I Am What I Eat

Post 20

(The following is lengthy. Here's a summary so that you can skip or read at your leisure. I started by talking about about my love of candy making and how I gained it. I was going to talk about being excited to make some caramel truffles with Schmetterling but I never got there. My comments morphed into something a little more meaningful to me. Part of my rich cultural heritage revolves around food. I've listed off tons of foods. These are meaningful to me not just because they are good foods but because of the good feelings they give me in relation to other people. My family ties are laced with foods and I don't think I ever really noticed that. Making unique foods (or common foods, or even buying certain foods at certain times) is a part of personality and family bonding, because of tradition. I eat and enjoy food as much because of who I eat it with and when as I eat and enjoy it because of it's flavor. My last line is really what sums it up: "I'm a social eater. The best foods in life are no good if they aren't eaten with people you love.")

I love to make candy. I really do. I can see myself in the future as the grandpa who everybody loves to visit because he makes candy. I'll BUY my grandkids' love and nobody can stop me!

I can take this back to some few people that have been a great part of my life: To start with, my Grandpa Jim and Grandmother Beth, and my Aunt Allison who assists them - along with anybody who happens to go over to their house at the right time - make candy. Fondant is a favorite and is sucked off the spoon like a Popsicle or hand coated with chocolate. Dates and candied cherries are also hand dipped in chocolate. Whatever is chocolate coated stays out on 5 or 10 cookie sheets until they've been emptied. That never takes long when there are 20 grandkids in town. Another favorite is Divinity. I'm not sure how to describe that except for that it's named well.

My recently departed Great Aunt Pauline Winkler was a candy maker. Dear dear APW. She was a hard core candy maker. She was amazing! At her funeral last week every speaker talked about her honey candy. She taught school for 30 years and the kids sent cards and letters that were put on display at the funeral. There were several binders full of them. Almost every one of them talked about honey candy. They wondered who was going to teach the new kids how to make it. I didn't realize it until funeral, but this woman would make over 100 pounds of this stuff every Christmas, getting up early before going to school to make 2 or 3 batches at a time. Those of you who have never made honey candy may not appreciate this properly so I'll help you:

The ingredients are simple: 2 cups sugar, 1 cup honey, 1 cup cream (half and half). You combine these in a pot and boil them, using a wet pastry brush to wipe the edges above the liquid to keep it from crystallizing. Somewhere around 260 degrees you poor the molten candy onto a slab or tray that's been greased with butter (a marble slab works best). You let it cool until you can handle it, but you don't want it to cool long or it won't be workable. I don't do well with this part... I usually try to work it when it's too hot and end up with blisters... think touching something that looks cool but that's actually lava hot and sticks to you. Not very pleasant. Up to this point you've spent an hour or so in preperation and cooking... we'll say that because Pauline had this down to an art she did it in 30 min. After that you pull the candy (butter up your hands first). When you start it's pretty pliable but as you go it gets much firmer. It's tough work to pull honey candy - Pauline had shoulder problems for the last several years of her life, so this wasn't easy for her. When the candy has a white and creamy look to it and is difficult to pull you string it out on your slab and cut it up into pieces about the width of a finger with scissors and then toss those into a bowl of powdered sugar. You use a strainer to toss the candy to get excess powder off, and then wrap the pieces individually in wax paper. I've never spent less than 3 hours making a batch of honey candy unless I skipped powdering and wrapping it, but I'm not a pro like she was. I did this with her a few times and I loved it. It was amazing to me that I could do it. It was inpsiering to me that it was a part of my heritage. This is something that was done in my great grandparents frontier home in Bluebell, Utah (where Pauline lived till last week) from about 1940 till now. My Great Grandfather Ulrich Bernard Winkler built that house after the one he'd just built burned down. I've done a lot of things there, and making honey candy is one of the things that stands out the most. It's difficult for me that she's gone now. She was a bossy lady, but I liked her that way. Time spent at her house -either alone with her or at some annual family party (she hosted several)- was always time well spent. I learned a great deal from her.

Pauline also made some amazing butter mints. These were way better than the ones caterer's pull out of the shelves. I never learned to make them, but I think my grandmother knows how. I need to have her teach me.

