Your mom's go-to dinners (acquaintance, depression, retired, years)
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A lot of us here have/had Depression-era parents, and I've been surprised in casual talk with acquaintances how similar our meals were growing up. Did our moms all have the same "Joy of Cooking" cookbook?
My mom's cooking was excruciatingly boring (and they had money), and she was of course, a SAHM.
Shake n Bake pork chops
Van de Kamps frozen fish filets (the only fish we ever ate)
Overcooked hamburger patties or hot dogs
Meatloaf
Tuna/pea/potato-chip casserole
Insipid weak, watery chili
Pot roast occasionally on Sunday
Kentucky Fried chicken (since she wouldn't fry anything)
Spaghetti with bottled sauce
Canned chow mein
Swedish meatballs
Hamburger Helper (in later years)
I never had a steak, lamb or any other fish or pork product. I wonder how much of this is parsimonious cooking from the Depression? Never anything new or different. I've never made any of the above except lately I tried some more exotic meatloaf, and once in a great while, KFC.
Do you cook anything you grew up with? Maybe your mom was more adventurous, LOL.
My experience was 180 degrees from yours. My mom also grew up during the Depression, but she was a fabulous cook with a large repertoire of tasty dishes. Maybe it was because she grew up on a farm?
Every week she decided what she was going to cook and made her shopping list. Her go-to cookbooks were Betty Crocker and Better Homes & Gardens, and she also had a large file of recipes hand written onto 3x5 cards. Meals didn't repeat more than once a month, and dinners were always complete with a protein, veg, potatoes, side dishes and dessert. And she worked full time and didn't get home until 5:30 every weeknight! She would start supper in the morning before she left for work and finish it when she got home. She didn't use shortcuts or frozen foods, until the 70s when it was considered cool to do so, but even then, she mostly cooked from scratch. She also made several loaves of homemade bread each weekend, and we always had cookies, doughnuts, bars, or some other homemade dessert.
Some of the dishes she cooked:
Short ribs and sauerkraut
Spaghetti with homemade sauce
Roast beef (and my all time favorite the next day, Roast Beef Hash)
Pork roast
Fried chicken
Fried Pork Chops
Shepherd's pie
Liver and onions (which we all loved)
Ham hocks with navy beans
Meatballs in cream gravy
What I wouldn't give to be sitting at the table right now, eating one of the meals my mom cooked!
My mom was a great cook - mostly some kind of beef, potatoes/gravy, vegetable - but her cooking/seasoning skills were good and the basics tasted amazing.
Sometimes spaghetti (homemade sauce), or chicken and dumplings or homemade chili . . .
It was all very good (except lima beans) and there was always plenty to eat.
My favorite would have been a chicken fried steak, mashed potatoes and gravy concoction.
We had meat, potatoes and a veg. Day in and day out. Very few casseroles. I don’t remember salads. Almost always dessert. I never tasted pizza or chili until I was married. I do remember that macaroni and cheese was a main dish, not a side.
My wife told me about her mom's chipped beef over toast...I don't think it was very good...
My father LIKED that dish and requested it. I remember it chiefly as very salty. I am pretty sure it came as a frozen dinner, not made from scratch.
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Mom went back to work teaching after my younger brother was in school. Meals were basic Midwest staples, but always included a vegetable. She made a spinach casserole that us kids actually liked! Meals were basic, what could be thrown in the oven (acorn squash, baked potato, baked fish, meatloaf) or cooked quickly on the stovetop (goulash, spaghetti, pork chops). It all tasted fine to us. Dessert was a special occasion treat. Green grapes were a real treat and were gone 10 seconds after emerging from the grocery bag. Looking back, I wonder that my brothers and I weren’t asked to cook an occasional dinner, particularly once we got to high school, but we never were. And it certainly never occurred to any of us to offer! Mom always did our laundry too. And our household obligations were limited to helping clear up after dinner and mowing the lawn. Ah well, now that they are in their nineties, my brothers and I are doing what we can to return the care.
I will add that once they retired, my folks both got interested in cooking, subscribed to a gourmet cooking magazine, and enjoyed turning out some great dinners.
Last edited by upnorthretiree; 01-07-2019 at 10:42 AM..
My mom was a terrible cook. Very unimaginative. Meals were pretty boring with little exception. I don't like to cook either but my sister's are great cooks.
I never had a decent salad until I had one at a restaurant. Vegetables usually were peas from a can although sometimes they were fresh and we shelled them. Potatoes were mashed and lumpy and meat was cooked to death.
I think cooking just bored my mom but she did make a nice tuna salad, meatloaf, spaghetti casserole or pineapple chicken dish when she was in the mood.
To be honest I don't remember a lot of my mothers meals, I cooked most of the time and my mother wasn't a great cook. I do remember her making chicken and dumplings, fried chicken, Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners and she cooked a lot of vegetables out of her garden. Most of the time when she did cook she would serve each of us a slice of pineapple on a bed of lettuce, topped with cottage cheese and a cherry. I loved meatloaf but I don't think she ever made it. Mealtime was traumatic for me when I was very young. I hated meat and Brussels sprouts and it made me literally gag till I got sick which escalated the punishment. My mother was raised by her grandmother after her mother died during her birth. They had it hard during the depression and wasted nothing. I can only assume she refused to allow me to waste any food she put on the table.
My dad would make pancakes once in a while from scratch and I have to say they were the best I ever had...to this day, I wish I had is recipe. He also cooked on the grill, burgers and hot dogs and he made SOS (Chipped beef on toast) that he had in the Navy and he cooked when we had shrimp and fish.
The only pies my mother ever made were mincemeat, egg custard and pumpkin on holidays. She never made any cookies or candy. She made a fruitcake each Christmas (I didn't eat it). Around the late 1970's she started making a carrot cake once in a while.
There were so many foods I never had till I was grown and married. A few examples, Tuna, Rice, Salads, Broccoli, Roast, Most seafoods with exception of catfish and shrimp. baked potato's, Pasta dishes, pizza, chili...too many to name.
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