Elmer, you're describing me!

Lucille, unfortunately, do not have mother's recipe. You can do a search. There's a restaurant here, Demetri's that makes them just like hers. They make peach, apple and sweet potato fried pies.

Fried okra. I love okra and I especially love it fried.

Elizabeth, your Orange Cake with crunchy top sounds very interesting. Do you have a recipe worked out that you could share?

My favorite of Mom's was Pot Roast. She always added plenty of carrots, onions, and potatoes. The best part was the dumplings plopped on top twenty minutes before supper: fluffy white on top, brown with rich gravy below.

Some others posts are making me giggle.... My mom was a fantastic cook.

But whew, I was a not a fan of her porcupine balls or the bisquick dumpling things she would plop down on top of stuff.

I don't care a stitch about anyone's eating habits but choices have consequences. There's a region in the South that has shorter life expectancies and higher rates of cancer, diabetes and heart disease than the rest of the country. This is true for many reasons. One is that some parts of the area have people with lower than average educational levels from low socio-economic backgrounds. The stats affect non-African Americans as well as African Americans. Another factor is eating habits and the propensity to eat a lot of fried food, to fry any kind of food as a default when there are more heathful choices, and to to prepare food using saturated fat (like bacon fat).

Anyone who wants to crow about it as something to be proud of is welcome to do so, however foolish that makes them look. Choices do have consequences, notwithstanding the fact that your granny and Aunt Tilly lived to be 100.

I think fried food is fine in moderation. I almost never eat it, but I do love it when I do. Just because something is your favorite doesn't mean that you eat it every day - or even that often. I love tempura but only make it about twice a year.

My Mom and Dad were both great cooks. My favorite was cornmeal cakes fried crispy served with greens which had been sauteed in olive oil and garlic. Yum. Both were Italian so home made pasta was usually Sunday dinner. Stuffed veal breast, polenta, homemade bread and pizza. I could go on and on.

The subject was about your Mother's cooking. For some of us that began in the late 1930's Times change.

Subject:

Favorite food your mother cooked?

My mom was a wonderful cook. She learned from my grandmother, a poor minister's wife with 4 children to feed. Everything tasted great, even though as a young child I was not all that fond of many vegetables. My father used to say that in the future, we would never eat so well as we did at out dinner table. He was right. She had one cookbook--The Settlement Cookbook: The Way to a Man's Heart!

There wasn't that much that my mother made that I liked, possibly because she did not like to cook, but I did like her hamburger corn pone pie and her cornbread dressing/stuffing for turkey. My mother's mother (who was from Alsace) loved to cook and was very good at it, and she made lots of things that I liked.

I grew up on a working cattle farm, we also had pigs, chickens, rabbits and a huge garden. Everything we ate was from our farm. My mom was an excellent cook. Her green beans, corn, cornbread and fried chicken were my favorites.

My mom was a very good homestyle cook. Meat, potato/starch,veggie and salad most nights. I liked all in her rotation, even liver. The only think I really wouldn’t eat were stewed tomatoes that had bread or crackers mixed in. We didn’t have too many casserole type dishes but I did love her spaghetti and a dish she called conkie doodle, that was her spaghetti sauce over macaroni pasta. But my favorite thing she made was Hershey’s cocoa fudge. It wasn’t smooth and creamy like those made with marshmallows, but kind of grainy and melt in your mouth. I’ve never been able to replicate it and don’t really care about other recipes.

My mom was a FANTASTIC cook. We didn't always have money. My favorite though was, she made SPAM on cornbread with a cheese sauce from the Joy of Cooking. So so so good

" I think fried food is fine in moderation. "

Sure lars, anything in moderation is fine. Note I said " the propensity to eat a lot of fried food, to fry any kind of food as a default when there are more heathful choices, "

The poor health region with elevated disease levels I noted includes Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana and bleeds over in spots into adjacent states.

My mother was a basic cook and had a large family to feed with little money. Almost all food that my mother made was labor intensive such as homemade
pasta. She would toss noodles together with heavy cream that had been
cooked down to a crumbly state. It was delicious and required a small mountain of noodles for our large family. The bounty of the countryside was also a part of our family diet. One of my favorites was wild strawberries and cream and I have never again tasted such delicious berries.

Again the subject is about what your mother cooked.

Stick to the subject.

OR start your own thread!

