View from the Cab: Remembering meals past
By: Kent Casson
There’s nothing like a turkey with all of the trimmings in a year when we haven’t had much to look forward to.
Thanksgiving dinner is pretty much my favorite meal of the year and that’s saying something because I enjoy eating. I don’t know what I like better – the tender turkey, smooth mashed potatoes or warm dinner rolls. My mouth is watering just talking about the feast which awaits us this week.
Mom spent quite a bit of time in the kitchen while I was growing up, always whipping-up a good meal and Thanksgiving was no exception. She always made quite the preparations for the big holiday meals. I recall taking a picture of her in one of her favorite places just a couple of years before she passed away. What I wouldn’t give for another spoonful of Mom’s gravy over mashed potatoes.
I still can’t make gravy to this day but I bake a mean frozen pizza. Alright, I do more cooking than that but my offerings are limited. I would still like to learn how to make casseroles from scratch and what the trick is to bake the perfect chocolate chip cookie. My brother and I would tell you the success is adding countless chocolate chips into the dough.
Growing up, our family always had a big meal on Sundays after church. This often consisted of roast beef, potatoes and all of the fixings. What an amazing smell to come home to each Sunday at noon! I think the secret was Lipton onion soup mix seasoning on every beef roast we ever had in the oven. As I grew into a teenager, I eventually had the job of peeling the potatoes.
Turkey was always a treat since we didn’t eat it a whole lot aside from Thanksgiving Day. There was that occasional Sunday in December when we would invite both my grandmother and great-grandmother over for a smaller scale turkey dinner. We all felt like taking a nap on the couch after that one.
It’s funny what type of memories holiday meals bring back each year. Here’s to hoping we can all make some new pleasant memories during what is left of 2020 and into the next year. Even though this has been a rough time for so many, we truly do have plenty to be thankful for.
Happy Thanksgiving.
