I remember Mom's meatless meal ( a concept way ahead of its time)--- French fried eggplant. I could only eat it with ketchup and avoided the pieces that had a lot of seeds. Yuk! I secretly thought it was pretty cool that our family had this unusual meal. None of my friends ever had eggplant for dinner.
I learned to eat fish by eating those "wonderful" fish sticks. I thought they were great. Now I love fish--but not fish sticks.
I remember Grandma Calkins standing at the kitchen table, stirring up a double batch of cookies for us in one of those crock type bowls. She was astounded a few days later that they were gone! She couldn't believe that we could eat so many cookies. Mom often wrapped up some in packages for Dad's lunches and hid them so he'd have some for himself. Otherwise he didn't get any.
I wonder if Mom had any experience cooking with her mom. I thought maybe she didn't have to cook because she was the "baby" and her mom cooked for her, especially because her siblings were older and out on their own earlier. She liked to try new recipes but stuck to the ones we loved--like Corned Beef Casserole. On Saturdays when we'd empty out the fridge of the week's leftovers and have them for lunch. We would fight over the Corned Beef Casserole leftover, as well as the Corn Flake-covered mashed potato balls with cheese in the center! Yum!!
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And don't forget toasted cheese sandwiches with grape jelly...yum! Or those times when we would have breakfast for dinner...pancakes or french toast!
Yeah, breakfast for dinner was like a dream. To this day, I still enjoy breakfasts better than suppers. Corned beef casserole is a HUGE hit here. I loved it as a kid and now David and Jonathan both love it. Remember the time Mom made root beer? And you are right about the cookies. To this day, cookies are my biggest temptation. Cakes, pies, candy, even ice cream I can say no to. But cookies ... well, I mean they are just so small and harmless, right? Probably so if you don't eat two dozen at one sitting like I could. And Linda, I have very clear memories of you eating ice cream with something like marshmallow sauce on it when you got home from school. Remember when Dad had the MSPE picnic at our house and they roasted corn on the cob in the fireplace?
I remember the MSPE picnics. Mom once or twice made double or triple batches of yeast raised doughnuts and we all went nuts over those! She'd have them spread out all over every surface of the kitchen for their final rising. They were great. We tried to freeze some to make them last longer but that usually didn't help much. We'd pop one out and heat it up, I guess in the toaster and roll it in granulated sugar. YUM!
You know, I still have a hard time explaining how grilled cheese (ooops we used to actually have toasted cheese) sandwiches were good with grape Jelly on them. Any one else have that problem? And do you remember how Dad used to eat Limburger cheese. Now that stuff really STUNK! And remember Dad used to like Sardines? The one thing Dad used to like that I absolutely HATED was oyster soup. Remember Mom used to have Rainbow Sherbet ice cream, or sometimes just orange sherbet? Now NOBODY else had that! One thing our family can never brag about as we were growing up was our spaghetti. I mean maybe it's because I have a wife of full Mediterranean blood, but Franco American just was not that special, sorry Mom. But she made up for it with her baked ham, roast beef (which I actually became tired of), and even her meat loaf. Yumm.
Wow, I don't remember mom making root beer. I do remember her making bread from frozen loaves and ice cream from skimmed milk...yuk...not really my favorite. Lou, the marshmallow thing you probably remember is that every day after school, I would take two large marshmallows, a tablespoon of butter..melt them together and press like 1/2 cup of cocoa krispies cereal with them in a bowl...chocolate rice krispy treats! My family loves corned beef noodle casserole, too.(as well as hamburger pie). Another weird thing dad used to eat was cold baked beans and grape jelly sandwiches. Try explaining that to your friends. I remember the MSPE corn roast because Lou and I had to eat with Grandma in the house. I dropped my corn on the floor and when I brushed it off and went to eat it, Lou thought it was disgusting. I remember Grandma said, "A little dirt never hurt anyone". I was kind of surprised, I thought she was going to yell at me.
Grandma said, "A little dirt never hurt anyone". I was kind of surprised.,Yeah, from the lady who thought she would get trichinosis unless she cooked her bacon until it was carbon, that is very surprising. I do not remember the baked beans and jelly sandwiches. I just wouldn't tell anyone about that :-). I think Mom only tried the root beer thing one time. It wasn't all that great if I remember correctly. I remember the bottling apparatus she used to put the cap on. I have no idea how she carbonated it. I also remember when the dessert Strawberry Delight was renamed to "Strawberry Substance". It all happened in Junior High around the time of my birthday. I had a science teacher (Mr. Zag) who absolutely could not stand when we used the word "stuff" for things we did not understand. He would say, "it's not stuff, it's substance." So when Mom asked me what I wanted for my birthday cake I said, "Oh, make that strawberry stuff - uh, I mean substance."
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