Ladies night out—or in

 

The four of us at an earlier dinner.
Not sure when, but I think it was a Cajun restaurant that had been recommended.

For several years now, a group of four women (including me) has had dinner together once every month or so. We are—ahem! elderly, me more so than the others, and we are all interested in the arts. All three are old friends, though they didn’t all know each other until a few years ago. They claim they first met at my annual tree trimming Christmas parties, now a thing of the past much to my regret. Pandemic threw a huge monkey wrench into our dinner plans. We are all cautious, again me more so than the others. Each of us take masking and vaccines seriously—one because her partner is more elderly even than I, another because she is herself immune compromised, me because I’m an elderly scaredy cat.

We had managed a dinner just before the Delta variant swept us all up and again another in December for a birthday, just before omicron was a threat. And then we were all hiding in our homes again. Two ladies—Kathie and Subie—came to my aborted New Year’s Day party, but Carol stayed home out of an abundance of caution. She, however, was the one subsequently exposed to Covid, and although she tested positive, she was never sure she had it. Meanwhile I spent January alone in the cottage when first Jacob and then Jordan had mild cases.

Finally a week or so ago, Carol suggested we meet for pot-luck supper at my cottage—and joked about how bold she was being to invite people to my house. The usual juggling ensued as we tried to find a date that suited everyone. Tonight was our potluck dinner, and it brings aa couple of thoughts to mind. The obvious one is the good fortune of having four forty-plus year friendships—we literally have grown old together. The ties that bind have lasted, though we have each grown in different directions, developed new interests, etc. And yet, mostly, we blend and share.

The other is that potluck is an old-fashioned idea. As you know if you read this blog much at all, I am increasingly interested in so-called American food, the dishes that are considered passé now, the food of the fifties and sixties. And I’d sure put the concept of potluck right up there with those dishes, although I know it is much older and probably traces back through most of American history. Especially as we all get healthier and sanitation conscious due to covid, I wonder if both potluck and buffet lines aren't going the way of all good things.

As hostess, I felt it was incumbent on me to provide the entrée, so I fixed a chicken casserole, made with Campbell’s Cream of Mushroom Soup. Cooking with canned soups is a hangover from my growing-up years, and yet I have recipes I treasure that call for mushroom, chicken, or celery soup. Lots of cooking snobs scorn such cooking, but not me. Our appetizers tonight were sort of retro—vegetables and dips, though the dips were not anything we thought of back in the day. There was a herb dip—really herbal and really green, a cheese spread spiced with pimiento, and a hummus with peppers (I avoided that). The crispy breads with Parmesan would not have appeared at my growing-up table (we never had bread with dinner). Salad was a tossed green salad—shades of my mom, though she never would have added sunflower seeds, blueberries, and apple. I can just see my dad’s face if he found a blueberry in his salad—he loved them, but all things in their proper place.

And finally there was dessert—a scrumptious fruit salad (with lots of raspberries which is always a plus for me) and good bakery cookies. What struck me about the meal was that it was a blending of the food from our young years with some more trendy dishes from today. And maybe that’s what’s to be treasured about our friendship—the best from the old days when we were young and full of plans blended with whatever wisdom age has brought us and surviving despite diverse interests.

Want that good, light chicken recipe? Look for the Gourmet on a Hot Plate blog tomorrow. I plan to post my two favorite chicken casseroles. Meantime I have taken two days from my novel—one to do taxes and today to make the casserole, straighten the cottage and get ready for company. I laugh at myself because in these tiny quarters I usually don’t do much to prepare for company—just ask a couple of regulars—but today seemed more like an occasion, and I couldn’t wrap my mind around much else. Tomorrow, back to the novel!

Notes for chef

Girls' night dinner

Later this year I am to teach an online course for Romance Writers of America on creating a fictional chef. The mystery readers among you will know how popular culinary mysteries are, and I assume chefs pop up in romances too. But a lot of authors don’t know much about chefs, not that I know all that much. Obviously, however, food and food writing interest me, and I’ve been collecting notes and ideas as I go along. So I’m doing research and hoping to encourage authors to create realistic characters who are not all the temperamental male chefs in high-end restaurants. Maybe all this is a way of fulfilling a buried dream of mine. I’ve always said in another life I’d like to come back as a chef. In this life, my old back and knees couldn’t stand it.

Last night Jordan got to prowling through my old (1972) copy of the Southern Living Party Cookbook. I remember when once it was my bible. Jordan laughed long and hard at the directions for using a decorative ashtray. Hostesses were advised to light a cigarette, take a couple of puffs, and then snuff it out so guests would know that the ashtray was functional, not just decorative. We would no more do that today than jump through hoops. One time I’d get militant is if someone tried to light up in my house.

But Jordan liked the recipes too—we found twice-baked potatoes (which most of us do off the top of our heads) and Italian artichokes. Artichokes chilled in a sauce of Italian salad dressing, mayo, and capers. Creamed chicken, Recipes with lots of mayo and heavy cream and butter. Eggs without cooking them first shocked Jordan. Lots of dishes that could be prepared ahead and frozen or held for a day or two in the fridge. As Jordan said, it was true planning ahead. What she didn’t know was that the sixties were the era of freeing housewives from the constraints of their roles—thank you, Betty Freidan—and frozen food dinners came into vogue as a way of easing the housewife’s life. It was also the era of canned soups—in casseroles, dips, you name it. I still cook some dishes made with the help of Campbell’s and enjoy them. And I’m not too proud to admit it.

It dawned on me as we talked about this book that if an author was to create a 1960s chef, they’d have to adjust the menu drastically. I remember when friends and I had a retro potluck supper on the front porch. We had onion soup/sour cream dip, and one man looked at his wife and said seriously, “Can you get the recipe for this?” She smiled and said she thought she could.

Dinner that evening consisted of tuna casserole (I still love my recipe and make it occasionally just for myself) and orange Jell-O with pineapple chunks and grated carrots. I remember my mom making that and so did the friend who brought it that night. I honestly don’t remember what else we had, but it was a fun evening.

Tonight Jordan and I are having sort of a retro dinner. Christian and Jacob have gone to Dallas for a Mavericks game, and we’re having a girl’s night. We’re trying those artichokes, and I made twice-baked potatoes. But at Jordan’s request we’re having loin lamb chops. I salt and pepper them, sauté them to medium rare in olive oil, then finish with anchovy butter. I am finally happy with the way I cook lamb chops.At first, Jordan’s were not done enough for her, while mine, cooked at the same time, was almost overdone. The potatoes, however, were killer.

We topped our meal off with fudge hand-dipped in dark chocolate, from the Dutchman’s Hidden Valley. As she nibbled at that delicacy, Jordan said, “We have to go back there soon.”

For those of you who are “of an age,” what dishes do  you remember from the fifties, sixties, and seventies?