Food for Thought
I will NOT DWELL on the fact that my parents will be here in a few hours, nor on my older son`s perpetual Trouble with Nuns. No, I WILL NOT. Instead, I will conduct an exercise in positive thinking.
A funny story would be good right now. Odd, how I can always think of a gazillion funny stories to write about on my blog, until I sit down at my keyboard and consciously try to distract myself from stressful matters.
Oooh! Oooh! I`ve got one! The other day, I think I grossed out some of my new friends here, by revealing a little too much of my true self.
I`ve made some friends, with the mothers of other school kids. Our school has no shortage of nice, normal parents. A few of the moms are really into cooking healthy foods, and have been a wealth of information about where to buy what, where the best farmers` markets are, etc.
I love food. I truly do. Cooking food was one of the primary ways my late grandmother showed her love for us, and we showed our love for her by eating it.
But I`m not a gourmet type. While I do appreciate truly fine food, and enjoy it when I can, I can also appreciate food that`s, um.... not so fine. Often, my tastes run to the common, and sometimes even a little... well, gross.
I learned to cook from my grandmother, and it was only many years later that I realized she was not a "good" cook, according to most people`s definition of "good." Gramma was an expert in what I now call "Polish Poverty Cooking." Her creed was, "Never waste anything."
Many of her recipes call for sour milk, and this is a taste I associate with many of her dishes. I now make my sour milk by adding lemon juice to regular milk to curdle it, but it occurred to me that this ingredient was probably Gramma`s way of using up milk that had gone bad.
My grandmother`s mother died when she was 8 years old, and her stepmother was a serious alcoholic. So Gramma learned to cook from various aunts and cousins. She specialized in what Polish immigrant factory workers ate in the 1920`s and '30`s, so the scope of her culinary education encompassed the Great Depression.
As I result, I know dozens of ways to cook cabbage, and can make about 1,000 different kinds of soup.
I must say, everything I learned from Gramma came in mighty handy when I first moved to Tokyo, straight out of college, in 1987, and worked at various menial editorial jobs on the far fringes of my chosen field. These were Japan`s halcyon "Bubble" days, when the land surounding the Imperial Palace was valued at more than the entire state of California, when Japanese business were buying Pebble Beach and Rockefeller Center. Remember all that? It didn`t last -- it really was a giant soap bubble that sprang from the frothy banking system, and it soon popped and evaporated and left most Japanese people staring at the little wet spot on the pavement, wondering what happened.
When I was trying to stretch my tiny paychecks to cover the cost of living in Bubble-Era Tokyo, I put Gramma`s lessons to use on a daily basis. Just give me a wilted cabbage leaf and a bone, and I could make soup, and get through another day.
I used to cook the same chicken three times: first, I would boil it with some day-old vegetables, and make soup. I would eat that soup the first day, then I would fish out the chicken and roast it in aluminum foil in my tiny toaster oven, with some garlic and pepper, and eat it the second day. The third day, I would make another batch of soup from the bones.
Whenever it`s time to swap recipes with friends, I usually only tell them the "good" ones, and keep a lot of Gramma`s recipes to myself. To be sure, Gramma learned to make a mean lasagna somewhere along the way, her stuffed cabbage rolls were pure heaven and her cookies were divine. But her Poverty recipes -- those just weren`t meant to be written on index cards and filed in a little tin box with flowers on it, you know?
But one morning I had too much coffee with my friends, and I started babbling about what we`d had for dinner the night before.
When my brother visited, he and his wife had gone out for a steak dinner and ordered way too much. They brought us their doggy bag the next day, and I threw it in the freezer and forgot about it.
One day I noticed that our onions were growing green shoots, so I peeled them and threw away the mushy parts, and threw them in a pot. I looked through the freezer and lo and behold, there were two beautiful pieces of sirloin, with the bones still attached! I threw that in the pot, too, with some garlic -- both fresh and dried, since I wanted to used up the dried. I also had some broccoli stems, since the kids only like the flowers. I had a ton of leftover packets of soy sauce from the Chinese takeout place, so I threw those in, and some honey that had hardened into the bottom of the jar, and some salsa that had expired.
I boiled this all for a looooooong time, then removed the bones, chilled it overnight, added flour and milk to make it creamy, and reheated and served it.
My friends looked at me and smiled and said, "Oh, ah, you boiled leftover meat? Oh, mmmm."
And I realized that perhaps I shouldn`t have shared this story with the people I count on to tell me where to buy the best tomatoes.
Oh, well. Let them eat...cake?
A funny story would be good right now. Odd, how I can always think of a gazillion funny stories to write about on my blog, until I sit down at my keyboard and consciously try to distract myself from stressful matters.
Oooh! Oooh! I`ve got one! The other day, I think I grossed out some of my new friends here, by revealing a little too much of my true self.
I`ve made some friends, with the mothers of other school kids. Our school has no shortage of nice, normal parents. A few of the moms are really into cooking healthy foods, and have been a wealth of information about where to buy what, where the best farmers` markets are, etc.
I love food. I truly do. Cooking food was one of the primary ways my late grandmother showed her love for us, and we showed our love for her by eating it.
But I`m not a gourmet type. While I do appreciate truly fine food, and enjoy it when I can, I can also appreciate food that`s, um.... not so fine. Often, my tastes run to the common, and sometimes even a little... well, gross.
I learned to cook from my grandmother, and it was only many years later that I realized she was not a "good" cook, according to most people`s definition of "good." Gramma was an expert in what I now call "Polish Poverty Cooking." Her creed was, "Never waste anything."
