Season 1, bonus episode - small plate: kitchen memories

Transcript

Conner: (00:00)
Welcome to Kiddos in the Kitchen, a podcast hosted by my mom.

Stephanie: (00:17)
Powerful memories stem from food and time in the kitchen. There are the ritualistic experiences like annual holiday baking or summer camping meals. And then there are the consistent regular memories, like omelets on Sunday morning or spaghetti Wednesdays. And let's not forget the standalone memories like a flour fight or the time you broke out laughing as a family, after a meal went horribly wrong and you had to order pizza. These memories stay with us.

Stephanie: (00:50)
Welcome to Kiddos in the Kitchen. A podcast about helping busy adults find the inspiration and information they need to teach the kids in their lives how to cook. I'm your host, Stephanie Conner. And in this bonus episode, we're talking about the food memories that stay with us and the memories we hope to create today in our own kitchens. I'm sharing stories from a few of our past guests, as well as a few from you, our listeners. First step, Amy Lynn Smith, a writer based in Michigan.

Amy Lynn Smith: (01:39)
Everyone called my mother Jigger even though that clearly was not her given name. She was an incredible cook who made amazing meals for our family. I learned a lot about cooking just by being with her in the kitchen, which I loved as a child, watching her make things, and she would explain certain things as we went along. I learned a lot just by doing that. She would also help me make recipes out of the Betty Crocker Kids Cookbook, which I still own to this day, and by the way, has the world's best meatloaf recipe in it. She taught me some other very specific things that apply to anything you might want to make. The first being the rule that if you can read, you can cook. As long as you can read a recipe and follow it, you can make anything.

Amy Lynn Smith: (02:25)
So you should never be intimidated by a complicated recipe, but the caveat to that being, you need to read the entire recipe through first before you start, because you might realize halfway through you don't have an ingredient you need, or some other thing that leaves you with an unpleasant surprise in the midst of cooking. So always read the recipe through. The other really important takeaway I got from my mom is the notion that if you think something will taste good to you, it will. If it sounds good, it will taste good. So don't be afraid to experiment with different ingredients. Maybe you have to substitute something, or if I'm kind of making up a recipe as I go along, which I sometimes like to do, I have trusted that if it sounds like it will taste good, it will and I have never gone wrong with that. Now that doesn't guarantee it will taste good to others, but you can never count on that anyways. I learned a lot from my mom in the kitchen, and I'm grateful for all the many skills she taught me over the years.

Stephanie: (03:33)
Now, Stephanie Thurrott, a writer who currently lives in Pennsylvania, shares a memory from her childhood. She writes, I grew up near the water in Swansea, Massachusetts, close to the Cole River, a saltwater river that feeds into Mount Hope Bay and ultimately the Atlantic Ocean. During good weather at low tide, I could always spot people digging for softshell clams along the shore. They would skip rocks across the wet sand and clams would react by shooting up a spray of water, giving away their location. These clams, steamers, were the backbone of a favorite family dinner, the clam boil.

Stephanie: (04:11)
We would buy our clams by the quart from a little local fish market. Usually one quart per person if you really like clams. A few of these clams go in the bottom of a big pot with a couple of inches of water. On top of the clams, you put whole potatoes, whole peeled onions, hot dogs, breakfast sausages, bratwurst and chourico, a Portuguese sausage. A sprinkling of dried red pepper flakes and a can or bottle of beer can go on top of everything. Cover the pot and steam everything for about an hour until the potatoes and onions are tender.

Stephanie: (04:48)
When the clam boil is almost done, steam the rest of the clams in a separate pot. If you cook them with everything else, they'll be overcooked. Serve with melted butter, white vinegar, and broth from the pot for dipping the clams. My family always had good Portuguese bread alongside a clam boil too. This is a great meal for a crowd and is popular in the summer, though we had clam boils all year round for birthdays, holiday weekends, and even just Sundays, especially when clams were on sale.

