Grandmas cooking

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GB

Chief Eating Officer
Joined
Jul 14, 2004
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Location
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OK everyones grandma is the best cook in the world, but has yours ever messed up?

I was visiting grandma and grandpa with my best friend when we were about 14 years old. Grandma has always been a wonderful cook and we were eating very well on that trip. Well one night she wanted to make mashed potatoes and decided to use her new food processor to make them. She served us our dinner and went back into the kitchen to get some other things. My friend and I both tasted the potatoes and almost spit them out right there. Now being the polite boys that we were, when grandma asked how everything was we told her that it was delicious. She sat down, took one bite of the mashed potatoes and immediately spit them out. How can you kids like this??? It is horrible!!! LOL she was right. The mashed potatoes turned into paste. We were so thankful that she realized they were inedible. We learned NEVER to use a food processor to make mashed potatoes that day :)
 
My grandma made the world's worst spaghetti. She would make the sauce and noodles, then mix them together and put it back on the stove so it could get nice and dried out.
 
:x Ewwwwwwww!!!! My aunt made the WORST sauce. It tasted like tomato salt water. And the noodles were mush. She once cooked a plate for me last year and it tasted much better. I said it was her best.... THEN she told me it was Ragu. OOOOPPPPSSSSSS!!!!!!!! :oops:
 
Hmmm... I thought growing up that everyone had a grandmother who roasted sheep lungs with tracheas draining into a dish below....
 
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Neither of mine can cook worth a damn, I'm afraid! :(

What little cooking talent there is in my family's always passed through the men.
 
My grandma has been dead since September 11, 1991, god rest her soul, but gosh she could cook the best darn home-made chicken and noodles in town not to mention her fried chicken, cherry pies, and those little finger sandwiches made from tuna. When I was a child and spent the summer with her and my grandpa she would make those little tuna sandwiches and I thought those were just the best thing in the whole world. :D
 
Grandma's 90 now, so she doesn't cook anymore, but she was a wonderful cook (passed down to my mom & me :) )
Everything was always good, especially her special cookies, called "Monster Cookies", by all us grandkids.
One Thanksgiving day, however, we arrived at her home, anticipating the aroma of the perfect turkey she & grandpa would make.
Instead, as we pulled into the drive, the most horrific scent hit our noses.
Grandpa had preheated the oven, before Grandma had a chance to take all of the Tupperware out of there (where she regularly stored it!)

we ate late that day.
 
gramma made rotten potatoes taste good, but butter was always left out on the counter. More often than not, it was rancid and spread over Ranch (brand name) bread, toasted. I don't like toast very much.
 
Both of my grandma's were good cooks. One of them made the best cinnamon sweet rolls. They were to die for. She used to make them Christmas morning. They made her house smell so good. My other grandma made the best caramel corn. She used to package our Christmas presents with small bags of her caramel corn. So, we got two presents in one!!
 
My sisters and I used to go visit the bad-spaghetti grandma out in southern California every Easter. In honor of our visit, she would always make the most wonderful sugar cookies - big around as the palm of your hand, chewy, and moist.

When I got older I begged her for her "secret" recipe, which turned out to be one from the side of the Domino's sugar bag. Never could get mine to turn out the way hers did.

She also had lemon trees in her back yard so we had wonderful lemonade. Gram's back yard is another smell to add to my list of faves.
 
Mudbug,

Try this recipe it makes the best chewy, soft sugar cookies.

SC

Old Fashioned Sugar Cookies

½ cup butter, softened
1 cup sugar
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
½ cup milk
3 cups flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
Pinch of salt

Cream butter in a large bowl. Add sugar and continue to cream. Add egg and vanilla, beat well. Combine dry ingredients and add alternately to mixture with milk. Chill. Roll dough on a floured board at least ¼ inch thick. Cut dough into desired shapes. Bake at 375º for 10-12 minutes until bottoms are lightly browned. Frost after cooled.

Frosting:

1 lb. powdered sugar
¼ teaspoon salt
¼ cup milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
½ cup butter, softened

In a bowl combine all ingredients. Beat well until smooth and creamy. Scrape sides of the bowl often. It frosting is too stiff to spread easily beat in a few drops of milk.
 
So noted, SC. Will try my hand at yours and see what happens.

p.s. this means I will have to take the dogs on longer and more frequent walks. won't they just hate that?!
 
My grandmother and grandfather were the best cooks. I have never ever seen better. And they were always exquisitely consistent. Their bacon and eggs always looked the same and tasted --- perfect and lovely.

My grandmother's pies were always perfect. I have no clue how there was never any variations. Just always "perfect" -- even when they were in their 80's!
 
i really miss my grandmother's apple/cherry pie.
she also made an awesome apple/cranberry pie.
but for some reason her apple pie wasn't all that great.
 
My maternal grandmother is the only one I really know because my paternal grandmother died by the time I was 4.

My maternal grandmother was a horrible cook. She came from a well to do family and never had to learn how to cook. She married my grandfather and his mother did all the cooking and raised the children. She kept busy with her general store, meat market, and restaurant. The way I hear it from my aunties, she pretty much dropped the babies and went back to her businesses.
 
That's pretty unusual from my experience, psiguyy. My mother-in-law also worked all the time, beginning in the 30s, but her husband (who died before I married into the family) was a great cook who bequeathed his expertise to his son. Fairly rare among the men I have come in contact with. (MIL happened to be a good cook tho as well.)
 
Well, mudbug, you haven't met anybody like my grandmother. She was one of the coldest people you could ever meet. She even played favorites.

Unusual lady. They finally retired to a farm where my grandfather happily raised hogs, ran a small slaughterhouse, raised honey bees, and planted carrots. When my grandfather died, my grandmother shut everything down and traveled for a year. She finally went back to the farm and made life miserable for most everybody else.
 
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