Flashback

Yesterday, I was making a turkey sandwich and as I was spreading mayo, I had a flashback to making sandwiches when I was a kid. Using Miracle Whip. We never used real mayonnaise. It got me thinking about all the ways cooking and eating have changed since then. The way I learned to cook and had to unlearn when I grew up.

I was eighteen when I first tried broccoli and artichokes. I loved each. I suppose broccoli was within our means, but artichokes were foreign to my folks. They probably didn't have a clue how to eat them, so they never served them. I think my favorite vegetable is broccoli. Not covered in butter either, just steamed and yummy. I enjoy artichokes too. My kids like them too. Well, I am not certain about Zoe these days, but Katharine still likes them. And asparagus, I never had that until I was about eighteen and moved out either. I do enjoy steamed asparagus.

Our vegetables consisted of corn and green beans primarily. Carrots and potatoes. Potatoes cooked every way imaginable, but the best were fried, with onions in bacon grease. We saved bacon grease in a shortening can in the fridge. The mere thought of that now, makes me ill. We used shortening to cook, instead of oil. Maybe it was cheaper? I honestly don't know why we did that. We had one other vegetable to this day, is my favorite, but since I only like it fried, it only gets made once or twice a year. Okra. Okra with cornmeal and fried up crunchy. Delicious. Since it is so bad cooked that way, I am happy I love broccoli.

We used to cook bacon and eggs and cook the eggs right in the bacon grease. Sends shivers down my spine.....Thankfully Pam was invented and non stick pans! I think those two things were very important in helping people eat differently. Of course, If your family was not from Okalahoma or Iowa, maybe you would have eaten differently anyhow! Lox and bagels comes to mind... We had fish, but trust me, it was fried!

We used to have an occasional salad. Always with tomatoes and cucumber. I still love those two ingredients thrown into most salads even today. We only used thousand island salad dressing though. I like thousand island, but not on salads these days. Only for french fries! LOL I Love El Torito's Cilantro dressing and some others as well. I see a difference by introducing vegetables to my kids at an early age. Zoe is not fond of vegetables, but Katharine is and loves salads too. Zoe is better with fruit, like strawberries, grapes, cantaloupe, bananas, pears and watermelon. Which is great.

When I was little, we ate a lot of bologna. My mother made this bologna spread that was made with Miracle Whip and relish, I think. She would put the grinder on the edge of the kitchen counter and grind the bologna up and make her concoctive. I loved that stuff.

I also loved Brunsweiger (sp), I would take it to school and get teased by the other kids that said I was eating dog food! Of course I stopped taking it for a while. I have it once a year or so now, out of nostalgia!

I think the last time I had Miracle Whip was about six years ago, when my mother was dying. My brother came over to be with me at her apartment. He brought ham sandwiches with Miracle Whip. I told him the sandwich tasted different and I couldn't figure out why. He told me it was MW and I laughed, because he still uses it! Same way he laughs at me for breaking up crackers into my chili!

Okay, back to the last post when I mentioned HTML. The girls gave me a paper with instructions to do it. So, I promised I would try it and here goes....bold should be here. This should be italic. This should be underlined Okay, it is not that hard! The font and color still elude me.