Comfort Foods of Yore

I have just reread a book by the late humorist, Lewis Grizzard, of Atlanta. I used to have all of his books but must have shared them out over the years. This book is entitled "If Love Were Oil I'd Be About a Quart Low". He tells of how his mother would comfort him by making fresh squeezed orange juice for him when he was feeling low.

This started my chain of thinking about my own mother doing things to comfort us. Yes, fresh squeezed orange juice is what I think about too. I well remember that, what my sister Ruth remembers is biscuits and gravy at breakfast. Today my breakfast is cream of rice in memory of my mother. With ten to feed she would do what was easiest and quickest for all. Fresh squeezed orange juice was not on that list but white rice was. I liked the taste of it with sugar and milk. I still do but it takes too long for me in the mornings with only one to feed (me). So, the new product I found is cream of rice and it suits me just fine.

When I was sick and could not handle regular food she would give me canned tomatoes with saltine crackers. That does wonders for you when you are recovering from the flu and it is just acidic and salty enough to satisfy. I remember the time in my teens when I had a good old fashioned case of flu. I recall the doctor coming in to see me. I had been put in a separate area in a wide hallway upstairs - possibly to quarantine me from my siblings. I do not believe flu shots were available or I would have surely not been sick. This was around 1941.

With so many to feed, it meant there were many clothes to wash. This required a day long effort, with all the beds, towels, etc. By then my mother had an electric washing machine, before that, well the old scrub board had to do the job. She still had to feed us on laundry day so a huge pot of beef, vegetable soup filled the bill. But to comfort us on these days she actually had time to make pies. One lemon and one chocolate. I well remember peeking under the meringue to see which one was lemon.

While my mother could handle the activity of washing and cooking, it drove her up the wall to stand and iron. So, a little lady named Mrs. Elmore would come on ironing day and our clothes were turned over to her. I think she liked to talk too as I recall an old inside family joke "and Pascal said well.......". Pascal was Mrs. Elmore's husband. Apparently he had a limited vocabulary as she always ended her stories with that phrase "and Pascal said well...".

After my father was diagnosed with diabetes our meals took on a more balanced nature.
The deserts disappeared. If we wanted our accustomed sweet at the end of a meal she suggested we put jam on our bread. She had a formula for a balanced meal- something sour, something sweet, something red, something green.something hot, something cold. It is not a bad idea. For Sunday meals she used a drip-drop roaster. The food all went into that and when we came home from church the Sunday dinner was almost ready. I suppose it could be called the forerunner of our crock pots of today, except the crock pots are electric.

My mother did not lecture. Her advise was given calmly and succinctly. She said what she had to say and you were free to take it or suffer the consequences. This in it's way is a comfort. No excess verbiage to cloud the issue. Probably she developed this tactic as she had no time for anything else. We knew she valued us and showed it in many ways, comfort foods was just one aspect of her parenting.