I learned almost everything about cooking from doing the opposite of what my mother did. She never followed recipes and stuck to the same dozen recipes she learned from her mother and aunt most of her life. She never measured anything. Watching her make a noodle kugel or a soup was always a test of faith. You never really knew how anything was going to come out.
My mother swore by canned vegetables, made an eye-of-the-round with Lipton’s onion soup mix by encasing the meat in foil and cooking it to a uniform gray. My dad liked it that way. When she was first married, she tried to make spaghetti and meatballs for her new husband but didn’t realize she needed to boil the pasta first. I never knew what an artichoke was until I went to college.
Despite that, some of her dishes were always welcome and made converts of the girlfriends I brought home who survived our raucous dive-in-or-lose-out dinners. She eventually figured out the spaghetti thing and made awesome meatballs, beef stew, roast turkey with stuffing, latkes, and schmaltz hamburgers (what are they? Don’t ask if you hate heart attacks.)
When I was working on my first cookbook, I wanted to include my mom’s recipe for chopped liver. I told her I wanted her to teach me and watch while I made it. She demonstrated, and when she wasn’t looking, I measured everything.
My father made just two things—pancakes and apple pies. The former came from Aunt Jemima. I don’t know where he learned to make the latter, but he made the pies from scratch every fall and wouldn’t let anyone help. His recipe is a secret he took to his grave, but I am now the owner of the ancient commercial Swanson pie tins that he used. I have tried all sorts of recipes but have never managed to match his pie.
I tried a few times to expand their repertoire, but my meat-and-potatoes dad would have none of it. I made them cornish game hens for a holiday meal, and my dad looked down at the bird and said, “Get this pigeon off my plate!” (Of course, I had made a turkey breast knowing that would happen—sigh.)
They are both gone now, but every time I stuff a turkey (my mom wouldn’t hear of making it outside the bird), I am swept back to childhood. I’m in my PJs watching the Macy’s parade on our 20-inch Zenith while the aroma of onions, celery, parsley, and challah sautéing in butter and schmaltz filled the house.
