Before I begin this, here’s another scam: Bill hung up when a voice said, “There is a warrant for your arrest.” That was several days ago, and no police officer has shown up. I received threatening calls that the Internal Revenue service was after us. Folks, do be careful!
My words about bacon in last week’s column brought some replies. My nephew, John Jones, wrote, “BACON!! I love bacon! Bacon can’t help but improve darned near anything you add it to. I also bake my bacon when I’m cooking a lot of it. When we have the entire tribe here for breakfast I’ll usually fix about 4 lbs. of bacon and that keeps a couple of sheet pans busy in the oven. I’ve also found that 425 degrees works better.”
They talk about pork belly on the Food Networks cooking shows. Pork belly seems to be trendy these days. However, it’s just a chunk of pork that hasn’t been cut into bacon.
I don’t know anyone who cooks with lard these days, but it was a staple in my mother’s cupboard that she used to fry chops, home fried potatoes, French fries and donuts. Above all, her pie crust was made with lard. It was the most tender, flakiest, melt-in-your-mouth crust I’ve ever tasted. She’d make double-crust pies for four pies without measuring. I make good piecrust, but mine can’t compare with hers. I keep intending to buy lard and making crust with it, but never get around to it.
American cookery and the food available to us has changed greatly since I was a girl. Yesterday I made bacon, lettuce, tomato and avocado sandwiches. I doubt very much if my mother ever tasted an avocado. Avocados weren’t available in Knightstown or in Argos where Bill grew up. Aldis and Krogers near our home carry them all the time, and they carry tomatoes year round.
Olive oil is another thing. In those days the only olive oil on the shelves of the Knightstown groceries was a few small, dusty bottles of Pompeian olive oil. These days olive oil is “in.” Italian restaurants serve saucers of it in which to dunk your bread, and I like it on toast. Bill and I use it frequently. Bill even took advantage of a special deal to get twelve bottles of extra-virgin olive oil direct from Tuscany.
American food became internationalized after World War II. We didn’t make pizza until I was in college. Until Chef Boyardee came out with dough mix, we used Pillsbury hot roll mix. There’s a pizza explosion; Tex-Mex food is popular; and you can easily find the ingredients for both.
Mother cooked good old Hoosier comfort food — chicken and noodles or dumplings, cornbread and beans, Swiss steak, fried chicken, biscuits and gravy, chili, creamed vegetables . . . Bill’s mother cooked very plain food in the English style to please Bill’s English father. Rather than the green beans simmered for a long time with onion and bacon that my mother cooked, she cooked green beans for 20 minutes and seasoned them with butter and salt only. She learned to cook food such as Yorkshire Pudding and Standing Rib Roast from Mrs. Beeton’s English Cookery Book. Bill’s family also ate lamb, kippers and kidneys which my Hoosier family wouldn’t have touched with a ten-foot pole!
Our mothers had two kinds of vinegar in their cupboards — white and apple cider. Nowadays there’s designer vinegar — balsamic, sherry, red wine, etc. Our mothers never encountered miso, tofu, soy bean paste, or the variety of fresh peppers available today. Bill and I use a variety of pastas, but my mother’s cupboard contained only macaroni and spaghetti.
Bill’s and my cooking is a blend of the food that our mothers prepared plus international recipes that use ingredients that weren’t available to them when we were kids such as fresh mushrooms. We are so fortunate to have the rich array of ingredients featured in our grocery stores and markets.
wclarke@comcast.net