Taco Soup, BlackBerry Shots, Minneapolis, Minnesota, December 2010, photo © 2010 by QuoinMonkey. All rights reserved.
Family Recipes, BlackBerry Shots, Minneapolis, Minnesota, December 2010, photo © 2010 by QuoinMonkey. All rights reserved.
Simple Taco Soup
1 lb. lean ground beef
1 can whole kernel corn
1 can Mexican chili beans
1 can pinto beans
1 can kidney beans
1 large can petite diced tomatoes
1 package taco seasoning mix
Brown ground beef and stir in the taco seasoning. Add canned veggies and simmer until flavors are blended — about 20 minutes. Ladle into bowls and top with your choice of cheese, sour cream, cilantro, or tortilla chips.
Top With Your Choice, BlackBerry Shots, Minneapolis, Minnesota, December 2010, photo © 2010 by QuoinMonkey. All rights reserved.
Comfort Food - Taco Soup, BlackBerry Shots, Minneapolis, Minnesota, December 2010, photo © 2010 by QuoinMonkey. All rights reserved.
Sometimes it’s a gift to be a product of a blended family. There are different sets of parents, plumes of siblings, cousins galore. When I was in Pennsylvania a few weeks ago visiting my brother after his liver transplant, part of my Southern family showed up on the doorstep and surprised me. After driving the 10 hours from South Carolina, they literally stepped right out of the front seat of their car and into my brother’s kitchen. They came bearing gifts for a celebration of Thanksgiving. It was the first time in 45 years the Robertson side of the family had been together.
Though I’m not much of a cook, I love easy-to-make meals. One of my favorite gifts was a spiral bound recipe book. Daddy and Judy had handwritten simple recipes they collected from different members of the family. And behind the pages of the recipe cards, they tucked vintage family snapshots.
Like this one:
April 1973, Vintage Family Snapshot In Recipe Book, Morristown, Tennessee, photo © 2010 by QuoinMonkey. All rights reserved.
If you look closely, you might spot me there in Tennessee, in a half circle with my paternal grandparents, Ada and Jess, smirking behind that 70’s smile. So many memories.
Back in Minnesota, it’s a lot colder, and I’m a lot older. I pull the ground beef out of the freezer and open the handmade recipe book to Taco Soup. Since I’m late getting home, Liz starts dinner (if you are from the South, you might say “supper”), and I walk right into the middle smell of a family memory. The recipe book makes a creative Holiday gift. All you need are recipe cards, a fast writing pen, and a strong wrist. Food and family photos are a natural combination, a memory maker that keeps on giving.
-posted on red Ravine, with gratitude to my family, Wednesday, December 1st, 2010
-related to post: Memories, Writing, & Family Recipes
redravine.wordpress.com 
What an amazing gift! I’m already plotting a cookbook for my daughter when she moves out someday (she’s only 14, so I have plenty of time), of favorite recipes. Putting family photos in it would be a GREAT idea!
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That recipe is awesome! I’ll have to try it! I’m all about simple. Supper, dinner, or lunch! You already know how I love the photo in TN. : ) And, yes, the recipe cards with photos was one of the best gifts ever!
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Jules, I was really touched when I received the recipes and photos. Many were photos I had not seen or remembered in a very long time. Really takes you back! I am sure your daughter will love receiving your recipes, memories, and photos, too. I feel lucky to have the family stories from all different areas of our blended family passed down over time. They are all connected through the people they represent.
diddy, so great to see you on red Ravine! The Taco Soup recipe is REALLY simple. Nothing fancy, very tasty. Total comfort food. I’m going to make my way through the recipes over the next year. When I saw the TN photo, I was immediately taken back to the vacation when it was taken. It might have been one of the last times I was in TN with Granny & Pop. Yet, I remember it like it was yesterday. I LOVE Jack’s jeans in the photo!
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QM
Yum! I’m salivating as I read this post! What could be better on a cold, snowy day than simple Mexican food, warming you from the inside out?
We are experiencing the coldest weather WY has had in 20 years! (And that was before the first of December…not even officially winter yet!)
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I would try this soup (as it seems the only successful food I can make from scratch is in soup-form). The only problem is neither E nor I eats beans and tomatoes! Wonder if I could substitute with something else, but I can’t imagine what.
And thanks oh, so much for using ‘supper’, HAHAHA! You know my aversion to that word!
On a more positive note, I love the word ‘absolutely’. It makes me think of cantaloupe. And great–now I’m hungry after talking about all this food!
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oliverowl, please keep warm out there in Wyoming! Wow, didn’t know it was so cold this year. We’ve been having more early snow than we’ve had in years in Minnesota. In fact, I shoveled about 9 inches of it yesterday! Think of you often. And am always so glad when you visit red Ravine.
Scaramastra, good to hear from you. I think you can substitute any other two cans of veggies for the tomatoes and beans. Though it’s true that the beans are part of what makes it Taco Soup! I liked how easy it was to make. The flavors were good as well. I’m not much of a cook so easy works well for me! Liz is really the one that’s willing to try anything and make it come out delicious!
About the word “supper,” when I was growing up in the South we always said “supper.” I watched a program last night that was based in Great Britain and they said “supper” as well. I wonder if it comes from the ancestry? I actually like the word supper. But when we moved to Pennsylvania, everyone said dinner so eventually I started to say it, too.
BTW, why don’t you like the word “supper?” I love learning about words and phrases that are regional. Liz and I were listening to MPR and they were talking about a new database of phrases that are specifically regional. I think once you’ve lived different places in the country, you start to appreciate the differences we all have.
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QM, supper was the evening meal in my house. Dinner was lunch or supper, but it was fancier than a lunch or a supper and a bigger deal too.
A recipe book with family recipes and photographs would be a nice thing to have. I have Aunt Annie’s Scalloped Oysters and my mother’s recipe for pork chops and scalloped potatoes (and the baking dish she cooked the latter dish in). I wish I had my grandmother’s recipe for cole slaw which was a pinch of this and a pinch of that. You’re lucky to have all those recipes.
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Oh, I’m all about appreciating differences, it has nothing to do with that. It’s the sound of the words itself. I don’t know. Certain words get to me. ‘Moist’ is another. The worst one, well, I can’t even type it, it makes me kind of ill, lol. I don’t know what it is about certain words, they just rub me the wrong way. It’s not a lack of appreciation for differences in people and the language they use. It’s literally the sound of certain words. I can’t explain it any better than that. Maybe some form of OCD?
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Oops, that should be ‘the sound of the word itself’. I loathe typos!
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Bob, hmmmm, pork chops and scalloped potatoes. I think it’s cool you still have the baking dish. Is it the one in the Scalloped Oysters post? Wasn’t that one black? I have to go back and check out the photo again. I know what you mean about dinner being more formal. That makes sense to me.
Scaramastra, ah, I see more clearly now. It’s about the way the word sounds. I don’t know if I have words that I don’t like for that reason. I have to think about that. I do have words I like though. Words that are fun to say. I like succulent.
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Bob, oh, I just looked and it was the TABLE that was black. The dish was clear. [See Kansas City Writing & Bob’s Scalloped Oysters (LINK). I think we have a black or dark gray dish. Must have been coming to mind. For those who are interested, here is Bob’s recipe for Aunt Annie’s Scalloped Oysters (LINK).
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