The smell of freshly made pound cake, as I walked in the front door coming from school. Yes!!!!

My mother was a competent everyday cook. But she excelled in her pies and homemade soups. Also made of the best ethnic meals like beef stroganoff and an excellent kidney stew. She also came up with a "sort of" Spanish rice dish that incorporated lamb riblets that I wish i could replicate.

My father was the really good cook. He was the weekend cook. That is when we would have roasts, stuffed poultry, BBQ etc. When they would entertain guests she might make one of her famous oven dishes and he would do all the appetizers and sides, most of which could be quite labor intensive. No cheese and cracker or crudites and dip in our house. We had courses of appetizers.

Pumpkin pie.

My mom does not like to cook and is not good at it. She loves to bake though and is always making pies,cakes,cookies,etc. She and dad tend to eat most of their meals out now. But she always has some sort of homemade sweets,much to dads delight.

My favorite is her pumpkin pie. I always claim a whole one to take home with me at Thanksgiving.

My 5 siblings and I are all very good (IMHO) cooks. I started cooking dinner every night when I was 8 or so until I started working at 15,and even then I cooked dinner for the family on those days I didnt work. My mom was more than happy to let me cook and she would clean up the kitchen afterwards.

Orange-Raisin cake

½ C. butter

1 C sugar, divided in half

2 eggs

Zest and juice of 1 large orange

1 C raisins

½ C walnuts

1 C sour milk

1 teaspoon baking soda dissolved in 1 tablespoon water

2 C. flour

1 teaspoon vanilla

Squeeze the juice of the orange into a small bowl and set aside.

Zest the orange peel and add it to the bowl of a food processor with the nuts and raisins. Pulse until fine.

Sour milk can be made by adding ½ teaspoon of lemon juice to 1 cup of milk.

Mix by hand with a wooden spoon in a large bowl, softened butter, sugar and then eggs. Add the flour, baking soda in water and vanilla. Add fruit and nut mixture. Mix well so fruits and nuts do not sink to the bottom. Pour into a well-greased 11' X 6" loaf pan and bake at 350° for 45 to 55 minutes. Cake should be a medium golden brown.

Allow to partially cool in the pan on a cooling rack. Mix the remaining ½ C sugar to the reserved orange juice and very slowly pour over warm cake allowing all the liquid to absorb. There should be grainy sugar left behind on top. Cool completely before removing from pan. Wrap in foil.

( Note: there is not enough batter here for a Bundt pan. It would come out very dry. )

Beef n' home made noodles, pot roast, beef stew, hamburger & cabbage, baked green beans & tomatoes, Spanish rice, potato hot rolls, blackberry cobbler.

Fried Green Tomatoes, Spaghetti sauce, Eggplant Parmesan, Venison steak strips.

How did she make the venison steak strips? My version is rather tough.

She used strips cut from the backstrap. Dipped them in egg, then in a mixture of flour, salt and pepper, and a dash of garlic powder and onion powder and paprika- then fried in a little bit of oil.

Thank you. I must overcook them.

Two more--oven roasted pork ribs w/ 'fried' apples & chow mein.

She made THE BEST chicken chow mein and her turkey stuffing was FANTASTIC! I still copy that...to this day! Oh...and....beef stew. Yum!

Thanks for your mom's cake recipe, Elizabeth. Saved for next time I have an orange :-)

My mom was a terrific cook; everything she made was fabulous. Even though she was the daughter of a cattle rancher and grew up on meat and potatoes, once on her own she wasn't afraid to experiment with seasonings and unfamiliar foods. It didn't hurt that she married a boy from the East coast who found meat and potatoes boring and who had grown up eating all types of seafood.

Anyway, one of my favorites was her fried chicken made just like her mother made. So crispy on the outside and juicy/tender inside. When we moved to California, she embraced Mexican food and my other favorite(s) were her tacos and her beef enchiladas. To this day, her Chinese food was better than what I've had in most Chinese restaurants and she also made a mean curry.

She wasn't very interested in baking and her idea of making cookies was to buy one of those refrigerated cookie dough logs. But, she made it fun for her children by letting us help slice the dough and place it on cookie sheets. Sometimes she would buy the sugar cookie dough log and let us decorate the cookies with different colors of frosting and sprinkles.

Good memories, good times!

