"jmcquown" > wrote in message
...
> On 10/17/2013 5:01 AM, Ophelia wrote:
>>
>> "Tara" > wrote in message
>> ...
>>> On Wed, 16 Oct 2013 21:33:06 +0000, l not -l wrote:
>>>
>>>> It's cool here (STL) and getting cooler the next few days. If I hadn't
>>>> eaten the last of the cornbread with the collards, I'd pull the last
>>>> container of pinto beans from the freezer to have for dinner. I might
>>>> just have to make more cornbread tomorrow - beans and cornbread are
>>>> mighty fine when the north wind blows.
>>>
>>> Beans and greens and cornbread are pure comfort food. Good for the
>>> heart
>>> and soul.
>>
>> Do you think comfort foods are ones you grew up with?
>>
> I don't know about l not -l but I "grew up" with very few things I'd
> consider comfort food. I've mentioned many times, Mom hated to cook.
>
> I didn't grow up eating beans and greens and cornbread. The first
> cornbread I ever tasted came out of a boxed mix with a little foil baking
> pan. Probably a Betty Crocker creation. That was around 1969 when we
> lived in Virginia. It was okay, but I was about nine years old at the
> time so what did I know? In the ensuing years I have learned to make much
> better cornbread. 
>
We never had greens at home as in cooked greens. I made cooked dandelion
greens at a friend's house and I loved them. But beans and cornbread were a
common meal in our house. Mostly it was navy bean soup which I loved but my
mom put ham in it which I didn't love at all. I would eat my way around the
ham. She did make her cornbread from scratch back then. Somewhere along
the way she found cornbread mixes but that was after I moved away.
> Green beans in our house were limited to canned limas or just plain blue
> lake canned green beans.
We only had fresh beans if we/I grew them. Once we moved to WA, the garden
was all mine. We also had black eyed peas, kidney and garbanzo and Shelly
beans. But these all came from a can. My mom did cook some dried beans.
One of the worst years was the Weight Watcher year. My dad determined that
if he ate French cut green beans, he could fit more beans into his portion
size. So that meant those were pretty much the only vegetable we had,
besides salad unless we dined out, which we didn't do often that particular
year because it was difficult for him to get a meal that fit the parameters
of his diet. While I do not dislike those beans, it did get rather boring
to have them on the table at every dinner. And our salad was usually what
he called Honeymoon. Aka lettuce alone. One of us would take a head of
iceberg, core it, cut it in four pieces and there you go!
>
> There were absolutely no collard or turnip greens in my mother's
> repetoire. No slow cooked greens with pot likker soaked up with
> cornbread. I learned to appreciate that much later.
We never had those either. I did try collard greens when we lived in CA.
For some reason the KFC sold them. Nobody liked them but then we didn't
like any of the other food that we got from them either.
>
> My father knew how to cook. I absolutely love his navy bean soup made
> with a meaty ham bone or hocks. He didn't cook very often, though. He
> always managed to cut himself (rather severely) when he was slicing
> vegetables. Always on a Sunday. It became a family joke. Don't let Dad
> in the kitchen on Sunday!
My dad tried to cook. He wasn't very good at most things and had the
tendency to massively overseason. He figured if it liked something then he
should put in a ton of it. Mostly he stuck to hamburger patties either on
the grill or in a pan. He could do eggs and toast and he once made me a
tuna melt. He used to get angry with me for ordering a tuna melt in a
restaurant. He was one of those people who would say, "You shouldn't order
something in a restaurant that you can make at home!" I found this silly
because really you can make anything at home although granted a restaurant
might have a cut of meat that you can't easily get your hands on for your
house.
I never could do grilled sandwiches. They never came out right. I finally
resorted to making toasted ones in the oven. Those worked. Just bugged me
that my dad who didn't know how to cook much could turn out a good tuna
melt. And my friend who admits that she doesn't cook can also do a perfect
grilled cheese!
I think my problem with both of these is that I put too much filling in
them. Last night for dinner I made a cheaters grilled cheese. Toast, then
buttered (margarined), made into the sandwich then nuked till the cheese
melts. I put tomatoes inside and used Swiss and Cheddar Daiya rice cheese.
The end result was tasty but nuked it a bit long. Apparently that stuff
rather than melting slowly like real cheese, just goes from firm to goo in
seconds! I had to eat it with a fork but it was good.