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  • JacksonP,

    I'm not sure mine was so excellent, but in order to maintain the continuity.... :-)

    Strain through Ian’s underpants and add a small bottle of Worcester sauce (not necessary)

    Snort.

    Can we assume you’ll be following more modern standards of hygiene? Just curious, in case you ever offer it as a BBQ condiment. :-)

    Auckland • Since Mar 2011 • 2450 posts Report Reply

  • Jos,

    You could make a range of celebrity flavours!

    Whakatane • Since Jan 2012 • 877 posts Report Reply

  • Hebe,

    Great family tale Russell. Though I'm pleased I have never come across that garlic sauce, especially strained through underpants.

    I am very envious of a brick-based glasshouse.

    Christchurch • Since May 2011 • 2899 posts Report Reply

  • Sacha, in reply to JacksonP,

    modern standards of hygiene

    Strain again

    Ak • Since May 2008 • 19745 posts Report Reply

  • Sacha, in reply to Hebe,

    brick-based

    mighty mighty

    Ak • Since May 2008 • 19745 posts Report Reply

  • Russell Brown, in reply to JacksonP,

    Can we assume you’ll be following more modern standards of hygiene?

    Please. Clean underpants, obviously.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 22850 posts Report Reply

  • Hebe, in reply to Russell Brown,

    Boiled underpants puh-lease.

    Christchurch • Since May 2011 • 2899 posts Report Reply

  • Michael Stevens,

    One of my earliest memories is "helping" my grandfather plant beans in his vegetable garden, and the mysteries of his garden shed.

    And I think I'll give that recipe a go - what sort of vinegar do you think? Malt? White?

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 230 posts Report Reply

  • Hebe,

    His dream kitchen wasn't what we'd build today. It was small and quite dark, although the ceiling was high. In place of a table there was a diner-style booth. Proper meals were had in the living room next door.

    That conjures up an evocative mental picture. Were the walls T+G or hardboard with half-round edging the joins?

    I pretty much aspire to Elizabeth David's ideal simple kitchen --here she explains: http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/food-and-drink/features/elizabeth-davids-dream-kitchen-625982.html
    A picture: http://lukehoney.typepad.com/.a/6a00e54ef13a4f8834019aff8ec1ae970b-pi

    Christchurch • Since May 2011 • 2899 posts Report Reply

  • Kate Hannah,

    Beautiful. I'm off to a funeral tomorrow of a gentleman & scholar of the same school. Aged 92, was still gardening until last Wednesday.

    So lovely to have that food as history, which is my particular obsession. Food is what tells us who we are.

    Auckland • Since Mar 2010 • 107 posts Report Reply

  • Trevor Nicholls, in reply to Kate Hannah,

    well food quite literally makes us what we are

    Wellington, NZ • Since Nov 2006 • 325 posts Report Reply

  • linger,

    Kitchen stool… If it’s a question of hygiene, underpants and straining should never be mentioned in the same sentence (let alone in a recipe) … but I am envious all the same: my paternal grandfather’s notion of cooking was to boil everything into submission. For days, if necessary. And as for seasonings, well, even salt was viewed with some suspicion.

    Tokyo • Since Apr 2007 • 1944 posts Report Reply

  • Ian Dalziel, in reply to linger,

    airs and strains...

    underpants and straining

    a 'smalls' point of clarification
    - I believe the foundation garments of the later years of The Empire, were of a more generous and open weave...

    If you haven't had breakfast yet
    do not listen to the Bonzos on the matter,
    sympathetic reactions may occur...


    ps @ Linger
    Kitchen stool… ...nice!
    perfect for a new blog on the Law & Food
    it could be called the Kitchen stool box

    ...too soon?

    Christchurch • Since Dec 2006 • 7953 posts Report Reply

  • Russell Brown, in reply to Trevor Nicholls,

    well food quite literally makes us what we are

    So it's a metaphor that's literally true! I love that kind.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 22850 posts Report Reply

  • Russell Brown, in reply to Hebe,

    That conjures up an evocative mental picture. Were the walls T+G or hardboard with half-round edging the joins?

    From memory, there were many cupboards.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 22850 posts Report Reply

  • Ian Dalziel, in reply to Trevor Nicholls,

    well food quite literally makes us what we are

    Rise up, Free Radicals and er, Cannibalanoids…
    :- )

    Christchurch • Since Dec 2006 • 7953 posts Report Reply

  • JacksonP,

    rabbit gumbo

    You have reminded me (albeit delayed) of the time my grandmother made us rabbit stew. I thought it was delicious, but my grandmother, bless her, thought it would help the more squeamish among us if she sang;

    Yummy yummy yummy
    I've got bunny in my tummy

    She was always catching us on the hop.

