What My Grandmothers Taught Me

I'm re-running a portion of a post from 2008 today in honor of my beloved paternal grandmother, who died yesterday at the age of 92.

This weekend I reflected on the many lessons my two grandmothers taught me about food. They were born early in the 20th century, when America was just beginning to industrialize its food system, and their mothers and grandmothers still knew how to grow, produce and cook their own food.

1. Sit down at the table and eat a real meal. My grandmas would never eat in the car (Americans today report that up to 20% of their “meals” are eaten in cars), or scarf cold food straight from the refrigerator. Snacking was frowned upon. Many fond memories of my childhood stem from extended family meals around those long, dark, polished tables in formal dining rooms where we learned to eat and to converse.
2. Eat breakfast, lunch and dinner. A highlight of my annual week at Grandma’s was the lovely, simple lunches we would have together at the picnic table in her garden.
3. Food is always better when eaten outside. My father’s family were big fans of picnics—either in the middle of a hike or as a destination in themselves—and alfresco eating in general. When we finally had a garden of our own, my family immediately got a picnic table to continue the tradition of those wonderful meals out on the back patio.
4. Grow your own food. Both my paternal grandparents grew up on farms. Although they were happy to leave their rural lives behind when they moved to the Bay Area, they put in an apple tree and raspberry and blackberry bushes in their front yard in Piedmont, the source of many wonderful preserves and desserts. And my other set of grandparents always had a vegetable garden and allowed my uncle to keep chickens for his 4H projects. My grandmother can still do a credible imitation of a happy chicken’s “I just laid an egg!” cluck.
5. Get food straight from the farm. My lifelong love of farm stands was nurtured from childhood when a highlight of my weekend visits to Grandmas was stopping at Webb ranch for berries and artichokes. And my other grandma would drive out to the central valley each in early summer for a lug of Santa Rosa plums to be made into that wonderful, easy plum freezer jam she was famous for.
6. Butter is better. I remember my grandmother’s sad recollection of WW2 when they couldn’t get butter. Margarine was white and it came with a yellow food coloring packet which you had to use yourself to dye the butter yellow. No one was fooled! In the giant Nurse’s Health Study, the more margarine nurses ate, the more heart attacks they had. The more butter they ate, the less heart attacks. Hmm….
7. Make it yourself. In general, it will be better. One of my grandmother’s holiday treats was lemon milk sherbet she made at home. Now I make it too, using buttermilk, crème fraiche and maple syrup. I skip the antifreeze and additives used in commercial ice cream.
8. Pasta is not good for you. As grandma would say, “there’s nothing to it.” White flour products, in general, act as antinutrients because you must draw on your own nutritional reserves to metabolize them. Especially mac and cheese(a pet peeve). Forthcoming post : “Mom, please don’t feed me mac and cheese!”
9. Eat 3 green vegetables with your dinner. A standard I aspire to but often fall short. I usually get in one leafy green, one orange-yellow and at least one other.
10. Table salt is not healthy. My maternal grandfather was an early health nut—Jack La Lane style. They used a wonderful VegeSalt at the table (which probably has MSG). I’m confident he would use sea salt if he were alive today. He also introduced me to maple sugar candy, the best candy in the whole wide world.
11. Don’t drink soda. (Except the kind you make at home through lactofermentation).
12. Make your own salad dressing. You can use decent oils and spare yourself ingesting rancid, cancer promoting “vegetable oil” or worse, hydrogenated oil and other chemicals used in commercial salad dressing. Plus, you’ll save a lot of money!
13. There’s nothing wrong with meat. I will add: as long as it comes from an animal raised on a farm, not a factory.
14. Ditto: cream.
15. Soak your pancake batter overnight. Grandpa used to do this with his famous buckwheat pancakes. Now I know that soaking whole grains overnight in a slightly acidic medium, such as buttermilk or sourdough, neutralizes the phytic acid they contain which can block the absorption of calcium and other nutrients. I do the same with oatmeal.
16. Cook and eat at home.
17. Take a walk after dinner.
18. Finally: Eat real food.
19. One from my mother: if you are in a bad mood, chances are it is caused by lack of food or sleep.