Cloudy. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 66F. Winds light and variable..

Cloudy. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. Low 66F. Winds light and variable.

As a mother, I’m what you would call a “preparer” in the kitchen. I’m not someone that can whip up a gourmet meal, but more of someone that “prepares” the meal. I follow a recipe or my specialty of heating, reheating, throwing together and picking up hot bar from Baesler’s.

The recipes I do know mostly have come from my grandmother, Pauline. A lifelong resident of South Bend, she could make just about anything, mostly from memory and always the greatest thing you’d ever tasted.

While writing many of the articles for this month’s food issue of Terre Haute Living magazine, I found myself reflecting on my love of food, wine and entertaining, which I inherited from my grandmother. Sure, I wish I was effortlessly whipping things up instead of following a recipe (with mediocre results) but it’s the times that my daughters and I bake my grandmother’s famous cheesecake or I make chicken and noodles from scratch that I smile remembering the priceless time I spent in my grandparents’ little kitchen in rural South Bend.

I’m not the only one with these great food memories and I always love hearing other people’s experiences. (You know where I’m going with this…) So, I took to social media to find out about other people’s food memories. Again, thank you to everyone for responding, I love reading these fun, happy and positive comments.

“My Grandma was a great cook and I remember lots of family meals around her table,” Kristi Taylor Whitacre writes. “What I remember more than the meals was having tea with her at that table and visiting. Not hot tea in a fancy china cup. Iced tea made by the glass in dark amber tea glasses with powdered Nestea scooped from the jar and water stirred in with a long red DQ spoon. I did most of the talking and she always listened.”

It makes me smile that I’m not the only one with priceless grandmother stories.

Lindsey English has them too, writing, “Not being able to finish my plate at dinner, but my grandma snuck me a bowl of ice cream during every sleepover. We would watch game shows together and eat ice cream at night time when I was little and it was great bonding time.”

Amy Plant, a teacher at Saint Patrick School not only shared a great memory, but shared a great recipe too (visit my Facebook page for Amy’s recipe!). “One of the best meals my grandma made was called Goopy Chicken. It sounded horrible but it was SO DELICIOUS! Complete comfort food! She served it with mashed potatoes (instant potatoes, because she fed 20 people each week) and crescent rolls from a tube! Grandma would always make goopy chicken each time the older grandkids came home from college!”

Not every memory is a good one, as Susan Turner writes, “My mom tried to feed us BBQ tuna one time. It didn’t go over well.” (Read more about Susan’s mom, Linda Snider in her Terre Haute Living column, “Lines from Linda.”)

Crowdsourcing my column has been one of my favorite things to do because let’s be honest, I’m not that entertaining all the time and learning more about people in our community is always fun. But it also helps when someone writes such a good comment that it basically writes the column. My amazing friend (and local business owner of Common Ground Yoga) Kelsey Terry reminded me of the true reason all of those dishes and memories were so good: They were filled with love.

“We went to my grandma Martin’s (Dad, Jim Martin’s mom) every Sunday. She was a great cook but it was also just a great tradition. Fried chicken, mashed potatoes, pot roast, spaghetti, French toast. All the things. And the sweetest iced tea you’ve ever tasted,” Kelsey writes.

“My Mom (Cindy Hux Martin)’s mom was less of a cook but we would visit her in Florida and when we arrived she’d always have chicken noodle soup waiting for us whether it was summer or winter or 11 a.m. or 11 p.m. It was the best! Turns out it was Campbell’s but the details don’t matter … In either example I think it goes to show that the most important ingredient is love. Love makes everything taste better.”

Probably even those unfortunate recipes of BBQ tuna. I hope.

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