I guess I'm fortunate. Mom was a good cook and dad could handle the grill decently. Oven baked pork chops were dry but that is how everyone made them back then - afraid of trichinosis. They still tasted good though.
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My mom used to can pickled beets.
I hated that smell.Comment
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Growing up on a small Dairy Farm we always had plenty of work and plenty of food. My Mom was a good meat and potatoes cook. Most proteins were Well Done as that went with their generation. We did eat very well though. One of the things that stick out to me was how my Mom and Sisters would butcher some home grown chickens. Usually 20 or so at a time as I recall. Not wanting to waste freezer space my Mom would fry up a meal of chicken necks and backs when they finished cleaning chickens for the day. The better Chicken Parts were frozen right away. My Sister and I still joke about that. Lucky for me there was usually some hay to rake or other farm job for me on chicken cleaning day.Comment
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For as bad a cook my Dad was, he had a genuine green thumb; it was like he understood plants. We had flower gardens, rose bushes, and a large vegetable garden with tomatoes, onions, potatoes, cabbage, peppers, peas, beans, beets, carrots, broccoli, cauliflower, and more. He even planted corn one year, but we didn’t really have the space for it. We also had apple and pear trees.Originally posted by Duanessmokedmeats View Post
Anyhow, we never ate canned beets. I usually went down to the garden and picked what Mum told me she wanted for dinner, often including beets! I LOVE fresh beets, but Mrs Mosca likes them sliced from a jar, so that’s what we eat.Comment
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Super lean ground beef for burgers. Then properly cooked into mock hockey pucks. Other than that, mom and dad can throw down in the kitchen and the grill.Comment
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Both my parents were good cooks, but my mom did boil ribs before browning in the oven. I thought they were good as a kid, but I tried makin' them that way as an adult and wound up throwing them out.Comment
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Mom was a pretty decent cook. I do remember some bad things but it was probably more the recipe than anything else. Meatloaf was horrible as was the tuna casserole. Love my wife’s meatloaf so it must have been the recipe mom had.
I still won’t eat tuna anything though.Comment
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My grandma burned everything. I used to joke that all her recipes ended with, “…once it’s cooking walk away and do something else. It’s done when the fire alarm goes off.”
My mom was a better cook than her, but didn’t like to cook. That’s how I got involved with cooking. In my early-teens my mom told me if I cooked she’d do the dishes, and so began my cooking journey.
Fun fact: my wife doesn’t like that my mom made that deal, because I became a messy cook, and my wife doesn’t like cleaning up after me.
I’ve been better in recent years of cleaning as I go so it doesn’t look like the Tasmanian Devil went through the kitchen.Comment
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Reminds me of the time my now ex walked into a kitchen I was working at. I was washing a couple of my knives… As I finished she noted that there was still a fair amount of stuff that needed to be washed and asked if I was going to do it. My mentor immediately chimed in, “HE does not clean! Someone else needs to do that.” She looked surprised, so he added, “He cooks, he does not clean.” And then laughing said it should probably be that way at home as well. Doh! LOL
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My Mom was great at starting things on fire. On the stove, or in the oven, made no difference. On the plus side, all of us kids are well versed at handling any type of fire in the kitchen. No panic, no screaming, we've all seen it so many times, it's not panic inducing anymore.
Neither Mom nor Dad ever really used the grill as anything more than a place for the wasps to build nests, so no worries there.Last edited by WI Bubba; February 11, 2025, 08:10 AM.Comment
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Two things that mom made stick out. Instead of cranberry sauce she’d always make a jello salad. Not awful but why?? Fresh cranberry sauce w a little orange zest and Cointreau is so easy and delicious. The other thing is something most people think is disgusting. Peanut butter mayonnaise and lettuce sandwiches. To me, again, not horrible but incomplete so I’ll add chili crisp and roll it in a tortilla no bread and voila a prettt delicious hybrid south east Asiany wrap…of sorts.Comment
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Difficult question to answer as insanity doesn’t run in my family. Instead it takes it slow and embraces almost everyone in the family. 🙂Comment
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"Marry a southern woman" they said. "You'll have amazing food every meal" they said. Well, my wife, a thoroughly southern woman lacks this essential skill. She has two habits which really hold her back. The first is that she cooks by time. If the instructions say 18 minutes and 30 seconds, you better believe it's coming out at exactly 18:30. Even frozen french fries which are probably the easiest thing in the world to visually check if they're done or not.... Nope, doesn't matter what they look like, they're not getting cooked a single second past what's on the bag.
