When I was growing up we never had "dinner" we had "supper." But we've eaten "dinner" now for years, thanks to a hubby who has little quirks about these things. He hates it when people eat supper, and he a has a thing about always including a spoon with the table settings, even if you're just eating a sandwich. The man has issues.
But anyway, I was reading a book yesterday, it was from the turn of the century and they were talking about "getting supper." It made me smile and think how much we've changed.
When my grandmother "got supper" she had to kill the meat and preserve it, grow and can the vegetables, churn the butter, gather the eggs, her whole life centered around gathering food for breakfast, dinner and supper for her family of ten chldren and cooking it on a wood stove. But in my mother's house, our "supper" consisted of newly evolving foods from the grocery store. Things like frozen corn, packages of dry spaghetti sauce, our beloved Jeno's Pizza Mix in a box, my favorite Blue Bell Bologna and the always present packaged bear claws and Maxwell House Instant Coffee, mom's "treats" that were always in the house. Oh, the times they were a changin.'
And then came my years in the kitchen when the boys were young, when "getting dinner" often consisted of boxes of Kraft Mac & Cheese, and fish sticks, which our family still loves, with peas, you have to have peas with that meal. We had things like Hamburger Helper, and Totino's Pizza, Campbell's Condensed Soup and we ate box after box of Velveeta, it was all about processed foods in those years. And even though I baked bread, stirred together homemade pasta, baked pie, cakes and cookies, and cooked "real" food for my family, we all enjoyed the salty, processed food that was affordable and readily available in the grocery store. We bought cooking oil in a gallon jug and fried everything. I went thru countless tins of Crisco and always used Blue Bell Margarine. It was so good, but oh, it was not healthy eating.
And now here I am in my old(er) age, trying to eat clean, not much processed food, a lot of whole grains, fresh fruit and veggies, yogurt, olive oil, and lean meat. But I wonder if I'm in the minority, the younger generation's dinners often consist of eating out, or fast food, or picking up pizza. Things aren't what they used to be, but when I look back at what has evolved over the years, I'm more than ever convinced that grandma's way was the best. Fresh meat with no hormones, eggs, vegetables grown with no chemicals, butter instead of margarine, that's the way people are supposed to eat. But to do that today costs a small fortune!
Just an observation from me this week, makes you think about what you've eaten during your lifetime, doesn't it?
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