Comfort foods

When I think of "comfort foods" I think of those early winter, late autumn foods that mom made frequently.

No recipes with this post, just a rambling recall of those dishes my mother made so often.

I would say first on the list was spaghetti and meatballs.  My did didn't particularly care for a meat sauce, but he loved meatballs.  So mom always made her sauce with meatballs.  She would complain from time to time that the meatballs were "tough".  Then she learned a trick, or rather Aunt Rita told her how to get a perfect meatball every time.  Don't cook it through, just brown it, and let the simmering sauce do the work of cooking the meat.  Soft, but not break-apart meatballs every time.

Mom also made a great meatloaf.  And she always served it was a brown gravy, never any tomato or ketchup in it.  Dad preferred it that way.  I loved it that way, and could never stand a meatloaf that had ketchup on top and peppers inside.  It's a personal taste thing.  I'm not saying that it's wrong to put peppers in a meatloaf, along with all the other things that one puts in meatloaves, I'm just saying we didn't like it that way.  When I started cooking for my own children I varied moms recipe by crushing barbeque potato chips and used them in place of bread crumbs, and then added a little bit of barbeque sauce inside, not on top of, the loaf.  If anyone wanted more bbq sauce they could have it straight from the bottle.

Comfort food number three would have to be chicken and dumplings.  I recently saw a Food Network program where the chef put the entire chicken sans head into a pot of boiling water in order to stew the chicken.  Exactly what mom did, including the feet.  Mom had an affinity for chicken feet.  Yuck!  After she stewed the chicken so that it was falling off the bones, she would scrape the meat from the bones, making sure no bones remained in the pot.  How she did that -- making sure no bones remained in the pot -- I don't know.  I haven't had much luck with that.  It seems I always miss one or two bones, and Alan gets them in his dish, even though I scour his chicken before I serve it.  Then she'd make dumplings as directed on the Bisquick box.  No additives to the dumplings.  I usually sprinkled in some parsley flakes and maybe some grated cheddar cheese before I put them into the boiling stew.

Another comfort food was shepherd's pie.  Mom made it whenever we had lamb.  She would take the left over lamb, get out the meat grinder, attach it to the table, and grind away.  Sometimes, she'd let me grind, which was a treat for me.  Now we would probably call it child labor, but I loved turning that crank and watching the meat spew from the tiny holes.  After she ground up the lamb, she would put it in a casserole dish, mix in the left over gravy, and top it with mashed potatoes.  Then all that would be put in the oven for about 30 minutes so that the tips of the mashed potatoes would turn a golden brown, like merangue. 

I think in our household -- that is my husband's and mine -- our favorite is tomato soup and grilled cheese sandwiches with chips and pickles on the side.  So easy to do, and so good to eat.

I would say that favorite is followed by chili.  In Cincinnati chili has a unique flavor, and it is always mixed with spaghetti, topped with onions, beans, and cheese.  I make a good chili, and I put the beans into the "gravy" with the meat.  I don't just put the beans on top of the chili.  I remember having chili when I was a child, and it was always served with Italian bread, crisp and fresh bread, never with spaghetti.  Different locales, different styles.

Now, it's time to go get Alan's lunch ready.  His favorite?  Grilled ham and cheese.  But today he's getting plain ham and cheese with Guilden's mustard on the bread.  Me?  I'll be having a salad -- honeymoon salad -- lettuce alone!

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