The second is that she doesn't taste as it cooks or before serving. Much like the time thing, the recipe is the recipe and there will be absolutely no deviations. Nor can she fathom cooking without a recipe. I was a bit behind on Thanksgiving and asked her to take care of the mashed potatoes. She asked me for a recipe, so being the smartass that I occasionally known to be I just wrote "Potatoes, butter, milk, salt" on a piece of paper and handed it to her. She asked how much butter - I told her to put in what she thinks is right and then double it. How much milk? As much as it needs. How much salt? Add some, taste it, and add more if it needs it.
As far as "What the hell is wrong with you?" I have two. My uncle put jelly on his scrambled eggs, and my dad would eat hot dogs directly out of the fridge. Wouldn't cook them - just pulled one out and started chowing down.Comment
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Remembering the first time my dad grilled steaks on an old charcoal grill on the back porch. Even though I’ve had better steaks since then, nothing beats the memory of that first taste.Comment
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I grew up with steaks cooked in the oven until well-done. I did not eat a steak cooked properly until I was in mid-high school at a friend's house.
(I still remember my friend's mom asking me how I wanted my steak cooked on the grill and I simply did not understand the question!)Comment
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That's my path, exactly. Every steak I ate until I was about 20 years old was well done. One day, I was like "What the worst that could happen" and ordered my steak medium-well and over a few years, kept moving further down the ladder. Now, I generally order my steak medium rare if I'm in a chain restaurant or if I'm somewhere that knows how to cook a steak, I'll order it medium. -
Sounds like me. Mom bought chuck or round streak and cooked the hell out of it. I avoided steak until my early 20’s. Then I was at a restaurant with a work colleague and the subject of steak came up as we were looking at the menu. I told my story, he laughed out loud, insisted I let him order me a steak, and the truth was revealed!
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Mom was a pretty damn good cook. Been gone a few years now, and we're still trying to decipher her spaghetti sauce and pizza sauce recipe, along with the homemade dough (she grew up next to an Italian family whose grandmother used to teach her how to cook).
Her homemade pies and desserts were outstanding, her fried chicken and beef stews (anything really in a crockpot)? Delish! We also always had a large garden, so fresh tomato's, cucumbers, beets, beans, asparagus, and a whole lot more were always served with the meals.
Neighbor kids were always asking "what's for dinner?". Dad had no problem running them off...
That being said, everyone's description of "well-done" steak and pork chops, as well as hamburgers when cooked on the stove top, is how we ate em. Maybe it was the cheap steaks? Maybe it was a trichinosis thing? Or living through the great depression as kids? I dunno. I finally learned what rare and medium-rare steak tasted like as I got older and learned to grill.
The other thing was, besides tacos, we never had anything like Chinese dishes, culturally different dishes, BBQ, or any other spicy foods. I guess Dad never liked heat or spice that much (although he loved her spaghetti and pizza) so until I was old enough to drive and had a job, I never had any international cuisine or BBQ.
These days, I have a brother-in-law who likes to host Thanksgiving every year. Last couple of years, he insists on frying the turkey, even though he has a decent smoker. This year the turkey was 18lbs and really didn't quite fit that well into the pot... And well, I forgot to bring along my Thermopen (he usually let's me help just a little bit) and well... kinda dry... to say it nicely. It was like Christmas Vacation dry...
Add to that, his wife likes to cook the sides. Except none of my kids will touch them (they do taste somewhat funky. not sure what she puts in things...). This last time, there was a group chat with all the family about what sides people were bringing and my kids named every side possible and volunteered my wife and I to bring them (hell no, the kids weren't going to cook them!). I quickly shut that down, and privately told them I'll make turkey on the smoker and we'll have a small dinner a couple days after with just us. And to stop messing with their Aunt.Last edited by dpearce; February 10, 2025, 02:14 PM.Comment
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