My mother was an excellent cook. But some of the things she made that I really miss are things she made us as kids to make us feel special. Eggs in the basket, homemade waffles with ice cream, hot chocolate from scratch with home made whip cream. I miss my Mom.

My mother was an excellent cook, and its hard to nail down a favorite. One was chow mein, which we didn’t have often as it took her hours to make and cook properly. Of course there was delicious pot roast, and many times in summer we had fresh vegetables. My mom was well-known for her baking skills. Anytime someone needed a cake, pie, or cookies, she could provide. My favorite was a lemon meringue pie and her chocolate eclairs.

Glenda, your fried pies reminded me of the ones my mother made. Peach was our favorite, and she made them with dried peaches, not fresh or frozen, because of the consistency. I made them a few times years ago, but I don’t bake much any longer either.

Those you mentioned stuffing, made me think of a rather strange dressing my mine made, although I really liked it.

It was made with saltine crackers, diced fried chicken livers, and poultry seasoning. She baked it in a loaf pan and served it by the slice.

olychick, Mama never made that fudge -- left it up to us, but she usually ended up beating it when we got tired! Best stuff ever. Often we ended up eating it with spoons, not wanting to wait.

Mama's fried chicken was my favorite with her vegetable soup a close second. Whenever we came home for a visit after moving away, there was always a pot of that soup on the stove waiting for us. For dessert, it had to be her strawberry shortcake in early summer. Or frozen lemon pie. I have that recipe in her handwriting and treasure it.

So many yummy things - good thread!

My mom was a very good cook when we were young, but kind of gave up once we were grown. I think my fave thing from when we were little was a Lithuanian dish called virtinas(sp?) - homemade egg noodle dumplings filled with cottage cheese and served with a sauce of sour cream and butter.

My mom was a great cook. I loved everything she made. It was almost all things my dad liked. She was also the cook at my grade school and I loved having her at school to see every day. Roast beef, pork roast, fried chicken, mashed potatoes and gravy, lemon meringue pie, chocolate cake. Just about everything! Kids always liked to stay overnight at my house because my mom would let us have pie for breakfast. Both my sisters were good cooks. I'm not. It's a talent for sure.

She made some kind of potato salad with vinegar and oil and thin strips of lettuce. Wish I had the recipe! Her red cabbage I would eat straight from the fridge for breakfast, lunch , dinner, late night snack. She made a cake with melted milk duds over the top that was divine. Fried chicken and milk gravy. I loved her angel food cake with dream whip frosting for my bday.

Carolb - the stuffed dumplings you describe sound very much like perogies, which are stuffed pasta pockets. My mother made perogies a lot and one of our favorite fillings was homemade cottage cheese. Mother would use our own unpasteurized milk to make the cottage cheese and it had a wonderful flavor, much tastier than purchased types. As you mention, sour cream would be an accompaniment together with chopped onions caramelized in butter.

My mother was also a very good cook. My favourites were her tuna noodle casserole, which I loved so much I requested it for my last meal at home before I moved out on my own, and her fried leftover spaghetti, which we would have for lunch the day after we had spaghetti bolognese for dinner.

I haven’t had the tuna noodle casserole for decades now as DH doesn’t care for tuna, and I’ve never been able to replicate the fried spaghetti.

Thanks for all the beautiful tributes to your mothers. I can see them bustling around the kitchen getting all those little mouths fed. All of our meals were from scratch sitting around the farm table. We leaned so much around the dining room table, good manners, how to be kind to each other. I could see the love for each of your families reading your stories. Thanks for the memories.

My Mother was a very good cook. We raised most all of our own food and it was home canned. She made great pies and my most favorite meal would be her chicken and noodles with the noodles being home made.

Sue

There are several things I really enjoyed from mom's kitchen. Pan fried chicken, brisket, roasts, fondue to name just a few. Dad was a good cook as well and specialized in Asian cuisines.

My mother was a good cook....not fancy, but her basic everyday cooking are things I strive to make like hers. Her chicken and dumplings, cornbread dressing, fried chicken, and even her baked potatoes that she slathered in Criso and baked in the oven...remember that debate? Even her very plain lettuce and tomato salad was good.....and her banana pudding was also.

her best: Escarole soup w/ little meatballs!!! others know it as 'holiday soup'. homemade start to finish, took two days to put together. we had it every Thanksgiving. we have tried to duplicate it, have come close, but still 'no cigar' :)

she made THE BEST POUND CAKE!!! also from scratch...oh, what i would do for a slice of that!!