Stephanie: (05:19)
I've always loved clam boils and growing up, I took them for granted, our friends and neighbors all cooked clam boils. But when I got older and moved away from Swansea, I discovered what a regional dish the clam boil is. Lots of people know about its upscale cousin, the clambake, which usually includes lobster. But as far as I can tell the clam boil is a dish that hasn't spread much past Southeastern Massachusetts and Rhode Island. As long as you can find the soft-shell clams, though, you could make it anywhere.

Stephanie: (05:58)

Wendy McGowan, a cake decorator from Phoenix who appeared in episode 4, Baking with Kids, shared this story.

Wendy McGowan: (06:10)
I remember when I was maybe 12 years old and my mom was making rolls for Sunday dinner. I don't know if I had seen a picture or if I just had the idea on my own, but I asked my mom if I could be in charge of the rolls for dinner. I wanted to make the rolls into teddy bears. She agreed and even helped me and together we made teddy bears with big tummies, heads, beards, arms, legs, and as the finishing touch, I gave them all a small belly button. I was super proud of myself and my mom loved them. The thing I didn't realize was how much the dough would rise. As we pulled them out of the oven, the outie belly buttons were extremely pronounced. We laughed and enjoyed our delicious teddy bear rolls with dinner, and everybody pulled off the outie belly buttons and popped them into their mouths.

Stephanie: (07:02)
One anonymous listener shared this sweet thank you to his ex-mother-in-law.

Stephanie: (07:08)
I am not much of a cook or baker. I'm actually a person who doesn't like making meals for myself. Whenever I have to or agree to make some kind of meal, dinner, breakfast, or whatever, my dislike for it is multiplied by how many others I'm also preparing food for. But I do have kind of a kiddo story. I am divorced recently, but I was with my ex for 22 years and married for 17. And during that time I developed a strong relationship with my ex-mother-in-law. We are still close today. She always would want to cook meals or bake, but I didn't understand why, because she always seemed so irritated or exhausted while doing so, even if it was her idea.

Speaker 5: (07:51)
For the longest time, I never understood why she would want to go through all the trouble of grocery shopping, bringing her own stuff over to my home and spending hours in my kitchen and making such a mess and seem so irritated by doing so. But I understand why now, and I really appreciate what she did and why she made so much effort. I really miss those times, so much so that I regularly have nights with my kids at my home, having dinner together that was prepared by us. It's really special to me. And I thank my now former, but forever, mother-in-law for all of the special memories that I try to duplicate and continue to have.

Stephanie: (08:44)
EarthyB writer and podcaster, Rebecca Kimber, who appeared in our Earth Day bonus episode, sent in this story about her grandmother.

Rebecca Kimber: (08:55)
My story is about my grandmother, Ilsa, who I used to visit every summer in Sweden in a small town called Swanson. We used to walk down to the dock to order fresh fish from the fishermen who my grandmother had known since she was little, we would say we want five fish and we would pick them up first thing in the morning. If we timed it just right, we'd see his fishing boat coming in. We'd wait while he would gut the fish right in front of us, which was always kind of fascinating. And we'd walk home and she put it in the refrigerator and then in the evening she cleaned it all up, put it in a pan, go straight into the oven and we would have fresh fish with a face on it for dinner. It's one of my favorite memories of being with her.

Rebecca Kimber: (09:40)
I have so many, it's a tradition that I'm trying to pass on. Even though when I go and get fresh fish, I get it from Whole Foods, usually over at a local market, but I let my kids pick the fish. They love to do that. Especially my son, not so much my daughter, but my son he's like, "I want this guy." We'd tell the fishermen, please keep the face on it, because that's always what my son wants. We have it gutted. Then, we put it in the oven and I try to do it the same way that she did it. And it doesn't turn out as well as she did, but close enough. Whenever I see fresh fish, that's what I think of. And I really hope to pass that tradition on to my son. My daughter might not be as fond of it. She gets a little grossed out, but for him, I do think he'll remember. And even though he won't remember my grandmother, he will have a memory of a fish and how to cook it with his mom.

