphi and New York my mother lived in Germany till she was 13 and that informed the food she served and her attitudes towards it.
Just to say I no longer eat much of that type of food. I am happily nostalgic for some things and others make me feel a bit ill when I think of them.
On the former, she served fruit as a starter for evening meals. Usually a half a grapefruit (with the segments sort of dug through with a crazy looking grapefruit knife) or a slice of melon when it was in season. I even have vague memories of fruit cocktail in syrup from a can but I may be imagining that.
The main part of dinner was made up of protein, veg and starch – tending towards a dryish lamb or pork chop, veal parmigiana, sometimes boiled potatoes (never fries) and every once in a while these pan fried potats with onions which she made really well, more often white rice, and veg from a can or frozen (green beans, peas, maybe carrots). We did not generally do dessert. To mix things up sometimes there was lasagna.
She did not enjoy cooking but appeared to feel it was her duty. She was very modern for her time – there were only a few years early in childhood when she stayed home. She ‘wanted’ to work.
Oh, and she made devilled eggs, which my brother liked but made me ill to even see. She made the mistake of making me eat one once. That did not go well (very messy) and she never tried it again. Still don’t eat them.
My father had specialties which tended to come out on Saturday evenings: pirogies (Eastern European dumplings filled with stuff – his faves were the potato) with apple sauce or soured cream, soft pretzels after he found a recipe (which we had with tuna salad), even pizza using a pizza stones he found somewhere.
So, nostalgia … The pretzels and pizza are some of my happiest childhood food memories. And the pirogies. I still make my mother’s flourless (ground almonds) chocolate cake. Eat a lot of different fruit and veg. And I’m pleased I came out of childhood liking onions, garlic and spices.
Things that got divested … I haven’t touched veal or lamb since my 20s, don’t enjoy lasagna much, and got shot of the notion that dessert is always bad. I eat a lot more fish than we did when I was a kid. I have never ever touched devilled eggs again.
Oh, and we were definitely not members of the clean plate club. If you didn’t finish, fine – it went into the fridge for another time. She did not believe in forced consumption (except devilled eggs).
So does this get your brain going regarding your food upbringing? Any supreme hates and favourites you brought along into adulthood? Is there something you will never ever touch again?
Pics: wiki, pexels
What fun! I remember that we grew up in the 70’s when people were getting “into” food. People watched “The Galloping Gourmet” and Julia Child and had copies of the cookbooks. My mom was smart- she got us kids into competition and took most of the cooking off her hands.
I remember the Galloping Gourmet! So much fun.
Your mother definitely had the right idea.
What a fun post! My mother was a very good cook who did mostly simple dishes done very well. My favorite meal, growing up, was salmon croquettes with mashed potatoes and spinach ( my maternal side favors savory over sweet)
My dad, though! As in most things he was a flamboyant, seat of the pants cook, with little knowledge but a lot of confidence, usually misplaced , as in the case of the raccoon
He’d been given a raccoon that had been skinned and field dressed- but the head was still on , as were the claws. He declared that he was going to roast it! And so he did, giving it a cursory rinse and some salt and pepper.
Not only did our house stink… I am surprised the neighbors didn’t call the PD!
Anyway, he brought this travesty to the dinner table, yellowed fangs and all… and my 6 year old brother burst into tears!
Luckily my mother,foreseeing the disaster, had roasted chicken.
elevated comfort food. sigh.
I’m not surprised your brother burst into tears. I would have run screaming. So, in the end your mother saved the day 🙂
I have some college friends who still laugh about that time a housemate (individual rooms rented, we didn’t really know each other) shoved a dead raccoon, hair and claws and all, into the fridge for cooking later. I threw an absolute fit and made her throw it out.
OMG!
Uh, yuck.
My mother was a reluctant/resentful cook and we had a regular rotation. I admit I get nostalgic for her tuna noodle casserole, though not to the point of recreating it. I loathe meat loaf to this day. We had (canned) fruit for dessert, don’t miss those either. But COMFORT — she made cream of wheat with plenty of milk and sugar (she called it Three Bears’ Porridge) when we were sick or sad, I still do that for myself when I need it. And soft boiled eggs on toast, same situation. I miss you, mom.
It’s interesting with all the focus on women’s roles back when that so many women would have rather been doing so many other things.
