The Things I Miss The Most

The other evening I went out to dinner with friends.  Over bountiful salads, a croque monsieur, and steak frites, we landed on the topic of comfort foods and things we miss from our youth.  From doughnuts to Spam, we each had different thoughts on childhood culinary delights.  It is so interesting how canned corned beef can make one person so nostalgic, and another traumatized at the sheer memory of opening that can.  For the record, breakfast, lunch, and dinner were all represented in the wonder-meat discussion.

This is just one example of many food related nostalgic discussions.  Everyone’s favorite comfort foods seem to stem from family tradition (including spiritual or ethnic customs), geographic location, and of course those unique discoveries and circumstances from which we draw our best (and worst) memories.  I believe that there is a worldwide understanding of the sacred love of a meal made by one’s mother, father, or grandparent.  Last summer, I watched a good friend labor over a very special cheesecake.  It was her mother-in-law’s recipe, and she was trying to recreate it for her husband on his birthday.  Desperately trying to source Zwiebeck cookies (or some kind of teething cookie for the unique crust), she cast aside her Pastry Chef degree experience in order to reproduce this sacred cake.  It is one of those weird things, this silent respect for the food made by those who raised us.

I will always remember my father taking the family on an adventure into the heart of Lowell, MA to seek out George’s Subs.  This was the sub shop that we used as a basis of comparison to all other sandwich establishments.  When we went, my father told the story (every single time) about going to George’s with my mother back when he was studying at UMass Lowell.  I think it has been about eighteen years since I have feasted on their Italian sub, but I can still feel the subtle softness of the bread and taste the zesty vinegar over mortadella, salami, ham, and provolone. 

And, of course, there are the emotionally and gag reflex triggered negative memories.  To this day, I completely dissect fillet of sole, remembering myself as a seven year old with a needle-like bone poking into my narrow throat.  My mother still talks about being forced to eat canned asparagus when her family was stationed in Germany.  To this day, I believe she skips the canned food aisle, hoping to avoid shuddering at the memory. 

Before I get to the food item that inspired my latest project, I want to make a list of my personal comfort foods.  This list includes childhood memories, brief experiences and homes along the way (where I needed a little extra love, even if it was in the form of food), and things I love now as I build my own house of memories and traditions. 

My all time childhood favorite was ground beef tacos, the kind with crunchy shells from a box and grated cheese, chopped tomato, and iceberg lettuce.  Sausage bread (do I detect a ground meat theme here?), where Mom baked fresh bread with sharp white cheddar and spicy sausage rolled up in it.  Chicken with rice and a creamy dijon sauce, where Mom could sneak a huge pile of broccoli onto the plate and I’d still eat every last bite.  Ham glazed with pineapple and maraschino cherries, with the warm aroma beating down the drafty chill of Christmas day at Grandma’s house.  Sweet peas picked fresh from the vine and served in a bowl of ice water, Mom’s tan gardening arms hugging me tightly.  Fried dough on the weekend with Dad and my brother Adam, our misadventures in the kitchen when Mom was at work.  The dough came fresh out of the hot oil and directly into a paper bag with cinnamon sugar- one of us shaped the dough, Dad fried it, and the other shook the bag before piling them high on a plate.  Along with this memory, I recall the sound of Dad popping corn on the stovetop, shaking the pot vigorously over the electric coil to keep the kernels from burning.  That too went into a paper bag, this time shaken with butter and salt. 

Despite starting to drink coffee at fifteen (I loved Mom’s coffee breath in the early morning, much as my cat loves mine now), I truly fell in love with coffee in college.  Far from home I found a new family of friends, where my best memories revolved around our favorite coffee shop named Buzz and a certain red kitchen table on Vine Street.  We drank from thrift store mugs and shared stories of the day and dreams (and fears) of the future.  My last semester of school was especially stressful, and my friend Megan used to come by and start my coffee pot on her way to work.  For the first time since living with my parents, I awoke to the aroma of someone loving me unconditionally. 

When I spent a semester in Italy, my favorite comfort foods included pizza di carciofi (artichoke pizza) and ravioli di noci alle panna e gorgonzola (Walnut ravioli with a gorgonzola cream sauce).  Practicing restraint had never been one of my strengths.  Back at school, I matured beyond weekend Papa John’s pizza with garlic sauce and started actually cooking.  My dear friend Alicia showed me a love for food that I had tucked away for years, and we spent a summer making the best pizzas, salads, tacos, and pancakes I can remember. 

Then, in Maine, for the first time in my life I started to find comfort in my own cooking.  This opened up a whole new world to me, and while I didn’t know it at the time, began to shape my future.  It took the patient wisdom of my culinary and life mentor, Ellen, to show me the value of being methodical and organized in cooking (and let’s face it, also in health, matters of the heart, and pretty much across the board).  It is there where I never tired of making apple crisp, rustic french style loaves of bread, chowder and tomato based stews, and fresh pasta served with a bolognese that simmered for hours on end. 

Now, in Seattle, the food I make is a collage of those memories.  Jaimy and I share experiences of our youth and travels through what we cook for one another.  I also develop new meals inspired by current ideas and what I am learning now.  What hasn’t changed is the love I put in the food.  What has changed is the patience.  I remember jumping up and down, so excited for the fried dough to be ready.  Had it been up to me I would have pulled it half raw out of the oil.  Last week I fried chicken wings Vietnamese style, and while I contemplated pulling the wings as soon as I saw the telltale darkening of the skin, I patiently (still hovering though) waited for the deep golden brown that promised a crispy bite. 

A bit long on this one.  Tomorrow, I’ll dive into the thing I miss the most.  There will even be pictures.