Care for Some More Meat Gum?

I was IM'ing with my sister Mary and the subject of our mother's cooking came up (no pun intended). Our mom had a busy household what with four kids (all fussy eaters), my dad and her mother (good ol' Nana. My first roommate) all living in what was technically a 2-bedroom apartment. We had converted the dining room into another bedroom to give the illusion of having 3 bedrooms. In the 16 years that I lived in that apartment my bedroom was at one point or another located in every room except the bathroom and the kitchen. The bedrooms and the living room, which we called "the parlor" (although that summons an image of a pristine place that is only for "company" and off-limits to kids. This was not the case in our house), swapped locations several times during the time we rented the place. Often she would change the rooms while everyone else was at work and school. Mom would just decide that the front room was now a bedroom and the living room would now be located where the bedroom used to be.


This is ye olde homestead as it looks today. Our apartment
was on the first floor. Back then the house was green and
somewhat less dilapidated. There used to be a half-dead
tree in the little yard on the right too. Check out all the satellite dishes!

She tried her very best to make meals that were, at least in theory, edible. We were poor but, as evidenced by any pictures of us kids from back then, we didn't go hungry. The main obstacle in her way was the fact that no one had ever taught her how to cook properly so she made shit up with limited success. That sounds fairly harsh but honestly I didn't know any better until much later in life that the food I grew up on was ... let's just say "limiting". The first inkling that perhaps there was at the very least better tasting food out there was when I stayed over my Aunt Janie's place and she made lunch for me and my cousin David. She made macaroni and cheese and it was so goddamn CREAMY that I thought that there must be something terribly wrong. Mac and cheese at our house was usually clumped together and relatively dry. Y'see, my mom would take a gallon of milk (which she would send me to the corner store to buy every few days on my bike) and strrreeeeetch it out into 2.5 – 3 gallons of milk by using powdered milk. I thought that milk was supposed to be thin, semi-lumpy and sort of grayish. We had milk at every meal too. It didn't matter what the meal was, milk was going to be the beverage of choice. It seemed perfectly normal back then but now it seems bizarre to me. I haven't had a glass of milk in years. It doesn't appeal to me in the slightest.

There were other clues that maybe the culinary arts was not my mom's medium. Pork chops come to mind. In my mind to this very day pork chops are associated with sawdust-dry withered things that would wick all the moisture out of your mouth the instant you popped a piece in. Whenever The Wiff says that she is going to make pork chops she has to remind me that they will be delicious. I guess I make a face or something every single time. All vegetables were to be boiled until opaque. I remember the first time seeing what broccoli was supposed to look like and being totally shocked. Hey! This broccoli snapped when I bit it! How come it didn't just go away in my mouth like it's supposed to? And why is it so green? Fresh vegetables back then usually meant the can was opened that day. There are lots of square, canned veggies in my past. And wax beans. Jiminy Christmas the wax bean is not only a horrible name but it is the most revolting vegetable known to mankind. Or perhaps the lima bean is the most revolting? I'm guessing that it'll be a legume of some ilk.

But the worst offender in my mom's arsenal was her steak. She would pop it in the broiler (yes, the broiler) sans any seasoning and leave it in there for hours. What would come out was a gray, shoe-leathery facsimile of a steak. To call it "well done" is an understatement. It was certainly "done". So tough was this meat that no amount of chewing could break it down. It would become what I called "Meat Gum". You could chew that fucking thing until your jaw hurt but it wasn't going anywhere. I've gagged on a number of pieces of rubbery steak in my time simply because I was tired of chewing it and I knew that trying to spit it out was forbidden. It was so bad that I was convinced that I hated steak. Back when The Wiff and I were dating, she invited me to her mom's place for dinner. When I asked her what they were going to serve she said "Steak". My heart sank. Oh god, not another fucking meat gum horror show!

But imagine my surprise when what was served to me was NOT an old piece of a shredded tire found on a highway somewhere but a juicy, beautiful, succulent cut of perfectly prepared meat. It blew my mind. I literally had no idea food could be this good. Plus, there were fresh vegetables that had flavor and color. Amazing. I have to say though that I still have to re-learn that steak can be great almost every time someone brings up the idea of having one. I have to think to myself "oh right...this will not be like gnawing on a demon's scrotum" and then I can order the steak.

I do have to give Mom her props though. She was a decent baker and could whip up a batch of french toast (using the whitest of white breads of course) like no one's business. Her soda bread ruled. She baked us a cake for every birthday too. Plus, I can't cook to save my life so I really shouldn't be mocking anyone's attempts let alone the woman who raised me. But all that stuff just makes me think about how much I miss her. I would gladly eat a plateful of her horrible cooking, meat gum and all, just to have a chance to talk to her again. And maybe even get in a game or two of Boggle or Yahtzee.