Omage in Food

Yesterday morning I made a big breakfast here at The Casa. This is noteworthy because we are the grab and go, breakfast types. I made Mexican omelets, fried sausage and toast. Okay, maybe not a HUGE breakfast, but big for these here parts.... And as always, when I was chowing down on a "regular" type breakfast I started to reminisce about some childhood memories......

When my sister and I were little Mom and Dad would drive us (not often enough) to Indiana to visit our Grandpa and Grandma there. These visits were always a wonderful break from our inner city life, they lived on a farm, in an old farm house and Grandma Rose was not afraid of the kitchen, I can tell you that. She would get up every morning of our visits and make these huge country breakfasts. She would have bacon, sausage, biscuits, jelly, jam, eggs, hash browns....I would sit and eat and eat and eat- she probably thought that I had never been fed before , the way I would tuck in at her table. Looking back over my life and the many, many meals that I have had, I can say that those early morning breakfast with Grandma Rose and Grandpa Matt were some of the best meals of my life. I think that's why my favorite "going out" meal is breakfast.

It wasn't just the food that made the visits special, my sister and I loved sleeping upstairs in those elegant bedrooms, whispering to each other and listening to the bugs. It was bug hunting with Grandpa. It was the Indiana air and space. It was the absolute comfort in the home that they had and the way that they loved us. I guess I sum all of that up into "breakfast". So that's why, anytime I plop, hot eggs and sausage or bacon down on the table, Les has to hear all over again about our visits to Indiana, even though I'm sure Grandma never served Mexican omelets, it amounts to near enough for me and my memories.

Then, last night, using shared bounty from my sister-in-law's garden, I made a "country supper". It started out as just regular dinner, using leftovers from Leslie's party, but it changed and before I knew it I had a cast iron skillet on the stove and I was frying up my favorite food of all time, Fried Green Tomatoes. Can I get an "Amen!"? So we had FGT, fried cheeseburgers, corn on the cob, fresh sliced yellow tomatoes and vidalia onions for the burgers (thanks Jenny), day pickles and I topped it all off with a tall glass of iced milk. WOW! That was a great meal. And it was one very similar to the way that my Grandma (Jean or GG, to Evelyn) would out supper on when I was little. As you can imagine then, Leslie and Evelyn were regaled with tales of Grandma and her cooking and how special she was to me then (and now of course).

Fried Green Tomatoes in the pan

Me and my tomatoes = happy

The Supper Spread- don't mind the hodge-podge dishes