Things Consumed

 

Unlike Mom Used to Make, Part IV: Rosemary

This is one of the responses I received to my food survey that was an especial delight to read, because it's from another seriously dedicated foodie. Rosemary is one of the few people I know who has expressed the concept of eggs being 'in season,' a concession to the fact that chickens don't actually lay eggs in huge volumes year round when left to their own devices. I'm a zealous seasonal eater myself, and you can tell that she really pays attention to her food by the way she describes food based on when it's at its best.

As for me... my childhood foods run the gamut a bit. My mother was born & raised in SE Asia and my father was born & raised in Poland, both in Jewish households. They immigrated to Israel (where they met & had me) before settling down in the US, where 1980's suburban Michigan was their first home before bouncing around to the East Coast. Cuisine as I knew it as a kid was some bizarre mix of Eastern European/Ashkenazi dishes, middle eastern food, Malay/Indonesian dishes twisted beyond recognition by strange substitutions of ingredients, and midwestern recipes from the local paper. My mom also tends a little toward natural-food-nut in her ways, so we ate out/out-of-boxes exceedingly rarely. (This caused no end of embarrassment to me: I'd get lumpy, brown, homemade fruit leather in my lunches when the other kids got Fruit RollUps; my birthday "pizza parties" would be a source of ridicule for weeks thanks to my mother's creations failing to meet my friends' greasy Pizza-Hut expectations.)

Weekend meals were invariably lighter than weekday:

Main Courses, weeknight dinner
- Chicken, oven roasted in paprika. This was most often the "main" course, accompanied by a steamed or raw veg & one of the "side" dishes listed below. My mother (like me) dislikes land-meat, but believed that we needed it, so this was the, uh, standard dose. It was AWFUL.
- Chicken with apricots, a sort of Moroccan thing over rice. This was the only way I'd tolerate chicken -- we had horrible fights over the paprika stuff.
- Schnitzl, with a lot of dill. [Also spelled schnitzel, this is thinly sliced veal with his breaded and fried in butter.]
- Meatloaf. She put a TON of curry powder in it, which didn't really help. Mom & I both used to douse it in Indian pickles (sent from Singapore by my grandfather).
- Diaryland casserole: a (disgusting) melange of meat & cheese & noodles. Hello, Michigan.
- Liver. Yes, with onions. Oy. My mother recognized how unhealthy this habit was, so it was gradually phased out of the repertoire.
- Spaghetti with meatballs -- this was my favorite because it was rarely made & thus Exciting! Ethnic! Exotic!

Main courses, weekends:
- Kugel. My mother's was a sweet one -- noodles & cheese & raisins -- that we'd have for lunch on Saturday. Usually with avocado, which (continues to be) my mom's weekly splurge. [Kugel is a sort of casserole. I've only had savory kugels, and I'm fond of the potato version, though it's a little heavy for me.]
- Auntie Berta's salad. Finely chopped tomatoes & cukes & bell peppers in sour cream & cottage cheese (or, later, yoghurt & cottage cheese).
- Hummus! (Or just tehina on lazy days). Always with tomatoes & cukes & olives. My parents <3 hummus.
- Borscht. (Meatless; has beets, lemonjuice, carrots, hard boiled egg, and sour cream.)
- Sorrel soup. (Also meatless, has sour cream.)
- Kasha varnishkes - buckwheat & noodles, sometimes spiked with kielbasa & onion, sometimes eaten with sour cream.

"Side" dishes... note that many of these could stand on their own:
- Mee goreng, which is spicy, dry (pan fried) noodle dish. And, although it's a meal unto itself (has tofu), my mother always served it as a side dish. If she couldn't find mee (common in the earlier years), she'd use spaghetti. Sometimes she still does.
- Spicy rice (has tofu, tomatoes, turmeric-cinnamon-chilies-cloves, & onions).
- Bok choy w. tofu.
- Tahu goreng, gado gado, rojak -- all of which are Indonesian salad like things with a peanut sauce (tahu goreng literally means "fried tofu"). Early on, this would be a mix of peanut butter & Frank's RedHot sauce, because chilies were pretty hard to find. They all contained tofu -- I ate a lot of tofu as a kid (I hate to think how expensive it must have been there & then), and loved it.
- Pierogi. Always cheese & potato filled. Mmmmmmmm, pierogi. [This was something that I had a few times. My mother adored these, and purchased them frozen, but only very rarely. She ate them with sour cream; I ate mine with a little sour cream... and a lot of Louisiana hot sauce. Go figure.]
- Lentil rice. This is the standard middle eastern dish that involves lots of well-caramelized onions (the onions cook as long as the lentils & rice do) and is HEAVEN ON A PLATE.

