FOOD, GLORIOUS FOOD

I love good food. I love to cook. I love to cook simple home made good food and feed people at my table. I love to bake and roast and saute. I don't care much for cleaning the big K, but I do love to cook. And so in addition to the recipes I sometimes blog about ... or as a former English teacher, should I write, "about which I sometimes blog," I also think that I shall write about my real enjoyment of food that is not only good, but good for us.

Since 1971, I have dabbled in healthy foods. Now, I had always eaten more correctly than that with which the American and especially the Texan diet is credited. My mother brought me up on the small protein/ one carb/ green veggies meal plan; and when I married, I took that plan with me. I didn’t know that one was expected to have a stack of bread at the table with the meal and so I didn’t put one out. And that was the way our meals began: my very first meal I cooked that Sunday after we were married consisted of a small broiled steak, a baked potato, and a large salad of lettuce, onion, bell pepper, cucumber, tomatoes, you know … the works. No bread. And that is the way we ate most of the time.

Of course, when we had an “occasion,” we had fresh bread, something special; and that was my doom. I loved fresh bread and soon began to bake, having first begun baking fresh breads when I was 12 years old. That was my summer home making project: baking homemade yeast bread. And it was good. And, of course, when the holiday season, Christmas, came around, I baked a fruitcake… that first year. And it was good also. Friends came to eat with us, students came in to eat with us, family came to eat. We enjoyed the delights of food. Too much so, it seems. But there was always fresh fruit and green vegetables in the house and we did eat those. 

As years went on, food became a subject of the news and health and foods were seen as related; and we ate better and better. And it cost more and more. Remember that first piece of steak I cooked? I remember that I bought those from the very best source in town, Pip’s to be exact, and I bought two for about 80 cents! Those were the days. Now, truth is that we didn’t eat chicken or fish or pork at my house as my dear husband didn’t like them; but we didn’t have beef every night either. Frequently, we had all veggies for dinner: fresh corn as the carb and lots of salad vegetables to accompany it, or a baked potato or a pasta or even home made bread and always the big tossed salads with a little of everything tossed in there or the big vegetable platter of raw veggies.

Now, that I am alone and cook mostly for myself only, I do eat chicken and fish; but oh my, the price of fish is horrendous. How can anyone expect retired persons to eat fish 3 or 4 times a week? I try to eat fish or seafood only once or twice a month as it is far more expensive than other things. Of course, I lightly sauté my fish very quickly and that means that I have to have good fish. Were I frying it or dousing it in butter, a la Julia Child (did you see that fish in all that butter in the movie?), it could be almost anything. But when I try to buy fish that is high in Omega 3’s, then we are talking $10 a pound. Thank goodness, 3 cooked ounces is a portion. That means I could eat three times for that $10 were the fish not so delicious. So often, I simply give in and eat half a pound and love every bite. 


Yes, this is just the first of several comments about food and health and you may expect more to accompany the recipes that have been and will be. In memory of Julia, bon appetite.