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2003-05-19 - 5:05 p.m. Woe are we, the starving children Song, Song of the South Sweet potato pie and shut my mouth... - Alabama Today, a treatise on the politics of food in a Southern family. And a bit about a dog. My sister-in-law's graduated with a Masters in Education last weekend. Since our schedule hadn't permitted a mother's day visit, we spent Friday driving southward to the Appalachian mountains. God in heaven, it is beautiful country. But the plotting started weeks before our sojourn. My mother wanted to host a Saturday evening graduation dinner. With the experience of years of southern society, she avoided a long 'not-argument' with other family members who wanted to hostess, by volunteering me to cook. This kicks off our discussion with rule � #1 If the out of town sibling comes all this way to cook her sister-in-law a nice dinner, you have to let her. Ergo, it has to be at her mother's. (If you don't follow that logic, you're just from the wrong geography.) Mom says we'll just do steak and potatoes and have a nice dinner. I won't really have to do anything. I sigh. Mom's patented celebration dinner number#3 of 4 is too b-o-r-i-n-g for anyone subscribing the number of food magazines that make their way to my address. #2 If you volunteer the food snob to cook, you have to endure the consequences. This falls under those rules such as �Don�t poke bears with sticks,� for she will shriek when you suggest using instant mashed potatoes. Instant? For something *that* simple? Go right ahead and used packaged filio dough, not even I am crazy enough to make that from scratch, but mashed potatoes? Armistice is reached. Mom plans a nice simple dinner for Friday evening and I am in charge of fancy stuff Saturday night. Anytime you use those words in one sentence, I'm telling you - carefully elucidate your definitions of simple and fancy. #3 Mom's non-negotiable rule. Everyone at the table must have at least three dishes of which they will partake. If someone doesn't like chicken salad, we must make an entire extra dish so they will have the full range of choices. Case in point - Friday night�s dinner. A simple supper of chicken salad and corn, expanded to include rice, peas, (Ryan will like that better than corn), hamburgers (cause Roland doesn't like chicken salad), hot dogs (cause she's sure he likes hot dogs), strawberry shortcake (cause the berries were fresh), and two kinds of cake (cause Thad prefers chocolate). And let's make some cookies while we're at it, shall we? #4 Everyone is always starving if she's not there to feed them. And having only two extra burgers left meant more meat *must* be put on the grill for the 'boys'. Someday, mom will notice Roland doesn't eat three half-pound burgers no matter how hungry he is. Perhaps she�ll also realize it�s inconsistent to encourage me to loose weight and fret at me to take seconds of everything. Somehow �please cook two hot dogs for Roland,� resulted in an entire eight pack joining the hamburgers on the platter on the picnic table. At least the dog ate well. Aristophanes may have created the term �comedy� before Christ was born, but the true definition is found in my mother�s back yard watching a half dashund, half black Labrador beg. Buster tries so hard to leap like a lab, but his short little daschund legs just won�t let him. But, he�s too happy a dog to get frustrated, so he just keeps bobbing like a sinking bath toy. He was awarded at least two hot dogs for the effort. Roland and Ginger speculated wildly about how such a beast was conceived, but let�s move on to rule� #5 You never say no in the South. My first tactical error of the weekend was discussing with the other women present at Friday dinner what Saturday dinner would entail. This lead to expressed opinions on what people liked and didn't and fed poorly into point #3, under the subcategory �everyone must have their favorite food.