s/o Your grandma's cooking

[Velar Fricative]

Tell us about your grandma's cooking. Even if you were unable to spend many years with your grandma (if at all), were recipes passed down to your parents? Or was your grandma like a modern-day woman who understood the joys of takeout and eating at restaurants?

PIPs are welcome! 

[laurenpetro]

i never met my dad's mom but my nanny was, by all accounts, the WORST COOK EVER. even worse than my mom and she was terrible.

[pixy0stix]

My gma told my gpa when they married, "I don't cook, and I don't clean." So for most of their marriage they lived on what came out of a can, was easy to make, or what they could get at restaurants. Except she made the best damn divinity ever. I have that recipe and make it every xmas.

[cattledogkisses]

Tourtière at the holiday, always.

(Autocorrect tried to turn that into torturer. What kind of family do you think we are Apple?)

[ttt]

My dad's mom was a farm wife so she used to make AMAZING yeast rolls and such.

My mom's mom's idea of cooking was microwaveable frozen foods. Although I do have some incredible Christmas cookie recipes that were passed down from her grandmother that we still make every year.

[IIOY]

Paternal grandmother was pretty awful.

Maternal grandmother made the best damn baked goods ever and was a good cook.

[jsillyfun]

Both my grandmas are Italian and incredible cooks. Both make awesome tomato sauce. Moms mom makes the best eggplant parm in the world, delicious cookies and cakes, etc. dad's mom makes worlds best pesto, pumpkin soup, brownies, Italian fig cookies called cuccidati, pies, giant five layer cakes.....mmmmm

[downtoearth]

My mom's mom was terrible - think any casserole that involved opening a cream-of-mushroom can and adding some meat to it. Gross. My mom even says she didn't learn to cook because of it. My mom claims she learned how to make food by visiting my dad's mom.  Oddly my grandmas lived in the same town and were really close friends - even before my parents married.  My grandpa used to laugh about it and say things like "I didn't marry that beauty for her cooking, but her dancing is divine!"

My dad's mom was wonderful. She could feed her whole family amazing meals - mostly meat and potatoes types, but they were great. She even could make things like tongue and liver taste good. She also baked cakes and cookies and was almost always in the kitchen when we talked and bonded. Once she made "real" meatballs for us with some homemade sauce and spaghetti and I was devouring them. I noticed my parents and older sister weren't and couldn't figure out what was wrong b/c they were so good. Turns out when I was 8 I heard "real" as in homemade, but in reality it was "veal" and my parents didn't feel great about eating boxed, baby cow. I've never had veal since they explained about how you get veal, but damn those were fantastic.

[downtoearth]

Dec 9, 2014 11:15:45 GMT -5 jsillyfun said:

Both my grandmas are Italian and incredible cooks. Both make awesome tomato sauce. Moms mom makes the best eggplant parm in the world, delicious cookies and cakes, etc. dad's mom makes worlds best pesto, pumpkin soup, brownies, Italian fig cookies called cuccidati, pies, giant five layer cakes.....mmmmm

I would love to visit your family for dinner sometime. Mmmm.

[josieposy]

My maternal Grandmother was a farmer's wife and could outbake anyone. Some of my family members still haven't mastered her rolls. She always had stuff in the freezer. There was never a shortage of cookies or fresh bread.

My paternal Grandmother was a decent cook but not quite to the same extent that I remember. I do remember she had a bet with my mom once over who could cook something faster (mom on the stove, Grandma with the microwave). I can't remember what it was or who won.

[mysterons]

Supposedly my grandma was a good cook, but my memories are of my grandpa doing all the cooking. She ruled him with an iron fist.

[jeaniebueller]

My grandma made fabulous polish food and loved cooking. So we ate a lot at holiday gatherings. I miss it.

[Velar Fricative]

I only met my maternal grandmother once - she lived her entire life in Kosovo until she died in the mid-90s. So she probably made a lot of traditional dishes.

My paternal grandmother also made lots of traditional Albanian dishes.

Pite (lots of dough and you can fill it with spinach, cheese, or pumpkin. A dish called Burek is very similar):




Fli (more dough, more grease, more goodness. See why I love carbs so much?):



Tulumbe (but we stole this from the Turks or the Greeks, can't remember which. Fried batter in syrup. Very healthy.):

[anonymous]

my grandmother was amazing. She was born in 1921 and owned her own businesses for her entire adult life. I didn't realize how incredible that was until after her death in 2011.

