What foods did you grow up with?

My parents are both Texan so you can imagine that most of the food I grew up eating wasn't exactly low calorie. It was however, always homemade. We rarely ate out and I learned to cook at a very young age. Here are a few things I grew up eating!

Pot roast w/veggies, spaghetti, biscuits and gravy, chicken fried steak, baked rigatoni, french onion soup, fried chicken w/mashed potatoes & gravy, sloppy joes, chicken & egg noodles over mashed potatoes (carb overoad), meatloaf, fish & chips, tuna casserole, lots of soups and chowders, Mexican cornbread, spoonbread, Texas style chili (aka no beans), black eyed peas, fried okra, and of course good ol Texmex!

It wasn't until high school that I realized people didn't make most foods from scratch. Gravys, soups, sauces, ect.. My hubby's family came from North Dakota and they ate a lot of casseroles made with canned cream of whatever soups. Very little was ever made from scratch with the exception of baked goods and desserts. Their overuse of ranch dressing and cream of mushroom soup was truly inspiring! LOL Thank god I have converted hubby to real food! (not that it took much convincing).

Okay, who's next? Any family recipes to share?

a reply to: MaMaa

Originated in Texas, stayed in AZ for a decade or so and now in NV. I remember buttermilk pies, cornbread (always an outside piece for the crunch) with butter and honey, fried okra, BBQ, etc. Really do miss Tex-Mex. Chicken fried steaks are also missed (here and in AZ the steaks are served with meat gravy, not white gravy -- shutter). Big Red soda was also unavailable for many years. Sigh -- more hunger pains.

a reply to: MaMaa

my mom was irish..but.. she made meat loaf, enchilladas, spaghetti, some times we had tv dinners, she made a good potatoe salad...I remember she would make hamburgers and we would pile into the station wagon and my dad would drive us to the drive in!!

milk in glass bottles! I remember dropping one one my foot, luckily I didn;t break any bones!


dad m made pancakes every sunday morning!

a reply to: searching411

Ah yes, how could I forget the cornbread! We ate a lot of that! I have not had buttermilk pie since I was in high school! Meat gravy on a chicken fried steak?? Heresy!! Speaking of soda, that reminds me. All soda was called 'Coke'. As in "what kind of Coke would you like?" ummm a Dr. Pepper coke? LOL I do love Texas style bbq! Beef brisket! I'm in Colorado and unfortunately Kansas style bbq has wormed it's way over. Super sickenly sweet sauce!

New Mexico here. We ate red and green chile with everything. Fresh tortillas, beans, beans and then some beans.

My mom HATED to cook, so most of what I grew up with was fast food. I am considered picky by my family because I do not like hamburgers and fries.

My husband and I taught ourselves to cook.

There are very few family recipes that have survived. One of them is vegetable soup, but we've managed to tweak even it to our liking. I have more recipes from my grandmother than my actual mother (some special family holiday recipes like a couple of dips and the all-important fruit cake).

We are slowly accumulating a 3-ring binder of our go-tos, and our son joins us in the kitchen as he likes to help with the cooking. Our hope is that he grows up at least knowing how to boil water, and when he gets married, one of our gifts will be a copy of the binder with the explanation that all his childhood recipes are in there. He and his new wife are to take them, leave them, add to them and tweak them as they need in their new life.

a reply to: research100

My dad's side was Scottish/Irish!! Potatoes were the starch of choice in our family. I remember going to the drive in! Mom would make sandwiches or hamburgers and we would head out to the drive in. We lived up in Washington state up on Whidbey Island while dad was in the Navy. Our house was right next to the drive in. So we would have dinner and then go sit out in dad's truck and watch movies till late at night. It was hard in the summer time though because even as the last movie was finishing, it was just barely getting dark.

a reply to: JohnthePhilistine

My favorite food, green chile!

originally posted by: searching411
a reply to: MaMaa

Originated in Texas, stayed in AZ for a decade or so and now in NV. I remember buttermilk pies, cornbread (always an outside piece for the crunch) with butter and honey, fried okra, BBQ, etc. Really do miss Tex-Mex. Chicken fried steaks are also missed (here and in AZ the steaks are served with meat gravy, not white gravy -- shutter). Big Red soda was also unavailable for many years. Sigh -- more hunger pains.

everything you just said was something i miss from the good old times. chicken fried steaks have to be with white gravy i like my biscuits with it. my favorite is fried tators. my family was from OK but i live in NV atm

originally posted by: ketsuko

That's awesome!! I need to put together all of our recipes for my boys! I have four boys and they all have been taught how to cook. I started when they were around 4-5 years old. My youngest son wants to be a chef, he cooks better than most adults I know! My 17 year old son just made elk steaks tonight actually! lol Tomorrow my youngest will be making dinner (each kid gets one night a week that they have to make dinner). So tomorrow is Salt & Pepper Tofu over steamed rice with garlic baby bok choy side.

a reply to: malevolent

Fried potatoes was a weekend staple! Mom would get up and make a late breakfast, it always had fried potatoes! Eggs, hash browns, fried potatoes, bacon, sausage, pancakes, ect.. It was a practical buffet and she did it every single weekend!

a reply to: MaMaa

I was a fat, well fed kid and proud!