Stephanie: (10:35)
Amy Lockrin from Virginia wrote, My mom created a family in the kitchen. I can remember weeknight dinners after sports practice, where the whole family sat around and talked about our days and Sunday night movies. Remember Disney Sunday night movies? Where we made a simple meal to give Mom a break and just snuggle together to slowly ease into the week. My mom was always in the kitchen, cooking, cleaning, prepping, but never more than during the holidays. We have tried and true holiday dishes that define for me, family time, brownie pie from scratch to potato casserole, to nuts and bolts and winter trail mix.

Stephanie: (11:15)
Each dish represented special times for the family. She did not bake these during any other time growing up. And it created a sense of familiarity, excitement, and joy as soon as the smell of would waft into the room, I knew the holidays were near, and we would be together. The same holds true now. I bake potato casserole regularly for family gatherings, but leave the pie to her and know that it always brings our family together.

Stephanie: (11:44)
Kim Bise of naturaldeets.com who also appeared in episode 6, shared a story about her grandma.

Kim: (11:50)
When we were little, I can't remember how young we were. I’m from Hawaii, and I had a grandma who lived on a different island. Every Christmas we would go visit her. And the whole family would come over from all over the place. We'd all fly in. There's this Japanese tradition where you pound mochi. It's like this rice cake, and it's supposed to be good luck. What I remember is that everybody was involved, the women would be inside cooking the rice. The men would be outside pounding it, it was just a lot of fun. Everybody's laughing and having fun. And then it would come inside and they would teach us kids how to put them into portions. And there's a special way of rolling it. After that we would all just hang out together. The entire family was there, and it was one of the only times I can remember where everybody would show up no matter what.

Kim: (12:42)
When I think of my grandma, I always think of her cooking. And I think of that time, to me that is so special just because we were so close and we're all just spending time together. I think that really stands out to me because that's what I'm hoping that my kids get from me bringing them into the kitchen and cooking with them, that when they leave, they look back and remember that we had fun in the kitchen cooking together. And maybe they won't remember the dishes we made, but I want them to remember that feeling of all of us being together and being happy and having fun.

Stephanie: (13:14)
Thank you to everyone who sent your stories or wrote in. I love hearing the kitchen memories that stay with people. My grandmother lives in a rural West Virginia town on a hill. My husband and I have been able to take our son to visit her several times over the years. The first, when he was 15 months old. Every time we go back, our son retains a little bit more. There's a muscle memory now, like he knows where the bathroom is and he remembers where he can find the back scratcher. On our most recent trips, he is delighted in being able to eat outside. The meals have been a lot of what we might eat at home, pot roast and grilled chicken, steaks, burgers, potatoes, green beans, always a salad on the side. The thing that I think we'll all remember is the cool breeze on the patio. As we ate at her reddish picnic table on her immaculate patio, we'll remember talking and laughing, like the time our son told a tall tale about Daddy getting in trouble, and Grandma Mary could not stop laughing.

Stephanie: (14:19)
I think a lot about the memories I want my son to have later in life. And I want him to remember his family and friends gathered in our house for his birthdays and the bunny cakes I made at Easter. I want him to remember his favorite dish is mommy chicken. And that I always made Mickey Mouse pancakes with sprinkles on the weekends, but it's more than the food. It's a feeling. And I want him to remember the love that went into homemade dishes and the quality time that came from sitting down together around whatever the meal was. I want him to remember laughing with his great-grandma on her patio. I want him to know that yes, food brings us together, but it's about so much more than the food itself. It's about family. Thanks for joining me for this Kiddos in the Kitchen, Small Plate. I'm your host, Stephanie Conner, with a reminder from my son.

Conner: (15:17)
If you like my mom's podcast, as much as I do, you can subscribe, on Apple Podcast, Google Play, Stitcher, Spotify wherever you get your podcasts.

Stephanie: (15:36)
That's right, Conner. You can also view the show notes, subscribe to our newsletter and check out all of our other content at kiddosinthekitchen.com, where kiddos cook on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. And I'll be back next month with another fresh episode. Until then I encourage you to get your Kiddos in the Kitchen.