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Guy here, but at least one of my grandmother was the laziest and cheapest cook. She managed to ruin Goulash stews by leaving out almost all the spices other than paprika. My mother made it even worse by leaving out bullion, since she heard about star chefs trashing them for being “low class”. Result: food that tastes like something you get in a hospital or similar place.
My grandma on my father’s side was a great cook (or so I heard), but she died too soon for me to remember much.
My grandma on my mother’s side was a health nut, and I don’t remember anything that I would classify as tasty from her. No sugar and very little fat make food taste sad.
You can actually make food with very little sugar or fat not taste sad. But that’s more of a recent kitchen thing.
Yeah, the disgusting food from my grandparents (and to some extent my parents) must at least partially be to blame for me becoming a picky eater. Which is a really difficult thing to unlearn
Baked green apples with cinnamon. Silver dollar cornbread pancakes. Thick, steaming pea soup with hot dog chunks.
Now I’m hungry and I miss my grandma :(
My abuela might have left my entire family with deep seated generational trauma, but she also left us with some killer recipes. That’s the average Latino experience
One grandma thought cooking from scratch was old fashioned, so everything came from a box or can, and the other grandma cooked 99% from a 1950 betty crocker cookbook and a USDA home canning/pressure cooker bulletin. The chain of heirloom recipes being passed down was broken a generation or two earlier.
Grandma on my dad’s side can cook. Whenever we visit(she’s super out of state), my dad and I gain some weight.
Puddings, pies, casseroles, flat enchiladas, pulled pork, bbq beef, mac n cheese, steaks— You name it. Fuckin’ slaps! Unfortunately, grandpa died last year at 91, and there seems to be a historical tread among grandparents to dip out once the love of their life is gone. I should call her.
My grandmother made some good pulled pork when I was a teen, and I complimented it. She whispers to me, “the secret is a little paprika, isa little spicy”
I have a whole two nice memories with that lady. This one makes me chuckle as I load up ghost pepper sauce onto my rice.
Lol I might adopt that. Add a little bit of heat to a recipe and just whisper “isa little spicy”.
My grandmother didn’t know how to preheat the oven and turned everything into jerky.
I’ve read somewhere once that serving jello was a flex, because it meant you were wealthy enough to own a refrigerator. I don’t know if it’s true, but I choose to believe it because there has to be a reason for serving hot dogs in jello.
IIRC it wasn’t the fridge, it was the gelatin.
They came up with a much cheaper way of making it, so for a while jelly was cheap and readily available but people still thought of it as fancy food.
I also choose to believe this
The hot dogs in jello thing sounds like a bastardized version of some actual foods from way back. I know the dish as “sült”, but I’m sure it exists in many forms. It’s basically made by boiling bones (think the ones with all the nooks and crannies, like the skull) until all the meat and gelatin come out. Then cool until it solidifies.
Growing up in the US midwest, ‘bastardized version of actual food’ describes a lot of what I grew up with. Common substitutes: cream of mushroom soup for bechamel; mayonnaise for creme fraiche; hot dogs for literally any sausage or charcuterie; thyme for any herb.
You’re talking about aspic
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aspic
Which people have been making and still do make all over the world.
Aka head cheese
Hot dog jello fish sounds fire unless you’re a coward
Mamaw made bacon. That’s all she taught us, how to make ‘pop-pop’, our toddler name for bacon.
Omah couldn’t cook and was very proud of that lol.
Mother could cook but thought she couldn’t. Dad was a line cook (for a short time) so mom compared herself to him. She was fine.
Mother and grandmother were so proud of my being a good baker. Sometimes. Sometimes mother was jealous.
American and British food living up to thé stéréotypes.
Meanwhile, i miss my grandma’s food.
The 70s were truly a foreign country
Jello was mostly a 50s trend, due to the new commercialization of refrigeration and the ending of wartime rations
We are talking about Aspic. Which was popular through the 70s.
I haven’t heard of aspic, interesting.
In its simplest form, aspic is essentially a gelatinous version of conventional soup.
gag no longer interesting
*cold * gelatinous soup
My gran thought putting mint in peas was the height of fancy cooking (while serving a full roast for dinner in the height of summer).
I’m an American who grew up with an English Nan in a part of the country filled with Italian Nonnas.
My jealousy of their food compared to a roast that could not be more dry… my other grandma was American and couldn’t cook either.
Luckily, my mom was self taught so good food at home.
