One afternoon in last December I went to the library. I checked out three books: a bread baking cookbook, a chick Brit lit book and a book titled A Homemade Life, stories and recipes from my kitchen. I started and finished A Homemade Life by 10 pm.
During a break from reading I realized the last three books I have read are all stories of people lives and the recipes that make up their life; Lunch in Paris; A Love Story with Recipes, Alice Waters and Chez Panisse and A Homemade Life.
It is this last book that resonated with me the most. Molly Wizenberg, the author, writes, “When I walk into my kitchen today, I am not alone. Whether we know it or not, none of us is. We bring fathers and mothers and kitchen tables and every meal we have ever eaten. Food is never just food. It’s also a way of getting at something else: who we are, who we have been, and who we want to be.”
“When we fall in love with a certain dish, I think that’s what we’re often responding to: that something else behind the fork or spoon, the familiar story that food tells.”
I couldn’t agree more.
Here is the beginning to my life in recipes:
I still remember every Sunday coming home from church, anticipating the fragrance of Sunday dinner. Some sort of roast in the oven layered with the lingering fragrance of bacon and eggs from breakfast. My mom was responsible for all these wonderful fragrances. She made just about every meal I ate from the day I was born until I was teenager.
Of course there were days where I would make my own breakfast. But it is the peanut butter and bacon on toast, the bacon, egg, and cheese on an English muffin, and the fried bread with peanut butter that my mom made that I remember. It is the grilled cheese and peanut butter, the homemade chicken salad, and the roast beef sandwich for lunch. It is her beef stroganoff, eggs and potatoes dinner entree, meatloaf, macaroni and cheese, spaghetti and meatballs. I can see, taste, and smell the meals. I can see my mom, in the kitchen, happily cooking for our family.
There were a few dishes my mom made that I absolutely will never eat again; eggplant parmesan, chicken salad with green grapes, lentil soup with kielbasa. (I like the kielbasa part!) I know my dad likes two of the three dishes mentioned. I am not sure which dishes my sisters like. To this day I do not like eggplant parm or grapes in my chicken salad. I am still trying to like lentils. I have yet to fine a recipe containing lentils that I like. I haven’t given up.
Speaking of my dad; he can cook too. He is the grill master. He grills year round. Neither snow nor rain, nor heat nor gloom of night prevents my dad from grilling. I remember him grilling on the charcoal grill. I remember him trying to get the charcoal started. I remember getting the charcoal chimney starter. That simple contraption made grilling much more pleasant.
I don’t remember when he switched to a gas grill. But since then, each new gas grill has been bigger than the previous. A few years ago he got a light that attaches to the cover of the grill. My dad no longer needs to bring in the meat to see if it s done. He just turns on the light!
I learned from dad the signs that indicate when it is time to turn the meat or when it is done. Hot dogs crack when they are done. When the juices come to the surface of a steak or a hamburger it is time to flip it over. Here is the part I never remember; how many minutes after you flip the steak or burger is it done? Luckily I heard of a different way of determining when the meat is done. It is called "Test the Fleshiness."
When I go visit my family, I look forward to sitting at the dining room table and eating a home cooked meal with them. Sometimes it is just my mom, dad, and me. Other times one or both of my sisters and their family’s will join us. It doesn’t matter how many of us there are at the table or who’s table we are at. All that matters is that we are together, eating food made by “us” and the first ingredient is love.[ii]
Peanut Butter and Bacon Sandwich
Cook the bacon until just crisp. Place on a paper towel to absorb any extra fat that maybe on the bacon.
Make two slices of toast. (I preferred white bread at the time.)
Spread any type of peanut butter on both slices of toast.
Place 3-4 slices of bacon between the two slices of toast.
Enjoy!
Chicken Salad
Chicken Breasts
Celery, almost minced
Miracle Whip or mayonnaise
Salt to taste
Pepper to taste
Poach the chicken breasts. Allow to cool completely.
Tear apart the chicken, by hand, into smallish pieces. Place the torn chicken in a large bowl.
Throw in some of the celery. You know how much celery you like in your chicken salad.
Mix in some miracle whip to the desired consistency
S
alt and pepper to taste
Place the chicken salad on a bed of lettuce, between two pieces of any type of bread or toast.
Macaroni and Cheese
1
6 oz Elbow macaroni
1 small – medium onion, minced
4 oz (1 stick) butter (8 TBSP)
6 TBSP all purpose flour
4 c milk
4 c shredded sharp cheddar cheese
1 tsp dry mustard
½ tsp pepper
1 ½ c bread crumbs
Cook the pasta
Preheat oven to 350°
Baking time = 35 minutes or until lightly browned
Melt 6 TBSP butter in a medium sauce pan
Add the onion. Stir until tender
Stir in the flour
Gradually stir in the milk.
Cook until mixture thickens and comes to a boil. Stir continually!
Stir in mustard, cheese and pepper. Allow the cheese to melt.
Mix the pasta and cheese mixture is a very large bowl.
Pour mixture into a 13x9 baking pan. I like a glass baking pan for this.
Melt 2 TBSP butter
Add bread crumbs to the melted butter. Sprinkle on the pasta and cheese mixture
[i] A Homemade Life, stories and recipes from the kitchen table, Molly Wizenberg
[ii] I pilfered “love is the first ingredient from my friend Maggie. She once made me a homemade herbal tea blend where on the label love was then first ingredient. She’s right: love in the first ingredient when making something in the kitchen for those most special to us.