Stuffed artichokes were my favorite, and I still have them every birthday, although now I have to make them myself. My mom was from New Orleans, and even though I grew up in a tedious little Wisconsin factory town, we ate a lot of New Orleans foods that didn't exist in my friends' homes. My dad made sure that Mom got to go into Chicago often so she wouldn't miss being in a city, and special-ordered some New Orleans foods so she wouldn't miss her home. We had Creole cream cheese that he was able to get from a friend in the dairy business, and I was a grown adult before I found to that figs weren't usually bought by the crate.

My favourite meal my mom made was Sunday dinner which was served at 3pm on Sundays was Pasta a la forno which means pasta in the oven. Years later, found out everyone called this dish lasagna. Also, she made a delicious meat stuffing for our turkey dinners, we never heard of bread stuffing until I was an adult.

Both my parents cooked, so I won't limit this to "Mom". Although she used more set / repeatable recipes than my father did.

In no particular order:

* Chicken and popovers. Yes this was my mother's recipe as the popovers had to be made a certain way to come out right.

* Chicken casserole with cream of mushroom soup, curry powder, and additional mushrooms. I made a variant some years back with home made mushroom soup rather than the Campbell's and its additives - it turned out good but took a LOT of time to replicate.

* Grapefruit, avocado salad with Catalina dressing. Back before they added HFCS to that dressing, rendering it rather too sweet and obnoxious. (I've also tried my hand at a replacement for that dressing.)

* Seafood paella.

* Venison steaks on the grill.

* Fried rice.

* Mom's special turkey stuffing and gravy for Thanksgiving - I wish I could find this recipe !!! I will have to try re-creating this next November. It's the only one I REALLY like. The others are all "meh" to me.

* Mom's raspberry cobbler. She usually made It from raspberries we all gathered wild near where we were staying in Maine. Those berries had so much better flavor than any supermarket raspberry I've met since! (Whether cooked or just eaten from the vine...)

* Steamed artichokes, with leaves to be dipped in the aforementioned original Catalina dressing.

* Home made hamburger patties. Nice thick burgers with seasonings and perhaps chopped sautéed onions mixed within, or even on special occasions, niblets of cheese. Best when cooked on the grill.

* Just about any seafood that came home with the folks. Dad cooked most of that. When we vacationed in Maine, we harvested most of our own shellfish - and got good deals cutting out the middleman with the lobster and crab, from the lobster fishermen. .

* I really liked that green bean casserole with the canned crunchy onions on top - as long as we ate them quickly before the crunchy got soggy.

I also truly appreciated they loved to cook together. Courtesy of Dad, we tried a lot of Asian dishes. Courtesy of both, we tried a lot of offal - hence a life long love of heart and tongue and sweetbreads, especially. (AND, I will try just about anything once... I am supremely grateful to both parents for this.)

MEMORIES!

Just wanted to add that of course, many of the family favorites made by my mother came from her mother, who made them even better - and faster. My grandma made a lot of pies, but my mom wasn't a big pie baker.

Another childhood fave was penuche fudge, and a spice cake with brown sugar boiled frosting - all things my mom learned to make growing up.

Blackberry Cobbler

My mother wasn’t a very good cook. She found no joy in it. It was simply another chore that had to be done. Mac and cheese - awful, spaghetti - cringeworthy, roast - tough as shoe leather. But there were some things that she did very well.

Lars! Were our mother’s sisters? My mother made the best fried okra, always very well done...maybe even a couple of burnt pieces. Her cornbread dressing was fantastic. Of course, there was no recipe. Sister and I cannot duplicate it. Creamed corn that never had cream or flour in it. She cut the kernels off the cob and then “milked” the corn by scraping the cob. What a mess it made, but it was heavenly. Green beans from the garden cooked with bacon drippings. And her yeast dinner rolls were to die for.

Daddy did not grace the kitchen except to make 2 items. He made a wonderful vegetable soup that was so thick with vegetables and meat that it was more of a stew. And he made fried pies! Usually peach using peaches that mother had frozen in the summer.

We had an abundant garden. Mother never did any canning, but we had a freezer full of vegetables from the garden that lasted all winter.