My mother raised me on fried "tater" sammiches, cornbread n pinto beans, spanish rice, fried pork chops, fried chicken, baked (betcha thought I was gonna say 'fried' again!) Enchilada ground beef cassarole, baked tuna cassarole, mustard greens n vinegar, spinach n bacon, banana nut cake, peach cobbler, hand churned ice cream, iceberg lettuce salad with Green Goddess dressing, sweet tea, Sun tea, RC cola.....

I eat none of this now, except for fried chicken.

My mouth is watering down memory lane. I would kill or die for a fried tater sammich: Fried potatoes lil crispy, White Wonder bread, Miracle Whip, French's mustard, red onion.... nom-nom-NOM!

originally posted by: MaMaa
a reply to: malevolent

Fried potatoes was a weekend staple! Mom would get up and make a late breakfast, it always had fried potatoes! Eggs, hash browns, fried potatoes, bacon, sausage, pancakes, ect.. It was a practical buffet and she did it every single weekend!

we can never remake the tators grandma did but if you try cooking them in bacon grease its good, we never could make them as good as she did i told my family it had to be that cast iron skillet of hers

a reply to: MaMaa

I don't think there was too much Mom didn't cook or try at least once.
My Mom was from the Appalachians and Dad was PA dutch so...it was interesting combining the two.

Have you ever heard of shoo fly pie? Dad's favorite. Pork and Sauerkraut and Apple Butter.
Mom loved stews and soups (potato), roasts...it seemed as if as soon as the breakfast dishes were cleared, the women would set to preparing dinner. Lunch was breakfast leftovers which could be biscuits, gravy, sausage and/or bacon...
fresh applesauce really whatever you could find was lunch.

One of my fondest memories was Mom telling me to "Go get some tomatoes out of the garden". We would have tomato and onion sandwiches with a (un)healthy dollop of mayo, little salt and pepper...Delish! Fond memories of apple picking in New York, pulling off on the side of the road in VA (we lived there too LOl) and picking persimmons, chickens and eggs from the neighbor down the road. Butchering his (Dad's) cousins Turkeys at our house in PA. Deer and Gator from friends and family in FL.
Wow! Things sure have changed, haven't they?

We always had a garden when I was growing up and always went to the butcher for meats.
My parents canned and froze food like crazy. I remember trips to New Jersey to pick blueberries...LOL all I wanted to do was be at the pool or beach but, work came first.

Too many recipes and too many memories...it seems like there was such an abundance then...so different today...

Thanks for the memories!


I just thought of this place we would go every weekend. Gilbertsville Flea Market ( I think!) The car would be loaded down with all sorts of goodies!)

a reply to: malevolent

I have my mother's chicken fryin cast iron skillet, her dutch oven, and cook with them often. I used to fry potatoes like mama, but that was waaaaay back toward my corn shuckin, cotton pickin days. ( Yes, indeedy, I have picked cotton.)

originally posted by: NewzNose
a reply to: MaMaa

I was a fat, well fed kid and proud!

My mother raised me on fried "tater" sammiches, cornbread n pinto beans, spanish rice, fried pork chops, fried chicken, baked (betcha thought I was gonna say 'fried' again!) Enchilada ground beef cassarole, baked tuna cassarole, mustard greens n vinegar, spinach n bacon, banana nut cake, peach cobbler, hand churned ice cream, iceberg lettuce salad with Green Goddess dressing, sweet tea, Sun tea, RC cola.....

I eat none of this now, except for fried chicken.

My mouth is watering down memory lane. I would kill or die for a fried tater sammich: Fried potatoes lil crispy, White Wonder bread, Miracle Whip, French's mustard, red onion.... nom-nom-NOM!

Sounds delicious!! We ate mostly collard greens with the peppered vinegar. Sounds like we ate similar foods!! I was a well fed kid, although no matter how much I ate (which was a lot), I could never put weight on. Even at 21 years old as I was getting married I weighted 105lbs.

originally posted by: NewzNose
a reply to: malevolent

I have my mother's chicken fryin cast iron skillet, her dutch oven, and cook with them often. I used to fry potatoes like mama, but that was waaaaay back toward my corn shuckin, cotton pickin days. ( Yes, indeedy, I have picked cotton.)

so it just dont work out right then? even if you have the them? thats kindof a let down, i know the recipe she used.......

a reply to: TNMockingbird

We grew all our fruits, veggies, raised our meat and I was the chicken plucker, rabbit skinner. Can't say I enjoyed it at all but we lived a far piece out of town, so we grew pretty much everything.

We even had paw-paw trees! Wow, that was head rush memory flood.

originally posted by: MaMaa
a reply to: JohnthePhilistine

My favorite food, green chile!

a reply to: malevolent

I swear by my cast iron!! We joke that I will have to pass down my cast iron pans and dutch ovens to the boys after I die! LOL They are the only thing I will fry in because things get a better browning on them!