I did find it interesting when my son when off to uni how crap at cooking the other guys in his house were. Ready meals (plus care packages from moms) all the way.
That porridge sounds winter perfect.
I grew up around good cooking. Both my grandmothers had been professional cooks. Grammie J ran a hospital kitchen, and Grammie S was the private cook for a rich man during the depression. My mom was a good cook. She was willing to try new cooking tools like food processors and microwaves when they came on the scene. We took microwave lessons together when I was a teen. Even though we’re not of Italian ancestry, we ate a lot of homemade lasagna, spaghetti, and pizza. Those are the things I feel nostalgic about. I’m glad you got a little break from the rain. We had a rainy weekend here.
It does sound like you were surrounded by good cooking. How lovely.
It’s not supposed to rain today. Fingers crossed.
Mum was not a good cook, she was a good baker though. She loved sweet things & made what she liked well.
Dad was an excellent cook. As was his mum & siblings. Corned beef hash, meat & tatie pie, cow heel & shin beef, pig hock & peas & tatie hash were all regulars & relished.
Breakfast was hot, buttered hard boiled eggs on toast, mushrooms fried in butter then stewed in milk with a soft roll, proper porridge with golden syrup & my favourite, the left over cow heel & shin beef gravy with a soft roll to dip. All that savoury stickiness, yum!
I still make all these family recipes, they are well over a century old, probably older than that. One is even our family Christmas Eve dinner.
Alityke, what is Corned Beef Hash? I love Corned Beef but never heard of the hash.
Portia xx
Basically my recipe isn’t the US breakfast version but a stew.
2 floury potatoes per person, peeled & cubed
2-3 carrots per person, peeled & cut into coins.
1 large onion diced small
1 large tin baked beans in tomato sauce
1 tin corned beef cubed
A good jigger of Worcestershire Sauce
1/2 – 1 baked beans tin water
1 beef stock pot
Salt & pepper to taste.
In a slow cooker
Add everything but use only 1/2 tin of water, bring it to a bubble, stir then cook on slow for 4 hours
In a pan on the stove top
Add everything including a full tin of water. Bring to a bubble the bring heat to low & simmer until the potatoes & carrots are completely soft & the corned beef has melted to make a thick meaty gravy.
I’m common & serve it as comfort food in a bowl with brown sauce & eat with a spoon. It’s delicious in an old fashioned way. I always think of it as Irish. It may be it was from my mum’s rather than my dad’s family.
Do let me know if you try it xxx
WOW! It reads like something you have to grow up with Alityke but I bet Jin would go apeshit for it. I’m sending him the recipe.
Thank you.
My food reference is so Central/Eastern Europe and Mediterranean. I’ve lived in the UK a long time but really had to steal myself to try haggis (it was good), find white and black pudding nauseating, and made beans on toast for my kid with my nose closed. A Sunday roast is a thing of beauty though and roast potatoes are the bees knees.
Haggis makes me gip, I’ve never tried white pudding, love crisply fried black pudding though & miss the freshly made links that were sold on the market when I was young.
I agree about a good Sunday roast. I doubt every household makes it every week anymore.
Haggis was really good but that may be because it was made by a friend who came from Greece and sort of treated it differently than I’d read about. White pudding is a crime against food.
I’ve had to look it up. Fat, grains, onions & salt? Never had it or even seen it for sale! Would I want to try it? No & I’ve eaten andouiette in France.
SO MANY MEMORIES Cinnamon,
Mum was a simple cook but had a good sense of taste so often little extras were added that gave her food a zing over many of our friends and families dishes. I’m still making her pumpkin soup, beef barley vegetable soup, bolognaise, rissoles, and savory mince almost exactly as she did.
Dad was a fan of offal and we tried so much but most of it was disgusting to us. Tripe, brains, kidney were all not to my liking and though I do sometimes retry them to see if I can come at them now, nope.
Seafood was another taste I don’t really like, but can eat most of it except oysters and crustaceans, if I must.
My palate has been redrawn and extended a long way by my last two partners, Varun Indian and Jin South Korean. I’m eternally grateful for their long suffering patience.
Portia xx
Sounds like your mother enjoyed cooking. That’s a great thing to pass on to one’s kids, that attitude.
Innards. No. My mother like liver. She had to make it for herself as no one else in the house (including the dog, if I am recalling correctly) would touch it.