From My Mother's Cookbook
Anyone who has ever discussed food with me at any length knows that my mother's cooking did not enjoy the greatest reputation: she wasn't particularly interested in food and it showed. For the most part, she ate the absolute minimum of what she needed to stay alive, the more convenient the better.
For example, until I was 17, I had never eaten fish that wasn't formed into tiny sticks. My mother detested fish and didn't know how to cook it.
She didn't want to learn, either. But Better Homes and Gardens said it was what she should be feeding her family, so by golly, once a month or so she'd buy a box of frozen, breaded fish, douse it in Realemon, and broil it until it was burned.
Every once in a while though, she'd get inspired and really whip up something tasty. One of those dishes was split pea soup. This stuff was thick and creamy, flavorful, full of vegetables and, um, probably not kosher, if you get my drift. She made a HUGE vat of this stuff at least once a winter and freeze it. Even frozen it was something we all looked forward to. (Except maybe my sister. She poured ketchup in her soup.)
This past week I've been really craving some of this soup. Sure, I'll have to augment it a bit, since I'm not about to put a dead animal's bones in my food. But how much of a difference will that really make?
I guess I won't know, because I can't find her recipe. I remember seeing the recipe hand-written on yellowed looseleaf paper in the photo album she used as a cookbook. But when I looked today, it wasn't there.
I did, however, find this little gem, written on a piece of stationary from Calumet Auto Wrecking, Inc. It isn't in her writing, I didn't know she had friends to the south, but wouldn't you know, she got a moonshine recipe from them! I felt it would be irresponsible not to share this little gem further.
Kahlua
3 cups sugar
3 cups water
boil 10 minutes and then cool.
Add 750 ml of vodka
3/4 cup of instant coffee
Chop 1 long vanilla bean and divide between two fifth bottles. Pour the liquid into the bottles. Shake every day for three weeks.
Then I guess you drink it. Sounds kind of tasty, actually. I might have to try this instead of the soup.
posted by Michelle @ 12:51 PM
4 Comments
4 Comments:
what a shame! Why don't you do a tribute to the memory of the soup, by trying to remake it vegetarian-style? Since the orig recipe is lost, your memory is the closest thing left now.
PS - my sis used have a technique where she slowly burned onions in butter and claimed it tasted something like er.. chicken or some meat flavor. She'd do this with soups all the time.
A great place to look for a recipe that could work for you is www.allrecipes.com. You may have to adapt one of the many they're likely to have a little bit, although I'm not quite sure what you can add to replace the non-kosher stuff to give it that smoky taste. Funny, that hammy flavor is what I never liked about pea soup.
I'm thinking you might enjoy something along the lines of a minted pea soup, which is usually quite bright and crisp with lemon and fresh mint to give it flavor. Or else look in an Indian cookbook or website for pea soups that will be vegetarian, and swap out some of the spices.
I was never a big fan of split-pea. My mom's had a skin on it so thick you could refill potholes with it. The drink recipe sounds yummy, though.
As I told you earlier, I think we oughta try out this liquor recipe. I can't cook that well, but I bet I could make me some liquor!
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