Wednesday, March 26, 2014

Mom's home cooking....Mmmmmmm!

NOT!

My mom was an absolutely wonderful person.  If she had been Catholic, I'm sure she would have been made a Saint years ago.  The only blemish on her resume might be her cooking skills.  (Do Saints have to cook or are they assigned a personal chef?)



This photo in the newspaper today pointed out that casseroles are making a comeback.    I'm still traumatized by the "casseroles" my mom tried to feed me when I was  a kid.  I still have to approach casseroles like a dog sniffing something new in his food bowl before he actually tastes it.

Anything mom tried to cook never seemed to be able to hold its shape on the plate.  Everything seemed to just run together into a giant glob.  She tried to cover herself by calling it a "casserole".   I always thought "casserole" was just a French word for "glob".

Back in the day all her casseroles had two main ingredients:  Cream of Mushroom soup and soggy green beans.  To this day when K gives me a grocery list and it mentions Cream of Mushroom soup, I recoil.  And green beans still cause me to cringe, too.  

Chunky, tasteless tuna was also a common ingredient.  And that crusty stuff on top?....I think it's supposed to be crispy bread crumbs or something, right?  Mom's tasted like slightly charred sawdust.

Mom didn't like to cook and didn't want to learn.  (I'm not talking behind her back.  She laughed about her lack of culinary skills, too.)  The highlight of her day was when my dad would come home from work and ask her / us, "Where do you want to go for dinner tonight?" 

WooHoo!

She did manage to hit a home run with her spaghetti meat sauce, and she could slice a mean tomato.  Oh, and she made her own barbecue sauce.  It was so good the little hometown newspaper did a story about it / her.

K is an excellent cook.  She's served up a casserole or two, and despite my original trepidation, they were actually very good.  Maybe time does heal all wounds.  :)

Love you mom.  :)

S

14 comments:

  1. My mom could cook a number of things pretty well but one time she made this casserole with French fries in it that looked completely disgusting. My own cooking has two moves: shake and bake.

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  2. I always thought my mom was a great cook until I left the home and tasted real food. I still do stuff with Campbell's mushroom soup...mixed with noodles mmmm.

    Is it just me, or are your posts getting more betterer and more funnier?

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    1. Don't know about betterer or funnier, but if you like it I'm flattered. :)

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  3. In answer to your question, saints don't have to cook but several became saints because they WERE cooked, burned alive. Like you, I grew up hating casseroles and still dislike them. Mrs. C. makes fabulous enchiladas and she uses cream of mushroom soup in the sauce and it's to die for.

    By the way, I keep thinking about your theory about missing flight #370 and the more I do the more I think you might be right.

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    1. We're lucky guys to have ladies who are such great cooks taking care of us. MH370.... Who knows? If they could find the black boxes it would explain a lot. Still seems like a long shot, but never say ever.

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  4. Never liked casseroles, but I grew up on purple hull peas and butter beans and pan fried corn bread. Yep I was a country boy. Hope I did not offend you with my long reply about Boeing avionics , I spend some of each Summer explaining how it works to new aircraft mechanics. Perhaps it goes to my head.

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    1. Not at all. It was very interesting, the part I could keep up with, at least. ;)

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  5. My mom didn't know how to cook when she got married, but thank goodness she had learned by the time I was old enough to pay attention!

    I LOVE casseroles - I always liked cafeteria food. Turkey Tetrazzine (sp?)? Tuna Surprise? YUM!

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  6. Where I come from they weren't called casseroles. They were called hot dishes. Or more likely, hotdishes. I liked them and still do but then I, like you, have an excellent cook in my house.

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  7. I'm a fan of casseroles, too. Only one dish to clean...and you can sit and relax while it's cooking in the oven.

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