This Family Cooks

I am not sure where I got my love for cooking and baking, but I have it! My mother freely admits that she always hated cooking and was never very good at it. I have two sisters that also don't have the knack for whipping up a gourmet meal or baking a mouth-watering dessert. My grandmother on my dad's side (Grandma Springer) was a good cook. She mostly cooked down to earth, hearty dinners; I don't recall her baking fancy desserts. Her claim to fame was her 24 Hour Salad which I swore to her on her death bed I would continue the tradition of making this very old, family recipe. And I have! We have it every year for Thanksgiving. My immediate family loves it, but there are a few that have entered the family through marriage that aren't fans. We have a picture of my dad loading his whole plate with 24 Hour Salad while my oldest son looks on in awe. My dad was such a jokester!

I don't recall cooking much as a kid. When I was in my late teens I would make desserts for my mom and dad's euchre parties. Then I would make lasagna every year for my then boyfriend's birthday. I don't remember cooking much else until after I was married.

When I was married and my kids were growing up, I cooked basic foods - you know how husbands and kids are, they like to stick with what they know. Their  favorite was what they referred to as "deep down-in pizza." My kids were always wanting me to open up a pizza shop with this dish. I, on the other hand, didn't think it was all that great - good, but not great. I was famous for my chocolate chip cookies among family and friends. If we attended a picnic with friends and I didn't bring my cookies, I was banned from game playing! Not really, but that was the threat so I always brought them.

I am the person in my family that fixes Thanksgiving dinner. It is my favorite dinner and I love having my whole family come and rave over the traditional dinner that they love. Turkey, mashed potatoes, gravy, dressing, sweet potatoes, cranberry salad, corn bread pudding, rolls, 24 Hour Salad and, of course, pumpkin pie. I have been cooking Thanksgiving dinner for my family for more than 30 years! The best story, and the one no one will let me forget, is the year I failed to put sugar in the pumpkin pies!

When I became single, I started experimenting with new recipes and ingredients. Then I met my friend, Carla. Carla was originally from Texas and she introduced me to using fresher ingredients and herbs. Cilantro? Never heard of the stuff!  Carla was such an influence and I became fearless, expanding my cooking efforts exponentially.

My best friend now is Ree Drummond - the Pioneer Woman! That woman can cook! If I'm hunting a recipe for something, I go to her website first and do a search. More than likely she has made what I'm looking for and made it well. I have only found one recipe in her entire repertoire that I was not amazed with. Her recipe for brisket is not my favorite. Way too salty! If you haven't seen the Pioneer Woman on the food network channel or been to her website, you are missing out.

All three of my children cook and I am so very proud of them! My oldest, Bryan, likes to make the recipes his mom made - Connecticut Beef Supper and Just Like Stuffed Green Peppers are his classics. He doesn't have time to cook a lot, but he does a good job when he has the time. My youngest, Retta, also cooks. Her husband, however, is a rather finicky eater so she doesn't get to go outside the box a lot. She has her mother's talent for chocolate chip cookies and she makes 24 Hour Salad for her Thanksgiving dinner if she's not at my house! Her real claim to fame is her Mango Cheesecake. Since she lives in Miami she has access to freshly grown mangos. Retta and her husband are always having friends and family over and she cooks up a storm to feed them all.

Then there is my middle "child," Clayton. He mostly likes to cook meat, but his talent goes way beyond that. Several years' back, one of his co-workers was talking about her famous meatloaf. Clayton challenged her to a meatloaf cook-off and the entire office got involved. Clayton won best presentation and best overall for his efforts at meatloaf. The next challenge was at Christmas when they decided to have a bake-off. He called me at 7:30 in the evening and asked for my cheesecake recipe for the bake-off the next day. I told him that my cheesecake recipe calls for baking the cheesecake for 3 ½ hours. He took the recipe and must have been up half the night because that is what he entered in the bake-off! If I remember correctly, he also made my chocolate raspberry sauce for the cheesecake. This time he won it all - best tasting, best presentation and best overall! He sent me pictures of the table of desserts and there were quite a number of them!

As I said, Clayton loves to cook meat. He has a monster grill and he bought a smoker a year or so ago. He has cook-offs with his buddies. They compete for the prize for ribs and wings. Clayton is always working on perfecting his recipes for competition! Whenever he cooks something different, he takes pictures of it and sends the pictures to his buddies! He made Beef Wellington for Christmas and it was delicious. As soon as he cut it, he was taking pictures of it to send to his buddies! I received a text message from Clayton one Sunday afternoon - he had made short rib sandwiches! It was this huge sandwich on a very long loaf of French bread! I was impressed! Come Mother's Day, Clayton, his wife and baby boy showed up at my house with all the ingredients to make short rib sandwiches (a Pioneer Woman recipe, by the way)! They were delicious.

In this era of busy lifestyles and no time to cook, there are good recipes out there that can be made in an hour or less and continue the tradition of having family meals around the table. When I was working and raising a family, it was difficult as most of the meals I fixed took hours to prepare. Now I can come home from work and make a decent meal for my mother and me, in relatively short order. I believe that my kids cook because I cooked and I hope they hand that tradition down to their children. Mind you, my kids don't prepare an entire meal every day and neither do I, but at least I know they can and that I have influenced them to be able to cook.
If you haven't checked out the Pioneer Woman - please do. Her recipe for Sloppy Joe is amazing (just make sure you add the optional tomato paste)!