Favorite Meal

I signed up for these 27 days of blog prompts (Thanks BeagleBabe for the suggestion) in which each day, obviously, I'll get a suggested topic. The idea is to, like any muscle, exercise your writing muscle. 

Today's suggested topic is what your favorite childhood meal was.

I didn't have to ponder this for long. I immediately had a couple of thoughts when I did a quick think of my favorite childhood food. Then I realized I didn't have a specific favorite.  Instead there are meals I learned to cook that I still cook today. And those are what popped to mind.

I credit the MomUnit and the DadUnit for my love of cooking.  When they were married, ONE, (of the many chores - I was so abused to have chores as a child) was I made the salad for dinner every night AND cracked the ice AND did the dishes after dinner. I hated all of them.

Then the ParentalUnits suggested that once a week I was responsible for cooking the meal. They outlined what that meant as to my responsibility and so I got to work. 

It meant I had to have in mind what I was going to cook, the grocery list to the ParentalUnits and a "can-do" attitude.  This, for whatever reason, gave me something to look forward too. AND it meant that mom/dad had to make the salad, crack the ice AND do the dishes. THAT made it all worth it.

I started out small, and made recipes the DadUnit taught me. I don't recall what my first meal was, but I have recollections of making Hunter's Stew (I can't believe I don't have Hunter's Stew as a recipe on my cooking blog. I'll remedy that in short order) on a regular basis.  Mom's Tacos and enchiladas was another recipe I remember making.  I didn't have a 'favorite' as much as I had a 'favorite chore'.

First let's discuss Hunter's Stew.  Hunter's Stew is the one recipe that I still make today.  It is one of the few recipes that I will gladly eat the leftovers of.  In fact, the leftovers are almost better. The recipe may have changed over the years - adjusted for memory lapses.  BigBro and I had discussed this before and his version of Hunter's Stew was quite different from mine, which leads me to believe I changed it up a bit.

It's a simple dish. Designed to be made while camping, or in their case, hunting.  It's all canned goods and burger.

You take burger, brown it, then dump in a can of Veg-All, a can of kidney beans, a jar of picante sauce, a can of cut green beans, and a small can of corn.  Now, admittedly the can of green beans and can of corn are my own addition. Blueberry and I decided years ago when we lived together that we wanted more of those veggies. 

You let that cook for 15 minutes or so (oh and don't drain the cans of their liquid) until the liquid evaporates a bit.

Then you make Bisquik dumplings and plop them on top. That recipe calls for 10 minutes with them uncovered, then 10 minutes covered. You then take off the lid. Dump a bunch onto a plate or into a bowl, and take a bite...burning your tongue every single time.  Ok, so that last part isn't part of the recipe but what I do every...single... time.

The second food that popped to mind is the MomUnit's tacos and enchiladas.  I won't go into great detail with how they're made because I actually do have that recipe on my cooking blog, but suffice it to say they aren't low in calories. 

The one memory that stands out the most is making the taco shells.  Back in the day before hard taco shells were available, you had to make your own.  This meant filling a skillet with oil (sometimes we'd use Crisco). Then you'd slide the corn tortilla into the hot oil, and flip it in half. The challenge was trying to keep it open enough so you could stuff it with meat and what not.  I never did perfect doing that and the bottom of the shell was always closer together than the top.  Stuffing meat into the crevice was the fun in it.  And oh, those cold tacos the next day....YUM...Of course you'd eat them with bandaged hands because you always got burnt by the hot oil.  It was considered a badge of honor.

And the enchiladas...I can't even tell you how good they were.  I don't think I've modified that recipe one bit. If anything else I actually make it like the MomUnit did - for example, she put in onions and green chilies. For years I didn't like either in my enchiladas...now  I do. Go figure.

But again, nothing low-cal with these. You soften the corn tortilla by dipping it in hot oil...that in and of itself screams calories. But they are so worth it. And I figured, if you only have them once in a great while, then you're ok to have the higher calorie.  Right?

Those are my two fondest memories of food that came immediately to mind.  Do you have any favorite foods?