W2: Family Food Cultures

Similarly to Abu-Jaber’s shish kabob or Witzenberg’s French toast, my family also has a few special recipes that represent us. Although, the one particular meal that embodies my family is barbeque-grilled chicken, bow tied pasta, and salad. I just want to start off by saying, that, although this is a very good meal, it is not one of my favorites as far as my mother’s cooking goes. I only say this to make the point that the importance of this meal, in terms of representing my family, comes from the company over which we share it, not the taste of the food, which, by all accounts, is great! My family consists of my mom, my dad, my brother (who is 3 years younger than I), and myself. Growing up, my house was always the house where all the festivities would take place. Whether it was a backyard football game, a pick-up basketball game in the driveway, or video game session inside, we constantly had people over at our house. Eventually, everyone needs to eat; and for as far back as I can remember my mom would whip up meals large enough to feed a small army. At any given time, between my brother and I, we would have anywhere from 3 to 10 people over for dinner on weekends and during the summer months when we were out of school.

My mom had a collection of go to meals for when we had friends over for dinner, but her most common and popular was the barbeque-grilled chicken, bow tied pasta, and salad trio. The chicken is marinated in Italian dressing, doused in Open Pit barbeque sauce, and then grilled with more sauce as needed.  Although I do not eat chicken often, my mother’s barbeque chicken is excellent, especially dipped in Open Pit. The bow tied pasta is a very simple, yet amazing side. It is simply pasta loaded with pesto and melted cheese. Alas, the salad. I have the firm belief that my mother has the ability to make anyone a salad eater. I have been a main proponent of salad ever since I can remember, and my mother is responsible. While she makes an array of salads, when we had friends over for dinner she would keep it simple.  She would wash the lettuce, lay it out to dry on paper towels, then place it in the big aluminum bowl, large enough to hold all the lettuce that anyone could ever dream of. Next, she would take a cut a fresh lemon in half, squeezing both halves into the mixture of leaves. She would then toss in a little bit of red wine vinegar, along with fresh ground pepper. It is a very simple dressing, yet I have come in contact with less than a handful of store bought dressings. This is the meal that I was reminded of after reading the passage.