Favorite Food Memory

My mother’s vegetable garden is where it all started. Outside growing in the rich brown soil was the beginning of my favorite meal. The home to the roots of the bright green and red peppers that would pop in my mouth, that grew right next to the gigantic tomatoes.  These ingredients along with many others were the ones that made my favorite meal complete. This meal is something that makes me feel at home, in a place that makes me comfortable. I remember as a small child I would help my mother in the garden picking the vegetables that would soon be chopped and diced before being thrown into the huge metal pot on the stove. She would show me how to pick out the peppers that would be the right size and the tomatoes that did not have bruises on them. She would carefully help me pick the lettuce and make sure that I did not break every leaf. Whether it was rain or shine we always took our time and it was something that we could share together. As I got older, she did not need to teach me what vegetables to pick, and the silences would grow larger as my as did my age, but this was something that we would always do together.

            Picking the items from the garden was just the beginning of what made this meal special. Lugging all of them inside in a huge basket I would plop them down on our kitchen table. This table is not just an ordinary table though. The table was old and wooden with many scratches and marks on it so my mother painted it.  She painted the table to make it look like there is a checkered table cloth on it. The perfect one inch by on inch blue and white squares that alternated filled the entire table. Each square measured to perfection and painted so meticulously. Not only was this just a hand crafted table that sat in the corner of our kitchen but it had a matching bench that fit flawlessly with it. The bench as well had the same kind of design to match the table. This table was the place that only the four members of my family could all sit together comfortably and there was no big extra space that made it feel cold. This set of furniture was the first thing that made our kitchen so unique.

            I would sit at the table for hours helping my mother chop the vegetables into tiny pieces that would soon be added to the pot. This was a one of the only jobs that my mother would let me do because it was something she knew I could not mess up, and I was okay with that. As I would sit on the bench I would watch her while she would stand at the off white counter as she would prepare the other ingredients. Our counter was something that was not typically in other kitchens either. It was the same size on both sides of the extremely oversized sink. This sink was not your normal size though; when I say oversized I mean it. When my brother and I were little we would sit on each side of the counter and wash our feet off in it after a long day of playing outside. Then one side of the counter was the home to all of the different shapes of cutting boards including a pig, a paint pallet, and a shoe. My mother was always one for unique looking kitchen items. The pig cutting board is something that my mother will probably keep until the day she dies, and this is not the only pig that you see in our kitchen. She has a whole collection of objects that are pigs. Our towels, salt and pepper shakers, napkins, place mats, pictures, coasters and more all have pigs on them. This is another thing that makes the kitchen in my house something special and not just your ordinary kitchen.

            As she would assemble all of the other ingredients such as the beans and the cilantro you could always hear the bubbles from the pasta boiling almost over the top on the stove. Our stove has a painting that hangs right above it that is something I have never seen anywhere else. My mother being an artist painted it herself. A picture of a large metal pot sat on the same table that was in our kitchen in the painting. Then coming from every direction there were vegetables flying down into the pot that were all different colors. The background of the picture is a deep purple that draws your eyes into a small saying written in tiny black cursive letters which reads “Home is where the heart is, and the heart is always warmer in the kitchen”. I never really understood what this saying meant or where it came from but it was one that I would always remember because my mother had written it in the bottom left corner of this painting.

            After the pasta had become warm and soft we would drain it and add it to the pot full of sweet red onions, chopped celery, crispy red peppers, a million black beans and tons of diced tomatoes. Then the added spices such as ground cumin and salt and pepper which made my mouth always water would be sprinkled and dashed on top to give this meal that special something. All mixed together I would scoop some into a giant bowl, probably enough for at least two or three servings, and I would add shredded cheddar cheese all across the top. The heat from the hot black bean chili with penne pasta would instantly melt the cheese. Sitting at that kitchen table with my mom, dad and brother all eating together was something that I would always cherish. But it was the atmosphere and the experience that I got while making this meal that made it one that would be close to my heart forever. Those hours spent in the garden picking vegetables to perfection to sitting at the carefully painted kitchen table dicing every vegetable would make the memories of this meal special. This was something that my mom and I could always call our own, but something that in the end could always eat as a family.

