memories

Well, that got me going. I think it would be great to take off on sharing family memories. Family stories are so great--but they get lost between the generations. This blog might be a great vehicle for sharing family stories--the good, the bad and the terrible!

On the cooking vein, I think about GaGa--dad's mom. She was a fabulous cook! We mostly partook of her cooking on the big holidays--before mom and dad separated--we would drive to Lockheart--about 45 miles--for the holiday meal. And it would be a feast. Funny that one of my favorite food memories is of her green beans! She cooked them down, and down, and down in ham juices! And they were great. Then I learned, as an adult, that you should not do that because you cooked all the healthy part away. Well, I don't know but they were really good! And she made pickled peaches that were wonderful. And lemon chess pie! Because GaGa (and Big Josh?) rejected mom and make her feel unwelcome we girls were never close to dad's family. Only as an adult have I developed a new respect for GaGa. She was incredibly talented. Beside being a great cook, she did beautiful embroidery, made quilts, painted china, tatted lace edging on her linens. She had a garden where she grew her vegetables, she had hens for eggs and meat, she had a glorious iris bed in front of the house with an incredible bed of mint! She was competent, productive and accomplished. She played the organ for church services, keep boarders in an upstairs apartment, was the high school principal and math teacher! On the other hand, she was not warm and loving toward us--nor with mom. So no bond was developed. Hummm, having problems between mother and daughter-in-law seems to be a recurring theme. Hopefully, that is over come in the current generation!

My memory of Big Josh is that he was a sweetie-pie.

I expect tht I have opened the door for serious disagreement! Welcome! Coming up next, memories from Jefferson!

Starting Over...

Our stack of comments got wobbly, so here we are in a new place with fresh footing...

Margaret's comment got me going. I said, "whoa": I don't think of loaves of bread when I think of Mamama, only of her non-pareil dinner rolls. And, of course, the closely related cinnamon rolls.

Other than that I really don't think of food at all in relation to my childhood at 112 Charles (as opposed to that childhood in Jefferson, which holds vivid memories of the cookie jar with paper-thin molasses cookies.( Did Mother make those and, if so, why were they never in San Antonio?) Of hand-turned peach ice cream, the peaches from the yard; and, oh yes, the malted-milk ice cream cones that have been replicated only in the Grand Place in Brussels, of all places.

Which is not to say I don't have any Jones food favorites. Fig preserves Oh, yes, hers were the best. Liver and onions? Hmmm hmmm good. I miss that still, since no one else I know has any wish for such at all. The last time I ate them was while pregnant with Sarah. D.C. had (has?) a cafeteria that served terrific liver and onions, near my office, and I used to go there once a week or so because iron was good for growing babies. Wayne and I took a long, laborious (apt word, that) from the hospital to the cafeteria in the hope of coaxing out our overdue Sarah. I was so exhausted from the difficult "false" labor (don't get me started on "false" labor!) that tears were streaming down my cheeks and people on the street must have been certain that Wayne was refusing to "do right" by me.

But none of this is what I said a couple of hours ago. Not at all. What I said before, in the post that never made it to the posting, led me to conclude that Mother didn't really have much to do with us and food. But she had everything to do with us and this blog, with our doing it, with us as adults still striving to stay in touch, to be a family. Not nothing, that.

No-knead bread

I've been meaning to try making no-knead bread for a few months, and finally did it today. The quality of the bread is pretty amazing. I'm sure several of you must be familiar with this technique, which Mark Bittman featured in a NYT column in 2006. I only recently became aware of it, and as a bread-making novice I was amazed at how easy it was. I'd say the amount of actual work (including cleanup) is about 30 to 45 minutes.

The basic idea is to make a very wet dough with a small amount of yeast, and let it rise for 12-18 hours. The actual baking is done in a closed pot, so that the moisture from the bread is trapped inside the pot and creates a nice, thick crust (most commercial bakers have special ovens that keep a high moisture level with sprayers to produce this crust). For the more complete explanation, I'll point you to Bittman himself: here's the recipe, and here's the article explaining why it works so well.

Here are a couple of photos:

storing herbs

In case you have not found a good way to keep herbs fresh, here is what I am doing now. (Formerly, I put a batch of fresh herbs in a small jar with a little water and loosely covered it with a plastic produce bag. It worked great but we were forever knocking over the jar or small glass and spilling contents. Frustrating! And it took up a lot space especially if storing several herbs.)

A picture book lesson:

You will use 2 Ziploc sandwich bags and a soaking wet paper towel:

One bag has the rim turned back making a cuff.

The paper towel goes into the first bag, the herbs go into the one with the cuff.

The cuffed bag of herbs goes into the first bag which is sealed shut. The cuffed bag of herbs is left open inside the sealed bag. So the herb is in a nice humid environment without being wet. If there is a large bunch of herb to store, just use larger plastic bags.

This basil has been in the refrigerator for a week or more--pinched off my new plants to encourage branching. It is just as fresh as when just picked. The little bags just go into the hydrator, taking almost no room!

I am excited about this because I have planted a LOT of herbs and they all need cutting back to encourage healthy growth--but I won't want to use all of them that regularly. I'll have a whole produce department of herbs waiting on me in my own refrigerator.

Now, I'm not eager to hear from you that you've always kept your herbs stored this way! But you can remark that it is a very clever way to store herbs. Cheers!

A story...

I posted a story about my evening yesterday on my newish blog, Scattered Work. Then it occurred to me that this might be a good post for the MZJ blog. So I'm going to link yall to the story of the Southside Onion Hunt.

Enjoy!