Senior Chronicle 4

What was on our table in the 1950s--and what wasn't

My mother never took any prizes for innovative cookery. She put three meals a day on the table every day of the week, and even when there wasn’t enough money, there was always enough to eat. But for her, food wasn’t entertainment, or a hobby, or an art form. It was just plain food.

In the 1950s, we lived on an Illinois tenant farm, then moved to a nearby whistle-stop village. Mom cooked out of her garden (plenty of veggies) and the chicken coop, shopped at a tiny local grocery for staples, and mostly served economical “made dishes.” Tuna and noodles. Hamburger with macaroni, green peppers, onions, and chopped tomatoes. Chili with kidney beans and hamburger, no spices or hot peppers. Canned corned beef or Spam with chopped potatoes (from the garden) and corn (home-canned until the summer’s crop ran out). Macaroni and cheese, of course. Meatloaf. And chickens from her large flock, stewed, fried, roasted. No ethnic foods, no culinary experiments, no Joy of Cooking. Her old 1930s Pure Food