Recipe For Black Bean Chili with Penne Pasta

Ingredients

12 ounces dry whole grain penne pasta, uncooked

1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil

1/2 cup chopped red onion

1/4 cup chopped celery

1/4 cup chopped red bell pepper

1 tablespoon finely chopped jalapeno pepper

1/2 teaspoon minced garlic

2 can (15 oz each) Ranch Style® Black Beans, drained, rinsed

1 can (15 oz each) Hunt's® Tomato Sauce

1 can (14.5 oz each) Hunt's® Fire Roasted Diced Tomatoes, undrained

2 tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro

2 teaspoons ground cumin

1/2 teaspoon kosher salt

1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper

1 cup Shredded Cheddar Cheese 

Maggie's Diner

As the dust began to clear from my car pulling into the dirt and rock covered parking lot, a vision of history starred me back in the face. I parked my car and just sat, my eyes fixated on the white colored brick building ahead of me. I let my eyes wander between the barber shop and Maggie’s Diner, only to imagine of what was on the inside. It reminded me of a place in my hometown that had been standing since the revolutionary war. It was called Southport center, a row of brick buildings such as the post office, an insurance agency, a small market, and a boutique. Still today those places stand and the exteriors have not changed. It reminds me of a mirror image of what I see in Maggie’s. I wait for moments to gaze around me to try and take in the environment. The scenery looks like it is right out of a scene from the movie “October Sky”. A factory and coal mining town, that was close knit and worked together to create a life for one another. Looking at Maggie’s I knew that there was more character in that one building than I could ever imagine.

I got out of my car and walked across the street, I stopped in front of the building to read the signs on the outside and I found myself hesitating to go in. I don’t know what it was about me but part of me was nervous. I thought in my head of what my mother always said to me “never judge a book by its cover”. I didn’t want to judge Maggie’s by the appearance on the outside but I can’t lie and say that I didn’t.

As I opened the door it creaked as though it had not been greased in a while, I let it shut slowly behind me and turned my head around to amazement. There were so many things to look at and the smells overwhelmed my nose. As I walked forward my mind concentrated on the immense amount of pie that was individually sliced before my eyes. The cookies that sat neatly in row right next to it grabbed my attention as I so badly wanted to grab one. I gazed up at the menu when suddenly I had a flash back to my childhood. I vividly remember the dry cleaners, it was called Connie’s. My mother used to take me there when I was a child and while she chatted for hours with the three old African American women I would wander in between the nicely altered dresses and climb the alteration stairs. The carpet that was worn in and fraying at the edges and would hold my balance while I would try on all of high heels as I would model them for all of the women. All of them chuckling as I would stumble my way across the floor.  My memories from that store were ones that warmed my heart, it was somewhere that I always felt like I was at home, and I began to feel that way at Maggie’s. Abruptly my thoughts were interrupted by the women behind the counter saying “honey, you ready to order”? I starred at all of the food that was in the steam plates and wondered what everything was. Trying to think quickly on my feet I said “may I please have one of the pancakes”. She replied “honey, that’s corn bread, do you still want one”? My cheeks started to turn red of embarrassment and I instantly replied “yes please”! Both of the women behind the counter clearly got much amusement out of my ignorant request, and when they started laughing I could tell that they knew I was not from around here. Being a girl from the North, my experience with Southern food is slim to none. I had never tried grits, or ever eaten much fried chicken. Nor did I have any idea what “soul  food” was. I was clearly extremely naïve to any thought of Southern food. As Ms. Maggie explained to me what all the different types of food were behind the counter I felt more comfortable, I felt like I could ask question and maybe try to learn more about the culture. My plate filled with all different kinds of food that I had never heard of before I was ready to experience it all.

Sitting in Maggie’s dining room I was too busy to even eat because I was looking at all of the different things that made up the room. The wall paper looked old but almost vintage in a sense and it allowed the art work to hang perfectly on top. All of the different paintings covered the wall and gave your eyes something to look at. All of them completely different in look, size, and color there was nothing that looked like it was a duplicate. Everything looked like it was original. This gave the atmosphere a homey and warm feel to it. Even looking at the window unit air conditioner I felt as though this was some place I could call home.

When I finally got to eating my food, I first off tried to corn bread pancake and I had never tasted something so good. The moist feel of the bread hitting my tongue and the sweet after taste was nothing I had ever tasted before. With that and the mix or creamy macaroni and cheese my hunger was instantly filled with greatness. Trying the chicken stuffing my taste buds became nervous but once it hit my mouth I realized that I had nothing to be afraid of.  The mix of spices and the textures reminded me of a thanksgiving meal at home. At that moment I understood why they called this kind of food “soul food”.

Not only did I feel like I was somewhere that I could be myself and ask silly questions, but I felt a warm feeling in my heart not just from the hot mac and cheese flowing down my throat but from the hospitality I felt at Maggie’s. Being so far from home this was a place that I felt comfortable in. If I could I would sit for hours in Maggie’s and just stare at my surroundings trying to soak up some of the history that I knew grew in the walls. Maggie’s is not just a place where you can order good Southern cooking; it is full of experiences and love that I have never felt in any other place.

