PRACTICE — CHOCOLATE – 15min

By Teri Blair

This is the first time I’ve done a timed, 15-minute write on my Royal Deluxe manual typewriter. I bought this green machine in Amherst, Massachusetts—Emily Dickinson’s hometown. The man at the shop told me it was the model Hemingway used. Did Emily like chocolate? She like ginger-tasting things like ginger cookies and ginger cakes if memory serves.

My first strong memory of chocolate were the Mr. Goodbars Mom had hidden in her purse. We were allowed pretty easy access to her purse (she wasn’t private about it) and she always shared pieces of her Mr. Goodbar. There was an unwritten understanding if we didn’t ask why they were always hidden there, we’d always get to have pieces. Sometimes she’d shake up the mix and have a Hershey Bar with almonds, never plain. Even now, when I want to buy her a treat she is delighted to be given either.

She told us the story of the Milky Way incident during her childhood, a guilty memory that still taints her love affair with that particular brand. She grew up in Hawick, a tiny town in Minnesota. There was one general story, the type that had the post office in one corner. Her parents would send her to the store for supplies from time to time, and she was always instructed to charge everything to John Everson’s account. Once a month her father, the town blacksmith, would get his itemized list of charged groceries. These would only be the necessities his family of nine needed. There was nothing extra to throw around during the Depression. After Mom charged the Milky Way (and stole away to a private place to eat it), she lived in mortal fear of the impending grocery bill. They’d know then. She’d lied and wasn’t worthy of their trust.

But when the bill came, not a word was said. It wasn’t until Mom was about 50 that she told her dad about it. I remember it. Even though he was a kind, gentle man, she still didn’t want to disappoint him. He smiled, I suppose, and told her in his thick Norwegian accent that it didn’t matter. Knowing him, he probably went right out and bought her another one. He was sorry he couldn’t give his kids more. When they asked him for money when they were children, he’d turn his wallet inside out to show them it was completely empty. After he died and they cleaned out his house, she found that old wallet. She keeps it on her dresser.

They were broke. It was the Depression. They lived on potatoes, headcheese, and lefse. Maybe an occasional chicken some farmer paid his welding bill with. There were bums who came to their door begging for a meal. Her mom made them a plate of their starchy food. Surely no chocolate on the plate.

NOTE: WRITING TOPIC — CHOCOLATE is the latest Writing Topic on red Ravine. Frequent guest writer Teri Blair joined QuoinMonkey in doing a Writing Practice on the topic.

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PRACTICE: Potatoes – 15min

Potatoes are a heroic food. They emerge from the dirt, lumpy and misshapen. It is rare to find a perfectly round potato. They are the Salt of the Earth among vegetables. Not a diva or prince among them. If potatoes were people, they would be the peasants, toiling in the fields.

I love the potato, filling and hearty. There is little as satisfying as potato salad made with small red potatoes, mayonnaise, spicy mustard, dill, and hard-boiled eggs. Sure, the accoutrements add flavor, but it is the potato that takes the show.

And the mashed potato is a dish without compare. Wasn’t it just the other day that Dee was craving roasted turkey with mashed potatoes and gravy? A meal that satisfies like no other, and while one may give credit to the turkey and the gravy, it is again the potato that keeps us going back to that ensemble again and again.

Jim says that the potato is most prone among vegetables to be affected by toxins in the environment, and I suppose in that way the potato is the toad among vegetables, warty and thin-skinned. And like the toad, the potato is an essential member of the ecosystem, a staple in the food pyramid, like corn or wheat or rice, and among all of those the potato takes you further, sustains you, keeps your tummy from grumbling overnight.

Mom was a fan of potatoes. She sliced them thin and fried them with garlic and onion, and we ate them greasy and salty with a piece of overdone meat and a salad. Or cubed in teeny tiny squares reminiscent of board game pieces, mixed with ground beef—filling for tacos.

The potatoes of my youth were always greasy, except for baked potatoes, although I don’t think Mom made those until after we were out of the house. Three fried Russets could feed a large family, whereas the same number of baked Russets feeds only three.

Jim buys his potatoes now during Growers Market season from the Johnstons. They are among the handful, maybe less, selling potatoes. They grow small red ones and one that is such a deep purple color it looks like a bruise, and I have to say I’ve never tasted as smooth and creamy a potato as theirs.

Tonight it’s turkey cutlets, which I’ll lightly bread and fry, and some of those bruised potatoes, which I hate to peel, but there’s nothing more appetizing than a cream-colored mashed potato (and with my girls, anything that resembles mashed prunes will be rejected outright). And gravy. To satisfy the need in all of us for heavier food, to keep us warm during cooling nights.

If I were to write a potato haiku, it would read:

Mister Potato
hero among veggies
Here to save the day




-Related to topic post I Found Potatoes In My Pantry (& They Scared The Hell Out Of Me) and haiku 2 (one-a-day)

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Memories, Writing, & Family Recipes

Stirring the steaming, liquid vanilla pudding as it warms on the stove is kind of Zen for me. The silver spoon gleams and swirls through currents of milk and cornstarch. I stare, mesmerized.

Liz was bustling around the kitchen, dicing and dashing, mixing the Dijon, OJ, and honey basting sauce, chopping bananas, basting the naked Cornish hens, while I stirred, and stirred, and stirred.

It’s a meditative practice, stirring pudding. Anything can be practice. Cooking is grounding. Recipes provide structure. Food anchors us in detail. Natalie often taught us – if you want to ground your writing, write about food. The closer to your heart, the better.

I kept staring at the steam, lost in memories of all the times Mom would grab one of us kids to stir, and keep the pudding from scorching, while she hurried around the kitchen, trying to pull a meal together for our family of 8. I have a lot of appreciation for all the meals she cooked for us.

When Liz broke into the box of Nabisco “simple goodness” Nilla wafers, she smiled and pointed to the inside of the cardboard. There, printed in both English and Spanish, was the recipe for the Original Nilla Banana Pudding with meringue topping, the one that Mom talked about in her comment on Southern Banana Pudding.

                          

I remember the old style pudding and the time it took to make it. In further research, I discovered that the recipe for original banana pudding with meringue (that’s printed inside our Nilla wafer box) can be found at NabiscoWorld, Original Nilla Banana Pudding. 

There’s also a page of Spread Some Holiday Cheer Nilla recipes that includes a Meringue-Topped Southern Banana Pudding that uses the boxed vanilla pudding (not Instant but Cook & Serve) that is in R3’s recipe post — Southern Banana Pudding – A Family Tradition.

                         

Confused? Like I said, there are as many banana pudding recipes as there are families to make them. Each is unique, traditional for that family. It seems to me that as puddings and pies became more packaged and convenient, the recipes were slightly altered to adapt them to the additional speed needed to save time as women became busier and busier outside the home.

That’s my theory. So take your pick; try them all and see which appeals to you. Next time, I want to make the vanilla pudding from scratch, the Original Nilla Banana Pudding with meringue. Just like my Aunt used to make.

I hope everyone had a Happy Thanksgiving. A Holiday to count our blessings. To be grateful for what we have. Now it’s time to head off to my writing projects. I’m grateful for the simple gift of time. This day is just for me.

 
 

-posted on red Ravine, Friday, November 23rd, 2007

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