suppertime

My father is old school. He eats three meals a day and they are breakfast, dinner, and supper. He also believes that the reason my niece and nephew, his grandchildren, eat nothing but junk and fastfood is because they never smell food cooking. He might be right. There is something comforting about walking in the backdoor and smelling supper.

When I was in college I worked summers in a day camp. The only perks of the job were sun-streaked hair, a fabulous tan, and a great item on the resume for a teaching job. I can remember pushing in the backdoor and being enormously thankful for air conditioning and smiling at the smells coming from the kitchen. Sometimes the smell (weekly!) was hot soup and, after standing in the sun all day, I wasn't too enthused. But I'd set the table and my father would come home from work and we would all sit down and eat and talk and laugh. Suppertime was a nice time.

I read a statistic somewhere, I forget where, that the only this all Rhodes scholars had in common was that they ate supper as a family. Every night.

I know so many, many people who rarely eat a meal together ever. Our children are really missing out. My children are adults and they have always had regular mealtimes with food that I've prepared for them. I even packed their lunches. They do their own now but I still do for husband.

Right now, as I type this, I can smell a pork roast that I put in the oven a while ago. It's cooking very slowly with leeks and apples and garlic. It smells wonderful. My older daughter will come out of her third floor apartment and ask what's for supper and say that she's been smelling it all day. Younger daughter will arrive home and walk in the backdoor and smell what's for dinner. Both will ask at some point in the day what I'm planning. It's nice to know that eating dinner means something to both of them. I hope they will continue the tradition.

When younger daughter went away to college it was difficult for me to make the correct amount of food. I often would set the table for all of us instead of all of us minus one. When older daughter works and her shift keeps her away from dinner, I set her plate and put aside her food. And when she gets home, I sit with her while she eats. It's no fun to eat alone....especially supper.

Tonight we're having a pork roast with gravy made from the meat juices and the leeks and garlic and apples. We're having baked yams and green beans. A big salad, of course. Tonight we're having a real meal.

While I understand why this diet of low carbohydrates is necessary I still can't get my mind around a salad for dinner (especially since I always have one for lunch). I love to cook. I love to cook meals. I miss making beef stew with potatoes. I miss roasted chicken with parsleyed potatoes. I miss homemade pizza (a Friday night tradition that dates bake pre-children). I miss the traditional food of my family. There is a joke...although too true to be terribly funny...that a Slavic mother could make supper for twelve with one potato. I know I could.

I read cookbooks like novels. I think about what vegetables should be served with what meat and how they should be prepared. I know people who think canned corn is the only vegetable palatable to human beings. My children ask for cabbage and asparagus and squash. They've eaten it all their lives.

Yesterday I had a salad for lunch and another one for dinner. Today I had a salad for my dinner. And tonight, for my supper, I'm eating real food. Family food. Tonight's supper is a juicy pork roast and some beautifully orange baked yams and fresh green beans...and a salad.



Tonight every one will be home and supper will be on the table at 6:30.