While eating a mutually unsatisfactory chili last night, Matt and I fell to discussing our mothers' recipes and what we liked about them. (I hadn't followed my mother's chili recipe because I forgot to check it before the weekly shopping trip, and was missing several key ingredients. Like cocoa powder. Shh, that's a secret.) We've noticed that, while there are certain meals unique to one or the other's childhood, many of our "comfort foods" overlap, and that the recipes can be very different. My apple pie has a sour cream custard base, his is straight-up apples. His macaroni and cheese has to be made with conchiglie (shells), mine with elbows.
And so we wondered, how do other couples handle the dichotomy between Manhattan and New England clam chowder? When only one of us has a strong attachment to the particular recipe we grew up with, it is easy. In cases where we both feel strongly about our own recipe, though, I've generally added both to my cookbook and tried to alternate between them.
Okay, my elaborating, since I said "other." In general, my family tended towards more processed foods than John's did. (That being said, compared to your average American, my family ate hardly any processed foods.) So in many cases, I'd cook John's recipes. For example, at first I was buying pizza sauce, but after tasting his mom's homemade sauce and realizing it really wasn't that hard to make and freeze, I haven't used the canned stuff. However, when it comes to canning (tomatoes, jam, fruit) I tend towards the way my mom did it because John's mom doesn't.
ReplyDeleteI guess the only place where we actually overlap and disagree on something is spaghetti sauce. And I use my mom's recipe because I love it, John gets a lot of his mom's food when we go to their house, it's easier, and actually has less processed food in i
I think in a lot of cases I've just gotten my own recipe for classics. If there is something John or his mom makes that I grew up with a different version, I try to go into it with an open mind. And John is good about having an open mind, too. For the most part I'm the one cooking, so I decide on the recipes. I think John is very thankful for what I cook because when I was living on my own, I really lived off easy mac, chef boyardi, pizza, and spaghetti (with homemade sauce). So the fact that I now home can, cook meals from scratch, and try to avoid as much processed foods as possible is a 180. So even if the recipe is DIFFERENT, he's happy that it's still healthy.
Also, I used to cook more like my mom and John would complain, so we've had this discussion about how I'm doing what I know. I then tried to cook more of what John was used to, and of course he loved that. But now I've kinda struck a balance between foods I grew up with, foods John grew up with, but mostly recipes I've found in the meanwhile.
btw, the pita bread was a big hit here! Thanks for sharing the recipe!