Poll of the Day > They are saying that the old school family dishes are dying out.

(+) Yeah! (+)

People are not learning to make their grandmothers recipes anymore and a lot of the meals are dying with the people.

Do you know how to make any of your family dishes?
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I have a few recipes from my mom, most importantly pho, but I've never attempted to make it myself. I help when I can and it's on the list of things to learn from her.
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we have a cookbook from the 1920's that (allegedly) my great-grandmother co-wrote. i say allegedly because it doesn't have the original cover or any copyright info anymore, but it's a legit published book. i imagine it will be passed down to me eventually. the brownie recipe it has is really good
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My grandmother was a horrible cook so my mom learned nothing. My wife however learned a lot of tasty traditional dishes from her mom.
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I heard about it mostly effecting Italian families as most people don't wanna spend the hours, if not days making the sauces, and the noodles, or what have you.
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I dont think we really have any family dishes...
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Inherent effect of the breakdown of the family unit.
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or people can just look up the best recipes, try them all, and then use ones that they like rather than the ones that grandmother knows.

there's no reason that one recipe is any better than the rest, or is the best of the 500 of the same thing online.

Fam_Fam posted...

or people can just look up the best recipes, try them all, and then use ones that they like rather than the ones that grandmother knows.

there's no reason that one recipe is any better than the rest, or is the best of the 500 of the same thing online.

Sounds like you haven't had very many home cooked meals. I can tell you my moms spaghetti or my grandmothers chicken and dumplings my not be the "best" but theirs are the ones I rather have.
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I dont know any family recipes. I doubt we even have any.

My grandmother's recipes mostly died with her, other grandmother's recipes too. My mom knew a few of them. My dad has been able to recreate many of my mom's recipes, and I imagine he could get any of them down with a little effort, barring some of the more exotic things she liked to try. Mostly because neither of us remember enough to even know where to begin.

Unfortunately, I haven't cooked anything too involved myself. Breakfast, burgers, sandwiches, things you can toss in an oven/fryer/microwave - these things I can do. A complicated casserole or dessert? Never done it. I do imagine that I could do it well given basic instructions, but if my dad were unable to tell me how the dishes were made, they'd be lost. I couldn't reverse engineer them like he did lol. I guess what I would end up doing is looking up similar dishes, trying them, and taking months or years adjusting them to remembered tastes/textures.

In theory. Hell if I know if that'd actually work though.
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We don't have any family recipes. I tried asking my grandma and she would say "take a hen's egg size of this, a handful of that" and so on.

We do have regional recipes and I guess I'm like grandma in that way because I don't measure, I just put it in until it is right.
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hypnox posted...

Fam_Fam posted...

or people can just look up the best recipes, try them all, and then use ones that they like rather than the ones that grandmother knows.

there's no reason that one recipe is any better than the rest, or is the best of the 500 of the same thing online.

Sounds like you haven't had very many home cooked meals. I can tell you my moms spaghetti or my grandmothers chicken and dumplings my not be the "best" but theirs are the ones I rather have.

now people can look up better ones and get used to those. there's an emotional component to why we like what's familiar, but that doesn't mean they are better.

now people can eat better food than what their parents/grandparents were limited to

When did this become a cooking contest? lol
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hypnox posted...

Do you know how to make any of your family dishes?

Yes. My wife as well.
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My grandmother had a cookbook that I still use a few things from. My favourite chocolate chip cookie recipe is in there. There's also a recipe for excellent soft molasses cookies, though it's not the clearest recipe (calls for "about 4-1/2 cups flour," heaping teaspoons of some stuff, and has no yield, oven temperature, or cook time). Mostly, though, I'll find recipes online to use for what I want to make, or sometimes get my mom to send me the recipe she uses.

Fam_Fam posted...

hypnox posted...

Fam_Fam posted...

or people can just look up the best recipes, try them all, and then use ones that they like rather than the ones that grandmother knows.

there's no reason that one recipe is any better than the rest, or is the best of the 500 of the same thing online.

Sounds like you haven't had very many home cooked meals. I can tell you my moms spaghetti or my grandmothers chicken and dumplings my not be the "best" but theirs are the ones I rather have.

now people can look up better ones and get used to those. there's an emotional component to why we like what's familiar, but that doesn't mean they are better.

now people can eat better food than what their parents/grandparents were limited to

It might be better to them. Especially when they add a certain ingredient or something. And like hypnox said, even if its not the best, its sometimes the ones youd rather have.
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Yep, we have a box with recipes in it. A lot are quite old.
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My grandfather was a baker in the Marine Corps and he used to make these amazing cream puffs. I don't think the recipe was that important, because there are only so many ways to make a proper pte choux. It's the technique that's important because you have to bake the pastry in such a way that it blows up like a balloon. Then you fill the hollow center with pastry cream.

My grandmother was a pretty lousy cook, but she could make a really great stuffing for turkey. I've searched all over and have never found a similar recipe. All I can remember about it is that it used homemade cornbread and hard-boiled eggs, which seems to be the really unusual part. I don't think she ever wrote down the recipe.

My mother came up with a great recipe for beef stroganoff. Fortunately my grandfather was able to get a copy of the recipe from her, and he gave it to me. It's one of my favorite dishes, but one that I prepare very rarely. It's pretty heavy, with lots of cream and sour cream.
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People have been shaming home cooking and personal recipes lately hence the potato salad debacle.

My mom still bakes her Christmas cookies every year.
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As far as I know, my family really only had two dishes, one of which I got the recipe for, and one of which my cousin supposedly got the recipe for (and supposedly proceeded to lose).

The problem is, it's a dish that was never really prepared according to the recipe anyway (there was a lot of "add to taste" going on when it was made), and I almost never make it anyway, so it's pretty much functionally dead.

Not that I would be passing anything on anyway, so it all pretty much ends with me regardless.
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hypnox posted...

Do you know how to make any of your family dishes?

Nope. My dad didn't bother to learn from my nan. My nan is no longer with us. As for my mums side? They are as good as dead to me. I do think though had I actually had my mum in my life then perhaps I would have learned family dishes. Mind you she didn't seem the cooking type so probably not. It is normally the gals who learn from the mothers though.
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My memaws both made a recipe book for all the family members.
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KeijiMaedaTiger posted...

My memaws both made a recipe book for all the family members.

That's actually neat.
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I didn't have a family on either side that had family recipes but I try a ton of different recipes and I love to cook.
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