Mom in the kitchen

By the time I was in the 11th grade Mom had been working for several years and my sister Brenda had been helping Mom out by making dinner once or twice a week. Dinner usually consisted of meat, potatoes, vegetables and a small toss salad of iceberg lettuce, sliced celery, carrots cut into pennies, and a few chunks of fresh tomatoes. Pretty basic food, but always good and fulfilling. Dad always claimed that he taught Mom how to cook the old southern way of over cooking the vegetables no matter how fresh they were and cooking meat, like pot roast, until it was totally falling apart. Seldom did dinner stray from this basic formula.  Occasionally there would be rice instead of potatoes, or perhaps a casserole from some recipe that Mom found in one of her Women’s magazines.  The meat was mostly beef, with occasional pork chops and fresh fish only when Dad brought them home from one of his fishing trips.  

Spaghetti was one of the meals that was acceptable to Dad, and we would have it a few times a year and us kids really liked it.  We all loved it when Mom used the extra-long spaghetti which we would swirl around our forks and slurp it up through our lips, it made dinner fun.  The pre-made spaghetti sauces you can now get in the grocery store did not exist at the time, the sauce had to be made from the basic ingredients.  Mom’s spaghetti sauce was pretty basic, consisting of ground beef, tomato sauce and a couple of spices. When it came to spices Mom didn’t use many as spicy food upset Dad’s stomach ulcers. The only spices Mom used on a daily basis was salt and pepper.  The six or so spices that were used on a regular, or occasionally, were in the spice rack that sat on the top of the back control panel of the stove, the rack I had made in shop class in 9th grade wood shop. Cinnamon powder, and cinnamon sugar mix were always there, nutmeg, cloves, poultry seasoning, Italian seasoning, perhaps one or two others. 

Brenda had watched Mom make spaghetti sauce many times and when Mom asked her to make it that night Brenda was happy to do so. It is a pretty basic recipe, I probably could have made it at the time and did so a couple of years later when I moved out on my own.  It’s quite simple, a pound of ground beef browned in a pan in a skillet, drain grease, add can of tomato sauce, and spices, salt, pepper, and a tablespoon of Italian seasoning then simmer for a while. A good hour is best but, in a hurry, ten minutes.

Mom and Dad were going to be home a bit late that day due to something at work so would not have time to make dinner and have it on the table by six, so Mom asked Brenda to make the spaghetti sauce early.  Brenda, a senior in high school, was a pretty good cook by this time having helped Mom for many years, taken Home Economics at school, and from being in the Girl Scouts for many years.  She started making the sauce around four thirty so that it would have a good hour to simmer before dinner at six. I always liked helping Mom in the kitchen, so I was right there by Brenda’s side. She didn’t mind at all, we always got along really well, and I think she liked showing me that she could cook.

Brenda got the cast iron skillet out, browned the meat, drained the grease added the tomato sauce and then the spices.  Salt, pepper, the Italian seasoning which she added an extra teaspoon full, she liked it spicier than what Mom made, she explained. But she wasn’t done, she opens the cabinet door above the stove where Mom kept the spices she seldom used and she pulls out one, paprika I think, and sprinkles some into the sauce and after giving it a good stir, takes a spoonful, blows on it till it cools and then tastes it.  Just right she proclaims as she puts the cover on for it to simmer.  I helped Brenda chop vegetables for the toss salad, David set the table including the round green can of parmesan cheese. The only thing needed was the spaghetti noodles and the water for them was boiling in a pot on the stove.  

Mom and Dad got home precisely at 5:45 and Mom and Dad immediately turns on the TV to watch the news while Mom goes to the kitchen where Brenda and I are and comments how good it smells as she steps in.  As she walks over to the stove, Brenda lifts the lid of the sauce and with a spoon in her hand asks Mom if she wanted to taste it.  Of course she does, Mom could never resist a tasting of something cooking. She takes the spoon and goes to dip into the pan when she pauses and asks, “What are those little black things?”  Brenda quite proudly says, “That is paprika.”  Mom pauses a second and says, “That’s not what paprika looks like. Where did you get it?” Brenda points to the cabinet above the stove and says up there and Mom opens the cabinet, yes, it says paprika, she opens the lid looks in, and looks puzzled and then pours some into a spoon and says, “Its full weevils.” I look at the spoon and see little black weevils squirming around and then peer into the sauce and see them floating in the spaghetti sauce. The sauce was ruined, Brenda was in tears saying, “She didn’t know.” Mom comforts her and says, “I will have to tell you of the things I ruined when her and Dad first got married.”  Don’t worry honey.”, Mom said, “Well just make some more.”  Dad and David had stepped into the kitchen by this time to see what the commotion was about and Mom says, “Dinner will be few minutes late.”  Dad, knowing not to say anything, returns to the family room to watch the news.  David says, “What happened?” and Mom says, “The spaghetti has bugs in it.” David says, "Let me see.”, and comes running over and Mom lets him have a quick look then shooed him and me out of the kitchen.  After tossing the sauce into the garbage, Brenda helped Mom make another batch, the ten-minute version.

Dinner was served by six fifteen, we sat around the table, Mom said the prayer, and er ate our spaghetti. David, who seem to never know when not to say something asks, “What happened to Brenda’s sauce?” I about choked on my spaghetti while Brenda almost broke out crying again and Mom said, “Don’t you worry about it, eat your spaghetti.”  David sputtered, “Bbbbut…”, but Mom gave him that look, and he shut up. Dad sat quietly there the whole time not saying a word. Dinner was over quicker than usual as there was no other conversation.  When we were all done Mom says, “Larry and David you can clear the table and do the dishes since Brenda made dinner.”  David mumbles to me, “That’s not fair.”, but he knew that battle was lost.

David and I, being the brothers we were, the following days mercilessly kidded Brenda about her “bug spaghetti” making her so mad at us she wouldn’t speak to us. In the following weeks, months and at family gatherings David or I would tell the story about Brenda’s bug spaghetti.

Brenda was a little hesitant about making dinner for a while after that and never again used much in the way of spices, but I always thought she was a good cook. One thing I never told Brenda was that that, when she stepped out of the kitchen for a moment, I went in and sampled her sauce and thought it was the best sauce I had ever tasted, much better than what Mom made.

 

Updated: 02-24-2024

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