Bad Eating Experience

It was one of those days where it was just one thing after another. It started off by me waking up twenty minutes late for my 9:30 class. Then I proceeded to spill my cup of water all the way down my shirt as I walked to class, mind you it was pouring rain outside and I did not have time to grab my rain boots so now my Sperry’s the shoes they claim to be “boat” shoes were completely ruined. So not only was my shirt soaking wet but so was the rest of me. As I sat in my own puddle on my chair I then came to realize that I had forgotten my homework for a class that does not accept late submissions and I was late, so basically I received no credit for even being there. So now I was soaking wet, failing chemistry and it was only 9:45 in the morning. By the time lunch time came around I just wanted the day to be over, but lucky for me that was not the case, it was just the beginning. The rain still hadn’t stopped and I still had two more classes left for the day, and I had promised my friends that if the rain stopped we would play tennis. This day was going to be anything but short.

As the day went on the rain died down and the warm breezes started drying everything up. My friends and I decided that we would still play tennis since the courts were starting to dry so we drove over to the rec. On our way there we noticed that not that many people were still out walking around campus and that campus seemed almost dead. The sky still seemed dreary due to the rain from earlier that day but there was something else, it was almost like campus had a strange aura to it. It seemed deserted and spooky and in my mind I was convinced that it was because of the rain. We had played for about an hour when we saw eight cop cars drive by the rec center and tennis courts. We all looked up and pondered the thought as to why they were all following each other and what for, but with no answers and no words between any of us we just kept playing. Time past and we hadn’t seen any more cops in a while but we also hadn’t seen many other people either. Which was strange for an afternoon mid-week at the rec center, because typically it is packed. As we packed up our equipment I took out my phone to see if I had any messages. I had one text message from my mother and one email from the university. The text from my mom read “have you checked your school email? Bomb threat?” So immediately I got nervous and my palms began to sweat as I opened the email from the university to read “The University of Alabama is under a bomb threat warning. Students in the areas of sorority row, fraternity row, The Ferguson Center, and so on should evacuate those areas immediately and return when instructed.”  As any person would I began to panic as I read the message to my friends and we got in the car to leave. None of us could go home seeing as we all lived in the sorority house together so we decided that we would go out for dinner to try and make the time pass. We thought that we were making a great decision to go somewhere a little farther away from campus, so just in case we wouldn’t be in harm’s way, little to our knowledge we had just made a big mistake.

We chose to go to a restaurant that all of us had gone to before and no one had anything bad to say about it. I think I can speak for all of us in saying that we will never return after the outing we experienced the night of the bomb threat. We arrived around six o’clock and were seated within five minutes of arriving. Everything was going great, the hostess was very polite and sweet and we instantly had water on the table. But what I was about to experience was something that was going to blow my mind. Our waitress did not come to our table for another fifteen minutes of us being there, a little busy maybe I though in my head?  But as I looked around for confirmation I realized that there were only eight other tables full out of the twenty that were there. So let’s just say we had some extra time to look at the menus. As time passed we were finally greeted by our waitress, and all of us being the impatient people that we are decided to put our orders in with are appetizers and drinks. Well for us this was where it all went wrong. Apparently that was far too confusing for our waitress because not only were the drinks all messed up but we never even received our appetizers. After “arguing” with our waitress about who ordered what drinks we gave up on the thought of even eating any appetizers, at that point we just wanted our meals. Two of us had ordered steak dinners, one ordered the crispy chicken strips and two of us ordered the chicken and pasta dish. We waited and waited, but the food never came. From the time we walked in the door to then we had been there for almost an hour in fifteen minutes. Having a father that works in the food industry I have learned that drinks should be delivered to the table in less than five minutes, appetizers in fewer than 15 and your meal within twenty five to thirty minutes, this was clearly not the case for us. So not only were we worried about our entire school being blown up by some crazy bombers but we had waited for our food for over an hour now. I finally saw the waitress come around the corner approaching our table when everything flashed before my eyes. She tipped her carrying tray slightly to the right and the steak dinners flew off crashing onto the floor and splattering everywhere. She was able to salvage the chicken tenders and the chicken and pasta dinners somehow but I just knew in my mind this dinner had just begun. When the new portions of steak dinners arrived we were instantly disappointed with them as well seeing as both of their side items were wrong, but at that point waiting a total of almost two hours for all of the meals we were not going to send anything back. As to be expected my meal was anything but impressive as well. The chicken was dry and tasted like there was no flavoring and the portion of pasta was maybe enough to feed a small infant. As you can imagine the chicken tenders although they looked appetizing the uncooked raw middle tasted anything but divine.

