CV Rick posted his experiences about his parents and food which made me think of a couple of experiences that I had when I was growing up. Like Rick's mom, my mom tends toward easily prepared basics. Unlike Rick's dad, my dad can cook. He has more cookbooks than I have books. He reads food magazines and tries out the recipes that he comes across in them.
And sometimes he creates his own bits of masterpiece.
When we lived in San Diego, he was trying to win some recipe contest. I don't know the details of the contest or how it turned out. All I know is what my dad was making. It was a sausage and vegetable concoction in barbeque sauce put into pita bread. Quite frankly, it was quite tasty . . . the first day.
Let me interupt here by saying that although I can cook and do quite often for my family, I don't necessarily enjoy it. I tend toward stuff that I can whip up pretty quickly and get onto the table. One of the reasons I am this way (besides time better spent on things other than cooking) is that I never trained myself to discern different flavors. Subtle nuances are completely wasted on me.
"Do you taste the hint of sage in the cream sauce? It really brings out the flavor of the chicken."
"Uhhh, no. What does sage taste like? And I thought this was pork."
So, the difference between Monday's recipe and Tuesday's recipe was lost on me. Wednesday's was pretty much the same. Thursday's stood out because I don't know what my dad did but not even the basset hound would touch that stuff. Learning from his mistake though, Friday's and Saturday's were back up to par but even after 30 years, I remember Monday's as being the best because let's face it, after 6 days of barbequed sausage, Top Ramen sans flavor packet would be a nice change.
My siblings were all probably too young to remember that episode but there is one that has become a hallmark in my family.
We were living in London at the time and sitting down to family dinner which we did whenever my dad wasn't out to sea. This is one of the greatest traditions we ever had and worth a post of its own (tomorrow). He served up cream of garlic soup.
Let me start by saying that although a little bit more runny, this stuff really did look like baby diarrhea. It was that weird shade of green that only seems to occur in nature after something has been run through a two month old human system.
Everyone just stared at it. Even my dad.
A blessing was said on the food. Looking back, an exorcism might have been more appropriate but I'm getting ahead of myself.
Amens said, everyone looked again at the food. I don't remember who tried it first. My impression looking back was a kind of mutual everyone trying it at the same time thing. I don't remember what it tasted like. The memory is probably blocked out by trauma. I do know that it tasted like garlic. No doubt about it. Even someone as untrained as I am about distinguishing flavors could taste the subtle hint of garlic in this soup.
No one, not even my dad, took a second bite. The soup was removed from the table and we moved on to the main course which oddly enough tasted like garlic but that was probably because of the residual garlic left in my mouth from the soup.
You see, my dad had somehow put in about 10 times the amount of garlic that the recipe called for. We could have taken garlic cloves and bit off pieces and gotten less garlic in our bodies.
Most of the food was great though and events like the garlic soup are great for a laugh at the family parties.
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