� #6 Mother will always pay to provide for her children or pout. After mom tried to kill us with food Friday night, we went grocery shopping for Saturday. This turned into an ever expanding menu because we had nine people invited, they each needed a wide selection (see#3). I paid for the groceries, cause a credit card is quicker than a check and mom had paid for all the other food the entire weekend. Besides, I was supposed to be the hostess (see point#1). Mom sulked. I promised she could pay for the food next time she visited me. Saturday was an overcrowded graduation spent playing with my nephew who was amazingly good for a lad of 2 and three quarters. He was quiet and patient for over two hours, pacing amongst the seating area in the bleachers. I want to go home, Daddy. Me too, son. Me too. replies my brother. Why, after all the expense and planning, are graduations always dull, hot and crowded? Surely, western civilization could find a better way to solemnize this rite of passage. Tattoos, piercings, something less painful than two hours of speeches and unnecessary musical numbers in a stuffy gym. Ah, but I wasn�t finished with mom yet. #7 Revenge is a dish best served - otherwise known as when you volunteer a food snob to cook, you have to help her. What was my definition of fancy morphed into? Well, let�s see. Oven fried chicken (involves brining and double batter over 20 pieces cause - see#4 - we have to make six more pieces than we could possible eat) Do you really need the baking racks for this recipe? I never heard of letting chicken 'rest' between coatings? Hot slaw - delicious red wilted cabbage salad - which leads us to point: #8 Vegetables must be cooked to colorless in the South. ... because Mom was greatly distressed there was still crunch to the cabbage even after cooking was complete. Vegetable torte, cause Mom insisted on buying six additional kinds of vegetables (onion, mushrooms, red and yellow peppers, eggplant) and that's the only thing I could think of to put them in one dish. Cold cooked vegetables? Yuck. says Mom. It's okay. Everything else is hot. Negotiation on dividing them into another three dishes were met with stubborn refusal on my part. Mashed potatoes - cause my brother won't eat this fancy stuff. Roasted brussel sprouts - Roasted? I've never heard of that. Don't you want to boil them? Sigh. If you think the cooking method was a dicey 'not saying no' disagreement, you should've heard me flat out force her to buy good olive oil. Biscuits - cause my brother won't eat this fancy stuff. Gravy - cause my sister-in-law through the gravy looked good. Deviled eggs - cause sister-in-law's father likes them. Steamed shrimp - because we must have an appetizer. However, in the fine family tradition of my mother always forgetting to put one dish on the table, she left the shrimp in the fridge. Thank goodness some of the other guests brought the wine and dessert. As you might imagine, there was far far far too much food. As you might imagine, everyone liked my weird dishes, except my brother. The sprouts were so popular they were a rerun in Sunday night dinner (which we did not stay for.) As you might imagine, mom told me to pack up my fancy cooking magazines, cause she never wanted to see fried chicken involving that many steps ever again. I have a great mom. We had a good time cooking together and really didn�t manage to kill each other. Sunday morning, we were bad children and did not attend church. We communed with my mom rather than singing hymns. We gossiped about everyone I used to know and admired Mom�s new quilting projects, including a turquoise and orange effort with cat and planet prints, that must surely be visible from outer space. Mom sat out the breakfast food - biscuits, Danish, fruit, bacon � and stunned us by wringing her hands and offering to make more food. Roland and I, in chorus, sarcastically overdramatic: Oh woe are we! Woe are we, we starving children. Whatever shall we do. This leads to the swift and painful emphasis of point ... #9 You are *never* too old to get smacked by your mother. Lunch was a logjam at the microwave, as all the food had to be reheated and put on the table. This leads to rule .. #10 Serving dishes are required. My mom has relaxed since the days she used to put ketchup on the table in a glass jelly dish. God�s truth. My cousin put ketchup on his biscuit thinking it was applebutter. These days, she allow condiment bottles on the table, but the corning wear dishes that stored the leftover vegetables � oh, no. Far too plebian to be put on her table. So, there we sit, in front of the reheated leftovers of all these excessive meals, when my 2 year old nephew taught us anew children are fast learners by chanting. Whoa re we. We �arving chil-dren. His mother, Roland and I almost choked with laughter. Mom seemed mostly charmed. Mostly. Encouraged shamelessly, Ryan chanted it over and over the rest of the meal. At least until he crawled under the table to feed peas to the dog. � � Scribble to Theo previous - next �