How do you like your peanut butter and other food trivia

 

Mary's delicious leftovers

You may think food is always on my mind, and pretty much it is. But more so tonight as I think back on the last couple of days (my world was too hectic to blog last night, but that’s another story). My friend Mary Dulle teaches cooking classes, mostly online, but early this week she taught an in-person class at the Woman’s Club on Porch Party Tipples and Snacks—for tipples, she offered sangria. Tuesday night is our regular weekly happy hour, and we usually don’t have food, but Mary brought a bountiful feast—smoked trout-stuffed baguette slices and marinated goat cheese (I could so make a pig of myself on the latter!). We’ll always welcome her leftovers! Tuesday for TCU Silver Frogs she did another in-person class on breakfast pizzas. I’m not a pizza fan, but that sounds so good.

From fancy nibblers to the mundane: my mom taught me to eat peanut butter sandwiches with mayonnaise and a crisp leaf of lettuce. A childhood staple that I still occasionally crave, and now one of my sons likes it a lot. But the rest of the world looks at us like we’re crazy. There are lots of things to put with peanut butter, but mayonnaise? Turns out the sandwich was a staple during the Depression, especially across the South where peanuts are plentiful. It was a cheap but filling way to get some protein. Today’s afficionados insist that the sandwich must be on white bread, I guess preferably the kind that turns into cotton candy in your mouth and sticks to your teeth. But I’m pretty sure I grew up eating it on rye.

Mom used to occasionally add bacon to the sandwich, which was a good treat, but I’ve read recently that people also put grated cheddar, pickles, onion, sliced egg, sliced apple, and even salami. Of course, if you add some of those things, you defeat the inexpensive aspect of the sandwich. Me? I’ll stick with lettuce.

But guess what Ernest Hemingway’s favorite sandwich was—peanut butter with onion. I’m on a big, sweet onion kick, so I’m hoping it was sweet onion—or had they grown those yet when he was walking among us? Apparently, the peanut butter softens the bite of the onion, but the onion adds a nice crispness to the bite. He drank red wine with it.

Gastro Obscura, an online newsletter I read, brings up all kinds of food oddities. This week, it was a class in how to cook with crickets and cricket power. Those have been staples in some Asian countries, principally Japan I think, for years but the article points out that in the interest of sustainable food sources, we should really consider insects. There really is an Edible Insect Movement. Gastro Obscura sponsors exotic and unusual food trips but I think this was an online class.

Another memory from my childhood: Mom canning fruits and vegetables. I distinctly remember we ate her canned tomatoes and applesauce all winter, but I think she also did green beans and peaches and figs (Mom loved figs!). Home canning of course was big during WWII when certain foods were scarce, and Victory Gardens were encouraged. Today’s edition of The Food Historian talks about the dangers, and I well remember that when Mom was ready to take jars out of the oven, she made me leave the kitchen for fear they might explode. According to The Food Historian, that was a very real danger.

Water bath canning is what the name implies—immersing jars of food in boiling water. But it is a complicated process with many steps ensuring sanitation and proper cooking. Only high acid foods can be safely canned in a water bath—fruit jams, pickles, etc. Low-acid foods need to be cooked in a pressure cooker before canning. You can find complete, details directions online, but truthfully, I think Del Monte or Hunt do a better job than Mom. Shhh! Don’t let her hear me say that because in all else she was a terrific cook who gently taught me to love being in the kitchen. Just not for canning.

So, what’s on your menu this week?

The good old days

Remember when summer was a time for kids to be kids, free to do whatever they wanted (within reason)? I remember at least one summer when I rode my bike to the public library every morning got four or five books, went home and spent the day on the screened-in front porch reading. Next morning I went back to return those and get more. The neighborhood kids thought I was squirrelly at best.
These days kids don't have that freedom. I wouldn't let Jacob ride his bike alone around the block, let alone to a public library a mile from home. Because his parents both work all day, his summer days are as structured as during the school year. He's either in some special camp or he's at the Clayton YES (Youth Enrichment Services) program at his school.
This week, I'm giving him a vacation. He stayed over Sunday night, stayed up way too late without my knowledge, and slept until ten. That morning he said he'd just like a week when he could sleep in, so I thought why not? He sleeps in (except Tuesday when we went to the country where he had a wonderful time) and spends much of the day on his iPad though I arrange outings--one day we went to lunch with friends he enjoys, then we went to the bank to sign some papers and meet his mom, and he went for his regular reading lesson. Today friends he adores took him at lunch because I had a previous commitment and then he had a swimming play date. Tomorrow another swimming play date. I do not want him to be a kid who does nothing but iPad but I figure for one week, it's okay--it makes him use his brain cells. And, oh yes, we do read for 30 minutes every morning. He's eating lots of peanut butter and honey, but that's okay too. At night he's in his room on the iPad and I'm at my desk--like two ships passing in the night. But maybe someday he'll remember his grandmother who let him do whatever he wanted.
Meantime I'm enjoying his company--what I have of it. And I will confiscate the iPad at bedtime.