    #rip
    #badoom

    Auckland • Since Mar 2011 • 2450 posts Report Reply

  • Gareth, in reply to Ian Dalziel,

    Attachment

    Aaah, Viv!

    Barbed wire bum baby, be like me

    Neither of my grandfathers cooked, but one gardened. And I can't resist offering this picture (taken by my father in 1976, I think) of my grandmother's kitchen. This was the back room - more of an outhouse, really - of a tiny terraced house in a village on the outskirts of Llanelli, in Welsh-speaking Wales.

    My grandmother is on the right, Aunty Ansi is washing up, and my mum sports the tea towel. From that little room all manner of good meals would flow. The fridge sits on top of the bath, which was a new addition at the time. I was more used to the tin bath in front of a hot coal fire when I was small.

    The garden was long and thin. At the far end, chooks pecked around the battered pine tree that had been planted after my first Christmas in 1954. I can't remember what else was growing, beyond roses and mint and blackcurrants, of which my mother's family was inordinately fond. My great-grandmother's house in town had a tiny garden, large enough only for the coal shed and two blackcurrant bushes. I still look forward to the first blackcurrant tart of summer, and borrow my mother's pie dish, which she got from her mother, and so on back through the generations.

    Bucolic in the backblocks… • Since Jan 2008 • 269 posts Report Reply

  • Ian Dalziel, in reply to Russell Brown,

    there were many cupboards...

    ...and don't forget the bins!

    Christchurch • Since Dec 2006 • 7953 posts Report Reply

  • Robyn Gallagher,

    I keep thinking back to the time in the '90s when my friend and I made a day trip to Tauranga. We stopped off at her grandparents place and they insisted we stayed for dinner. Dinner was fish with white sauce, boiled potatoes, peas and carrots, followed by rock hard vanilla ice cream and canned fruit salad for dessert. It was like the food was trying really hard to barely exist.

    I don't have any cinematic memories of amazing cooking from my grandparents. When my grandma got older, she started boiling the crap out of vegetables and relying heavily on Maggi packets. My mum still makes a Grandma recipe called "Chinese beef and beans", which I think is "Chinese" because it has soya sauce in it.

    Meat and three veg is my heritage, but one that I'm not especially wanting to cling onto.

    Since Nov 2006 • 1946 posts Report Reply

  • Che Tibby,

    the main food memory of my grandfather is standing in the kitchen of their place in the mount, and he's teaching me how to dip stale bread in egg-whipped-with-milk. drop into hot buttery pan and fry on both sides.

    eat with liberal sprinkle of iodised salt and a dash of pepper from the small blue shakers.

    i still eat it when i need a particular kind of comfort food.

    Ma wai ra e taurima,Te marae i waho nei?

    i miss you old boy.

    the back of an envelope • Since Nov 2006 • 2042 posts Report Reply

  • Hebe,

    These memories of ancestral tucker are great. Especially Robyn's dinner -- a typical menu for that generation. Certain rellies are near 90 and still eat near identical meals. Each day of the week has its unvarying menu. An offer of zucchini from our garden last year was met with suspicion: "What are they?" "Courgettes sorry." Followed by an enunciated: "No thank you. We don't eat THAT sort of thing." It was evident that my poisoning attempt had been noted and seen off.

    Christchurch • Since May 2011 • 2899 posts Report Reply

  • Hebe, in reply to Ian Dalziel,

    ...and don't forget the bins!

    The bins! My Grandma's kitchen opposite Crichton Cobbers had a fine 1920s kitchen until the late 90s: bins, swishing sliding doors, a monster 50s fridge with no shelf space, and an original terrazzo grey stone-chip bench with ever-increasing canyons in the chip. The bench gave my hospital-matron mother nightmares about its food poisoning potential.

    Christchurch • Since May 2011 • 2899 posts Report Reply

  • Raymond A Francis,

    There is a long line of men being able to cook in our family despite some prize winning bakers on the female side
    I have always wondered about the dish called " pooftas " not sure how you would spell it but that is how it was pronounced
    These were fried scones which my Grandfather made for his wife's breakfast
    Love to know the origin of these, the scotch grannies or the Portugese whaler but they taste great, split with golden syrup, on the full breakfast plate

    45' South • Since Nov 2006 • 578 posts Report Reply

  • thegirlstefan, in reply to Raymond A Francis,

    my grandad, and then dad (Finnish-Scottish) both made fried scones with golden syrup, both in the electric frypan which also was the vehicle for a take on chicken chow mein

    Aotearoa • Since Oct 2011 • 42 posts Report Reply

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