As far as cooking-she was an amazing cook. Her gravy recipe, which was given to her by my grandfather's mother was the best tasting food ever. I know there is a gravy vs sauce thing but in our house it was gravy so for me it will forever be gravy. Anyway, a pot of gravy filled with meatballs and she's often put a neck bone in it and I swear that is where it got it's amazing flavor. And corn fritters-she used to make corn fritters that were so yummy. And one more-her cheesecakse. I can recreate her gravy but I cannot recreate her cheesecake. But now i'm motivated to try again.

[2curlydogs]

I never knew either grandma. But it seems like the recipes that have been passed down come from my dad's mom more than my mom's.

Those recipes are very German or Polish. Rouladen. Schaum torte. That sort of thing.

[Deleted]

My grandmas were both pioneers - like, homesteaders. My dad's mom died before I was born, but based upon her children, I'm pretty sure her cooking was not great. They lean toward "fry it in lard" as the most common technique.

My mom's mom cooked simple stuff from scratch. Roasts, veggies, potato. Make a great pie, and knew how to can and pickle everything under the sun.

[Bernadine]

My maternal grandmother is a great cook. Very meat and potatoes, 1950s-style cooking. Everything from scratch. If she was doing that buzzfeed list, she'd probably make a roast, with mashed potatoes, a veggie, and homemade bread. And pie for dessert.

My paternal grandmother was a good cook too. My favorite was her pastitsio. No one made it better. I never got her to teach me before she died

[mich1]

My grandmother on my mom's side was a typical midwest cook. The one thing that I remember to this day, and really REALLY wished I had paid more attention to her making was her chicken and noodles (where she made the noodles herself). I think her drying the noodles on cut up brown grocery bags added to the flavor some way!! The noodles and chicken were in a thick gravy that was served over mashed potatoes. I know she used a dozen egg yolks in the noodles because she used the dozen egg whites in the angel food cake that she made with them afterwards.

It was the ultimate in comfort food......

She also made pies, with lard. She fried her chicken in lard too.

[jillboston]

My Mom's mom died when she was ten. As she had 10 kids I imagine she cooked a lot - but Mom didn't remember.
My Dad's Mom was a farm wife and a good cook - she taught my Mom to make pies (my Grandpa had pie in milk for breakfast every day of his life - so at least one pie was made everyday by Grandma). She died when I was seven so I never ate her food.
My Mom taught us pie making from her MIL instructions-one sister is a particularly great pie maker as a result.
My Mom was a great cook - made the best bread.

DH and I had his Italian grandma teach us her tomato sauce - so glad we did.

[Deleted]

My grandmother was a poor cook. My mom says she did a few things well, but none I had, ha! My grandfather was a decent cook but sometimes to adventurous in switching out ingredients and ended up with some crazy dishes.

My mom and her sisters are all very good cooks and bakers though. So family get togethers are always awesome:)

No idea about my dad's mom. She passed when he was a teen. Both his sisters are good cooks though. His younger sister makes the best German chocolate cake.

Both families are mostly German backgrounds from the Midwest founded by German immigrants, so lots of meat and potato type dishes.

[ESF]

Dec 9, 2014 11:08:59 GMT -5 cattledogkisses said:

Tourtière at the holiday, always.

(Autocorrect tried to turn that into torturer. What kind of family do you think we are Apple?)

My paternal grandmother made this a few times when I was younger, but I was a picky eater and never tried it.  To the best of my knowledge, she has not made it in years.

I have made it a few times now though using online recipes.  mmmmm....

Other than that, I can't think of any other specialities.  She does a little bit of baking now, but uses boxed mixes.  

My maternal grandmother was one of the worst cooks ever.  A frequent meal was "Drop Hamburg and Potato" which was just balls of hamburger meat (not a meatball, just grab a chunk of hamburger and form a large 2 inch ball) and canned whole potatoes dumped into a stock pot filled with water, boiled until the meat turned gray, and then drained and served on a plate with ketchup.  

[mbcdefg]

Dec 9, 2014 11:07:33 GMT -5 laurenpetro said:

i never met my dad's mom but my nanny was, by all accounts, the WORST COOK EVER. even worse than my mom and she was terrible.

Are you Irish-American? I called my maternal grandmother Nanny, too.

The only thing I really remember Nanny making for us was roast beef and mashed potatoes. My dad says she wasn't a very good cook, and my mom definitely didn't inherit any cooking skills from her.

My paternal grandmother's pot roast is really good. I know she's made other good things but that's my favorite dish of hers. And her cranberry sauce is also good - when she lived nearby she'd give me a jar every Thanksgiving. She's given me some cooking utensils, pots, and her wedding silverware over the years.