Come to think of it, certain foods are a part of who I am. They have deep roots with my family traditions and with my heritage. The best tomato soup I ever had was consumed in Pauline's kitchen. Her sister, Grandma Beth makes an amazing fruit concoction we all call "Grandma Juice." If it ever shows up at a party, and you see it before it's noticed by the mob, protocol demands that you poor yourself a full glass so that you can drink it most of the way, fill it back up, and then alert everybody else. If you're lucky you get another glass. One Thanksgiving while I was on my mission I was living close to my cousin, Maren Kijek. She got grandma's recipe and made a jug for me. She dropped it off in the mission office for me. That was the best part of Thanksgiving that year.

Before I opened it I thought that the Grandma Juice was wassail. That's another big tradition. The Kijeks live close to us and Christmas/Thanksgiving at their house means wassail. Wassail is a tangy spicy holiday beverage.

In cold seasons Aunt Mareen Kijek makes Spanish Chocolate that she learned to make in Spain. It's hot chocolate but different. I'm not sure how to describe it except for that if you've never had it you need to get some.

My dad makes homemade jerky. You've never had anything better. If I was a betting man I'd stake my life's savings on it. My mom makes a raspberry pudding that's reserved for those with a refined sense of flavor. If you don't savor it and make contented noises while you eat it slowly you don't get any more - we don't waste the good stuff on people that like the generic stuff just as well. My parents grill lemon pepper chicken and BBQ'd chicken.

We used to make a tasty salsa as a family activity - it was when my dad was having sinus issues and thus tasting issues; as a result of his lack of satisfaction we would make each batch a little hotter and ended up with 4 labels of salsa - wimpy, mild, HOT, and 2HOT. 2HOT was way too hot for anybody but dad. A few years later dad found some 2HOT and got really excited. He'd resolved his ultra-congestion and after a sampling he decided that it was too hot too.

Grandpa makes a special cheese dip, and a pepper jelly. Everybody loves the cheese dip. Only a few of us like the jelly, but we revel in the comradery of loving something everybody else hates. Oh, and can you say chili? Grandpa's Chili is as famous as Grandma's Juice. Allison makes eggnog and pies... coconut cream is my favorite.

The more I think about it the more foods and peoples I get. There are certain food items that just belong to certain people. Chili. Whiskey Sauce! Root Beer. Chocolate Cake (I'm not a fan of most chocolate cake, but this one is amazing). Ginger Snaps. Spaghetti and Meatballs. Peppernuts. Minted Lemon. Spinach and Beans (only once a year... this was a tradition involving money and luck... we hated it but loved it simultaniously). The list goes on and on. Thus far limited myself to my mothers side, but My Grandma Merris makes/has food that's equally important to me in flavor and tradition: Pies, Cookies, Grilling on the Back Porch, The Candy Jar, Halloween Popcorn Balls, etc. If it wasn't 1:30 AM, I could make a list for my dad's side that is as long as the one i made for my mom's side.

Even my roommates are becoming associated with foods. Shmetterling = popcorn. Danny = chocolate malts. Chad next door = cookies EVERY TUESDAY NIGHT! I'm trying to make a name with smoothies and honey candy.

It's time for me to cut off. My list of unwritten foods and people is growing exponentially. I haven't even talked about Christmas, the 24th of July, Weddings (A catered reception in my family is rare. We do way better on our own), or Thanksgiving... actually I've hit on thanksgiving a little... mmmm... Whiskey Sauce! In short, I'm a social eater. The best foods in life are no good if they aren't eaten with people you love, but the worst foods become good foods when you have somebody fun to exchange looks and or gaging noises with. Memories around the dinner table, the hand grinder, the candy slab, the apple bobbing barrel, the blender, or the dutch oven are some of the best I've got. I think it's because I get to recall them and add to them every time something goes in my mouth.

I have all sorts of other memories I'd like to share... the kinds of foods I eat with my mother - the kinds of foods I eat with my father - these include not only that which we made but that which we purchased. Sorbet's, Rafello, Fresh Tomato Sandwiches.... stop stop stop. sleep Schlange. sleep.

G'night.

-Shlange