            Being the unhappy customers that we were, all we wanted at that point was the check, we didn’t care if we hadn’t been instructed to come back to campus, I would rather risk being blown up than sitting in that restaurant any longer. So we asked for the checks very politely and the snarly attitude that we received back from the waitress was anything but friendly. We waited and waited and at the time we had been there for two and a half hours and had been waiting for our checks for about forty five minutes. Little to our attention though our waitress had been trying to divide the appetizers we never received between all of us and trying to add the two dropped steak dinners to our checks as well. One of us went over to the manager and asked if we could speak with her about our service. We explained that we had never experienced such a rude waitress and that we demanded not to be charged for the oh yeah food we never received and for the dinners that had been dropped on the ground. The manager feeling entirely embarrassed fixed our bills for us and paid for our drinks. But in my mind that still did not change the terrible experience I had just had and the entirely unsatisfying meal either. I never thought that I would hate one meal so much that I would rather risk my life being on a campus with bomb threats, but I can assure you that night I would have done anything to get out of the restaurant.

My Guilty Pleasure of Food

There is nothing worse than waking up with an awful headache and feeling like there is a drought in your mouth because you desperately need some water due to the massive hangover that you are starting to feel, oh wait there is something worse. Realizing that you ate entire box of messy fries the night before by yourself, probably without breathing in between each bite. I am always terribly disappointed when I wake up that next morning and find the oversized styrofoam box on my night stand with a bunch of dirty napkins accompanying it. In that instant I know I have done something that I always regret and I start ask myself, why do I do this?

The big box just stares me in the face as I start to feel the guilt starting to set in. Apart of me just wants to roll over and pretend that I didn’t actually eat that last night, and that it is my roommates. But I know in my mind that that is clearly not the case and yes I have successfully done it again.

            Messy fries is the type of food that I would not dream of eating sober because I know how many calories it actually contains, nor would I be able to finish the massive portion of them in the right state of mind. The best part about this meal is I go the extra mile to actually break into the sorority house kitchen and into the refrigerator just to get the ranch dressing so that I can drown all of contents inside the box, as if it isn’t bad enough.

            All of the individual items that are put together to make this mess of food are fattening by themselves, but then added all together it creates something that you should not eat on a weekly basis, but apparently every Friday night I think differently. I did a little research just to show myself how bad messy fries actually were for me not like it has stopped me, but this is what I was able to find. The chili by itself is about 300 calories, then you add the french fries which are about another 300 or 350. Then add cheese onto all of that you get around 280. By adding all of that together you get a total of around 900 calories. Now don’t forget I smother them all in ranch dressing which adds about 150 calories, which brings this grand total to 1150 calories. This can be the total amount of calories some people eat in just one day; I on the other hand though take the liberty of eating them in about 20 minutes I would say. And these calculations are for a normal portion of each ingredient, and I can assure you there is not much portion control when constructing this master piece. But then again don’t let me fool you when you add french fries, with pounds of melted cheddar and monetary jack cheeses, with spicy chili that makes your tongue tingle, then suffocate every fry in ranch dressing you get a little something I like to call heaven.

The name “messy fries” is ironic due to the fact that I am typically highly intoxicated when purchasing such an item and I probably look and am acting like a “mess” as well, I can only imagine what I look like while eating them. I guess I could take a wild guess by the amount of napkins I normally find in and around the empty box and the few fries that dropped onto the ground next to my desk, and could say that I clearly do not use a fork. Digging my fingers through the chili and ranch dressing just to find a french fry is a battle in itself. But then being able to find the perfect bite is what takes the longest amount of time. You wouldn’t think that this would be important when I can barely even see straight, but it is. The amount of grease that typically seeps into my fingers from the pulling the stringy cheese apart so that I can get the perfect ratio of chili, cheese, ranch dressing and fries is in a way disgusting. But from the smears of white and brown on all of the napkins I guess you could say that enjoyed eating them.

I think the best thing about the messy fries is the experience you get when you are waiting anxiously to take them home with you. The fact that the Indian man behind the counter recognizes me from last weekend and doesn’t even need me to tell him what I will be ordering is a scary thought. Or when he laughs at me when I try to hand him my debit card but I mistakenly hand him my fake i.d. or the times when I am short a few dollars and they still give them to me because I am such a frequent customer, I can’t decide what situation is more embarrassing. Clearly none of these are too embarrassing though seeing as I always end up with the messy fries.  

Then I also think about my dedication to a food when I am in a totally different state of mind and how I go to great measures to make sure that I can have them. The fact that I have stood and waited in the rain or sat in 20 degree weather just so I can be disappointed with myself in the morning, in my mind could count as an addiction. My sober mind will admit that the messy fries are indeed delicious but my intoxicated mind will go on for days explaining just how delicious they actually are to anyone that will listen. This is a food that I will always have a secret part in my heart for but I will hate to admit to myself and anyone else that I eat these and how much I consume of them on a regular basis.