I think I'm a pretty good cook, but I'm self-taught. My mom's only good things are her Irish soda bread and her corned beef on St. Patrick's Day.

[stever]

My grandma's big thing was itty bitty mincemeat tarts. She used to make a batch and ship them to us in shoe boxes. My mom has the recipe somewhere.

[msmerymac]

My grandma (dad's mom) was an AWESOME cook. She also had all of her mother's recipes, and probably some of her grandmother's recipes... the kind of cards that just listed ingredients and not amount, lol.

Now, my grandmother was a 1950s housewife, so she was a lover of convenience foods. Miracle whip, cool whip and jello were staples in her house. It didn't affect her cooking though. Damn, I loved her cole slaw (creamy and not too sweet) and her angel food cake (so light and soft). And she would always make pumpkin pie at Thanksgiving. My aunt now has her recipes.

My grandmother was also someone who was like, "here, you can lick the beaters" but never really let you participate more than that. Well, she let me help make no-bake cookies by the time I was 16 or so, lol. My dad is also a fabulous cook (he cooked dinner every night when I was growing up and still does), but he actually learned most of his tricks when we worked at the kitchen of a country club, not from my grandmother! Natural talent, I guess.

The two big things my grandmother would always make were stollen at Christmas and Fastnacht keuchles for Fastnacht/Lent. All 4 of my grandmother's grandparents were immigrants - her dad's parents were from Berlin, her mom's mother was from Ireland, and her mom's father was from Bavaria. So being 3/4 German, her two big food traditions were, um, German. But I was never raised being told, "this is a German tradition" or "this recipe came from this family member because our family is from Germany." (FWIW, my grandfather's entire family was Scottish.) It's something I put together later, like when I was in high school. I've been trying to make keuchles for the past few years that taste like Grandma's. Stollen, on the other hand, well, even if I could make it taste like my grandmother's, I'm not THAT tied to actually eating it. My cousin made it a few times, though.


ETA: My husband, whose family is mostly German, was like, "the hell are Fastacht keuchles?" when I started making them.

[moreace01]

My dad's mom - when I was little, I thought she was a good cook. She excelled at grilling. For the holidays, we used to have this chicken ala king stuff that went in a shoestring potato basket. It wasn't till I was older that I realized this was just cream of crap. Anyway, we used to bake a lot - we made popovers and brownies and also tons of chocolate shakes. She had a pool and I was always hungry after swimming.

Overall though, she was better suited for cocktail hour and appetizers (catered). She liked to entertain and this was a bit more her speed.

My mom's mom couldn't cook at all. Like at all.

So the image people have of a grandma in the kitchen making everything homemade does not resonate with me at all. Neither of my grandma's were like this.

[jln]

My dad's mom makes amazing Swedish food. She's a little ball of white-haired happiness and loves making good food.

My mom's mom is a horrible cook. She thinks she can cook, but it's all bkand, colorless and tasteless. And she puts celery in jello.

[kittycatlove]

I don't really remember either of my grandmas. From what my mom has told me of my dad's eating when they met, he grew up with very bland irish food. So I imagine my grandma made kind of boring and bland food, plus they grew up without a lot of money. My mom on the other hand is Italian and an excellent cook. She makes everything from scratch without recipes and can throw things together and make a great meal. She learned it all from my grandma.

[redheadbaker]

We lived with my dad's mom when I was little, and we visited my mom's parents quite often. Both grandmothers cooked, but if they passed down any recipes to my parents, I don't know about them. My mother doesn't cook if she can help it. My dad grills a lot, and just got into baking bread, but that wasn't because of his mom.

My grandfather made delicious soups, but didn't have a recipe -- he just threw ingredients into the pot. 

[mrshandy]

My mom's side passed before I was born. I've never heard that she was that great of a cook, but maybe I'll ask my Mom sometime. I know that my Mom learned a lot of her cooking from having to cook for her brothers and sisters since my grandma was ill a lot.

My dad's side was never that great of a cook. She did make a yummy broccoli casserole for Xmas. No idea what the recipe is.

[msmerymac]

Oh! And before my dad was born, my grandparents owned a hot dog stand. My grandmother kept the books (she did accounting classes in high school - she actually went to a high school a bit further away because she wanted to take the specialized classes), and basically ran it, but "retired" when my dad was born (she was almost 35 when he was born, my aunt was 13 though so she remembers it).

Anyway, my grandparents still had the old industrial milkshake maker in their kitchen basically until my grandmother died and the house was sold. That thing was awesome.