To the degree that any of the nonmeat ones are made by me today, I make them rarely (though, for a time, I was basically living on the spicy rice & lentil rice recipes). Hummus is the one notable exception, and in summer when I'm feeling nostalgic I'll sometimes make Auntie Berta's salad (which sounds awful, but is incredibly refreshing).

Often, our meals are dictated by the availability of produce; in particular, our winter foods are dominated by squash and dried mushrooms. Living in a fishing village with two Spaniards got me hooked on seafood, a habit I haven't shaken, so that figures in as well. The "standard repertoire" goes something like this--

GROWING SEASON:
- Pasta & veg: whatever's available. The veg is generally roasted lightly in a dry pan, then added to saute'd garlic & spices (oregano- basil or bay-thyme, dried chilies, sometime cheese or anchovy paste) & lots of olive oil.
- Feta & mustard greens (in pasta or on bread) when mustard's in.
- Vegs, whatever's available, roasted in olive oil, salt, & garlic. Our favorite is green beans in spring. Usually eaten w. fresh bread or potatoes, or standing around the stove pulling melted raclette off the pan.
- Pesto, when basil is in season. We make gallons of the stuff & freeze it for winter. It ends up on pasta w. dried toms.
- Pizza. WAY better than moms. Usually topped with eggplant, olive oil, lots of garlic & dried chilies, and a little cheese; sometimes topped w. fresh toms/spinach & mozz. fresca.
- Calzones, which have in them tofu-ricotta, tomato paste + spices, and spinach.
- Hummus. Tomatoes are a crucial accompaniment, so this is seasonal.
- Baba ganoush, when eggplant's in.
- Fresh salsa only when tomatoes are in. Eaten in a 1:1 mix w. black beans, with a spoon.
- Cold pasta w. chickpeas & parsley & fresh toms, when toms are in.
- Quiche, only when eggs are in season. Fillings are leeks-stilton; mushroom-gruyere; roasted peppers-feta. Likewise, frittata (zucchini- parmesan).
- Saag paneer, with tofu instead of paneer. I only make this when spinach is in, although I realize frozen would do just fine.
- Polenta, with a sauce made of fresh tomatoes & basil.
- edamame! which P would painstakingly pull off the stalks. Ah, Urbana.

WINTERFOOD:
- Lentils. In the rice/onion recipe, above, or -- more often -- cooked in canned tomatoes w. garlic & rosemary & chilies. Lazy food :) Also, my most common winter food, because it allows me my tomato fix (in summer I average a dozen a week).
- Enchiladas. Your sauce.
- "Arlene's Soup". [I am honored to be mentioned here. :-) This is the Tibetan "Tupka" noodle soup from the Kopan Cookbook.]
- Risotto, either mushroom or shrimp.
- Lasagna, mushroom or squash-nut.
- Squash soup.
- Cheese soup (bad, I know, but I make it with horseradish and beer and lots of garlic & cayenne, and boy is it good).
- Pasta with marscapone & pistachios (Paul's mum's recipe).

EITHER:
- Soba, with tofu & veg (peas in spring, dried shiitake other times) in either a miso or hon dashi soup.
- Tofu & broccoli in (scratch) black bean sauce, when broccoli's in. Also, just tofu in a sorta Szechuan sauce (winterfood).
- Fish. We eat it rarely b/c I'm a freshness snob, but poor. My favorite way is covered w. olive oil & a little rosemary (or fresh chillies) and tiled with paper thin slices of lemon (or lime), and broiled; or poached in vermouth w. leeks.
- From a package: Malaysian foods I can't make, sent to me from Singapore; Tamale Molly tamales, which we eat with my friend E's salsa verde recipe; and veg burgers, for lazy cookouts.

Isn't that fun to read?
posted by Arlene (Beth)11:00 PM