Many of her recipes call for sour milk, and this is a taste I associate with many of her dishes. I now make my sour milk by adding lemon juice to regular milk to curdle it, but it occurred to me that this ingredient was probably Gramma`s way of using up milk that had gone bad.
My grandmother`s mother died when she was 8 years old, and her stepmother was a serious alcoholic. So Gramma learned to cook from various aunts and cousins. She specialized in what Polish immigrant factory workers ate in the 1920`s and '30`s, so the scope of her culinary education encompassed the Great Depression.
As I result, I know dozens of ways to cook cabbage, and can make about 1,000 different kinds of soup.
I must say, everything I learned from Gramma came in mighty handy when I first moved to Tokyo, straight out of college, in 1987, and worked at various menial editorial jobs on the far fringes of my chosen field. These were Japan`s halcyon "Bubble" days, when the land surounding the Imperial Palace was valued at more than the entire state of California, when Japanese business were buying Pebble Beach and Rockefeller Center. Remember all that? It didn`t last -- it really was a giant soap bubble that sprang from the frothy banking system, and it soon popped and evaporated and left most Japanese people staring at the little wet spot on the pavement, wondering what happened.
When I was trying to stretch my tiny paychecks to cover the cost of living in Bubble-Era Tokyo, I put Gramma`s lessons to use on a daily basis. Just give me a wilted cabbage leaf and a bone, and I could make soup, and get through another day.
I used to cook the same chicken three times: first, I would boil it with some day-old vegetables, and make soup. I would eat that soup the first day, then I would fish out the chicken and roast it in aluminum foil in my tiny toaster oven, with some garlic and pepper, and eat it the second day. The third day, I would make another batch of soup from the bones.
Whenever it`s time to swap recipes with friends, I usually only tell them the "good" ones, and keep a lot of Gramma`s recipes to myself. To be sure, Gramma learned to make a mean lasagna somewhere along the way, her stuffed cabbage rolls were pure heaven and her cookies were divine. But her Poverty recipes -- those just weren`t meant to be written on index cards and filed in a little tin box with flowers on it, you know?
But one morning I had too much coffee with my friends, and I started babbling about what we`d had for dinner the night before.
When my brother visited, he and his wife had gone out for a steak dinner and ordered way too much. They brought us their doggy bag the next day, and I threw it in the freezer and forgot about it.
One day I noticed that our onions were growing green shoots, so I peeled them and threw away the mushy parts, and threw them in a pot. I looked through the freezer and lo and behold, there were two beautiful pieces of sirloin, with the bones still attached! I threw that in the pot, too, with some garlic -- both fresh and dried, since I wanted to used up the dried. I also had some broccoli stems, since the kids only like the flowers. I had a ton of leftover packets of soy sauce from the Chinese takeout place, so I threw those in, and some honey that had hardened into the bottom of the jar, and some salsa that had expired.
I boiled this all for a looooooong time, then removed the bones, chilled it overnight, added flour and milk to make it creamy, and reheated and served it.
My friends looked at me and smiled and said, "Oh, ah, you boiled leftover meat? Oh, mmmm."
And I realized that perhaps I shouldn`t have shared this story with the people I count on to tell me where to buy the best tomatoes.
Oh, well. Let them eat...cake?
posted by L. at 9:31 AM
9 Comments:
Hell, I'd have been impressed that you were able to throw that stuff together to make a MEAL out of it! I usually joke that if it doesn't come in a box with directions, I can't make it.
Of course you boiled the meat. It's soup. I would have used everything except the honey and the next time I will. It just didn't occur to me.
The main reason I don't post my own recipes much is that there are no recipes. It's whatever I can catch and hold that hasn't formed a puddle in the bottom of the crisper.
You and my dad may be twin souls. He wouldn't have made a yummy soup, but he certainly wouldn't leave leftovers, free soy sauce, brocolli stems or questionable expiration dates get in his way, either :)
If the recipe calls for scrambled eggs then I am your cook. If you want something else, that is why God created Burger King.
Erm, I have to admit this is one of those recipes that I don't think I will be trying to replicate here at the BFB home.
Ever had Ukrainian sushi? That is what p-man and I sometimes call what the baba's call spring rolls. Come spring take the beet greens and clean 'em up nice. Squish together some rice, sushi rice is good for this, though Eurocentric recipes will say 'short grain'... anyway smoosh up the rice with plenty of salt and paper, chopped dill and green onions. Roll the rice in the greens and layer them like cabbage rolls. Cook with water for 20 min covered in the over. Then uncover and pour on CREAM. Cook another 30 min or so so the cream gets sort of crusty-buttery.
Best accompaniment for fresh salmon, EVER!
Let me know when you drop into Vancouver so I can cook up a batch.
And, tell me if you don't make soup with leftover meat. What do you make it with?
Actually, it is best with salt and PEPPer not salt and paper. Sheesh. I suppose they put that preview button there for a reason.
Miss Fancy did have paper for breakfast yesterday so, as usual, I will blame the baby for all of my odd behaviour.
Fun word ver on this comment. Solxcyim. As in, "my Solxcyim is a bit inflamed these days"
See, that's exactly what I do on a regular basis. Share things with my friends that are a little too strange, but seem perfectly normal to me.. The soup does sound kinda yummy though..
Let me ask you this--were you ever subjected to Chaneena (sp?)--Duck Blood Soup? As if that weren't bad enough, it had raisins in it. My other personal least favorite was potato and green bean soup with a broth of water, milk and pools of yellow margarine. The other stuff was ALLLLLL GOOOD--pierogies, kluski, halushki, golumki. That's good eating!
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