I am feeling nostalgic about my mother\u2019s Thanksgiving stuffing — not necessarily in a good way.<\/p>\n
Nothing lights up Facebook faster than a \u201cDo You Remember?\u201d post like this: \u201cName something that your mother\/grandmother cooked that was your favorite.\u201d I\u2019m one of nine children (and seven of us keep in touch regularly on Facebook). Throw a question like that out into the universe and the memories fly.<\/p>\n
My poor mother, now gone a year, worked miracles feeding a family of 11 on my dad\u2019s salary. Lots of potatoes with traces of meat.\u00a0 The Facebook memories included her pork chop casserole (hated it); stuffed peppers (edible); her stuffing (a mush of sage, stale bread and celery, hated it, too); her baked beans (never tasted them); and, alas, a bizarre concoction of ground beef and watery gravy she called \u201cCollops.\u201d Turns out that it\u2019s actually a real Scottish recipe, one that Allrecipes.com calls \u201ca delicious way to stretch ground beef.\u201d Not the way my mother made it (although my brother Jim would disagree with me). I always tried to get an invite to my girlfriend Joanie\u2019s house on nights that Collops were on the menu.<\/p>\n
As Mom got older and was unable to cook, she lamented that she missed her own cooking. A few of us would try to replicate her recipes (although nothing had been written down) and bring her dinner. She scoffed when Jim had the audacity to add parsnips to her beef stew. She was annoyed that I undercooked the vegetables. She possessed a sharp palate that detected spices she had never used. Garlic in her spaghetti sauce? Impossible.<\/p>\n
Now that she\u2019s gone, a conversation about her cooking congers up the happy memory of a massive, round kitchen table with each of us in a strategically assigned seat designed to keep potential outbreaks of wrestling or elbowing at bay for 30 minutes each evening. Food memories are so strong. We can smell the aroma and nearly taste the food, or gag again if that\u2019s what we did on that particular evening.<\/p>\n
Thanksgiving is around the corner, your sons and daughters will be coming home to you. Remember that home-cooked food at Thanksgiving is about tradition, comfort and family. Want to conjure up happy memories? Prepare a home-cooked feast your returning college student couldn\u2019t get in the finest restaurant!<\/p>\n
Here on campus we recognize that just about now students are longing for their parents\u2019 home-cooking, that very same cooking that they turned their noses up at a few short months ago. With this in mind, the University hosted a \u201cTaste of Home\u201d dinner on November 17, featuring out-of-state regional recipes. Students submitted suggestions for Gourmet Dining Services to cook that evening. It was a fun way to allay home-sickness and remind each other of the diversity of our backgrounds.<\/p>\n
We are an empty nest at my house now. Our youngest lives nearby and comes home for dinner on Thursday evenings (along with one or two baskets of laundry). He\u2019s not looking for Chinese take-out or a fancy roast, he asks for our pot roast, beef stew or chili. Home cooking a la Gottlieb — comfort food.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve never had much interest in cooking and I have no illusions about my talents in that regard. I\u2019m sure that our three children in decades to come will poke fun at mom\u2019s meatloaf, dad\u2019s noodles in a cup and my special interpretation of \u201cchicken fish,\u201d (don\u2019t ask!).<\/p>\n
My sister Peg always says, \u201cFood is Love.\u201d \u00a0Enjoy your children around your Thanksgiving table this year and pay no attention when they gag at Grandma\u2019s turnip recipe. Trust me, even if it never makes it past their lips, it will be a part of the family food lore forever. Happy Thanksgiving!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I am feeling nostalgic about my mother\u2019s Thanksgiving stuffing — not necessarily in a good way. Nothing lights up Facebook faster than a \u201cDo You Remember?\u201d post like this: \u201cName something that your mother\/grandmother cooked that was your favorite.\u201d I\u2019m one of nine children (and seven of us keep in touch regularly on Facebook). Throw […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1843,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-133","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/deansdesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/deansdesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/deansdesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/deansdesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1843"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/deansdesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=133"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/deansdesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":138,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/deansdesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133\/revisions\/138"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/deansdesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=133"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/deansdesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=133"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/deansdesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=133"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}