This is a picture of my mother, Annette. She is with Uncle Ed at a nightclub in New York in the early 40’s. I’m not exactly sure where my Father was, but he does show up in another picture with other family members on the same evening. I think my parents may have just been married. I think she looked very chic – she was a very pretty, but a very strict and opinioned woman who was almost provincial, but she cared undeniably about her family and her children. She was incredibly generous – particularly when it came to food. She grew up in a very poor family and believed that food was a luxury, and in the true spirit of luxury, she always surprised and delighted us with food. She treated it with love and care and as I mention below, she became an very good cook.
Before we insisted on taking our lunch to school in a lunchbox, she picked us up and brought us home at lunchtime so we could have a hot lunch. Our boxes never had sandwiches made with American (white) bread. rather a hard roll or rye bread. When I think of her I think of all of the years she took very good care of us, through food – and through clothing. She showered us with something new to wear almost every week. She gave us all of the things she never had as a girl. She has been gone for a long, long time now – almost 30 years ago – so I really never got to know her. Happy Mother’s Day Mom – this one is for you.
When I think of all of the woman in my family: from the past, my grandmother, my mother, my Aunt Amelia; from the present, my daughter and daughter-in-law, Karin and Shellee; and for the future my granddaughters, Claire and Keira, I wonder how much of the past goes into the present and continues into the future. What are the influencers, what were lasting impressions, what are the memories, good and bad – and how does this form one’s life?
So much has changed since my Grandmother’s time to my granddaughters’ time as it relates to cooking and food preparation for the family. For me, I’m thinking of my life as a girl, young woman, mother and grandmother – and wife, and one thing that has changed so much through these years – and was a staple for a long time, and a helpful one at that – is almost extinct now.
The Bakery.
When I was a girl, and a Catholic girl at that, the bakery was very important. In the 50’s and early 60’s anyone who was preparing to receive Holy Communion had to fast from Saturday evening, after dinner, to Sunday Mass. Kids went early and with their parents – usually to the 9:00 o’clock. We were starving after Mass and weren’t ready for Sunday dinner which was usually at my Grandmother’s at about 2:00 p.m. So, as soon as Mass was over we went to the Bakery on 16th Street in Irvington. A pink and black sliver of a shop it always had a line of people waiting.
They made the best Jewish Rye with caraway seeds and the best hard rolls with poppy seeds that I have ever tasted. Both were a very crisp crust, had a really good crumb and wonderful soft center with a distinct yeast taste. We also picked up the usual array of lekvar-filled Danish, Kolaches (squares of sweet dough with a round sweet cheese in the center and drizzled with a hard sauce) crumb buns and jelly donuts and sometimes a coffee ring. Each had a wonderful texture and crispness at the edges. The bread was always put in a brown paper bag; the sweets in a white box lined with paper and tied with red and white string.
White bread was a different story: it was sold by the Fisher Bakers man. Dressed in a uniform, bow tie and hat, he’d stop his truck on the street and walk into each alley between the houses carrying a basket of packaged bread and other baked goods. He would shout up to the floors above, “Fisher – Bakers!” and mothers would come out of their homes to buy the white bread.
After my Grandmother passed and my parents moved to the suburbs, we had a challenge. You couldn’t walk anywhere – and there was no shopping district. Middletown was spread out with a few villages and none offered the type of shopping my mother had grown up with. It was not an ethnic community and the first supermarkets were just beginning to appear. We were parishioners at St. Mary’s Church and we soon found our way, by car, to a little bakery in Campbell’s Junction just down the road from the church. And, it always had a line waiting. We stuck to the rolls and buns tradition of breaking the fast before Sunday Dinner until we moved to Lavallette year around
The tradition continued at St. Bonaventure. After Mass we made the buy at Kay’s. They had really good crumb buns that went along with the usual pastries, rolls and bread. And they had a line!
When I became a mother, I lived in Manasquan where we attended St. Dennis Church. After Mass we got in line at the bakery on Main Street. Later that day, there was always a Sunday dinner at my Mother’s.
When I moved to New York, there were so many wonderful bakeries – many in ethnic areas – all of which are gone today. I lived on the Upper East Side which was originally a group of German, Czech and Hungarian communities. The first generation families (like my mother and father) moved to the suburbs, and their parents, the original immigrants, continued to run the shops. Children were well-educated and had no interest in mom and pop businesses that required long hours with no real reward and lots of competition. With rising rents and then a change of tastes and diets of the young business people who were moving in, all of a sudden, these wonderful places were gone.
Today, Orwashers is one of the few bakeries left of the upper east side – still making wonderful bread, but I fear to guess they never make a hard roll with poppy seed. Every bread is geared toward “healthy” with wheat, oats, etc. being the basis of their trade.
There is one place that has held firm in New York – William Greenberg Desserts. It is on Madison and 83rd. I don’t think they have changed anything except they now they make cupcakes. Their specialty is the honeybun or schnecken as they call it. This gem of a treat is so light (yes light), buttery and crispy it almost falls apart. It is filled with beautiful, plump raisins and cinnamon and topped with big, soft, pecans and then coated with a honey glaze – the real thing! They make great tea cookies and a layer cake that is reminiscent of those made at the bakery on 16th Street in Irvington. And they package everything in a white box and tie it with red and white string. I always ate my schnecken after Mass at St. Ignatius along with a good cup of coffee and the New York Times.
Today, Doug and I have a soft boiled egg and a piece of toast or a serving of yogurt after Mass at St. Michael the Archangel. Paying more attention to our diets, we occasionally visit Publix Bakery (rated the #1 Bakery in Paradise) but it is not for convenience of breaking a long-forgiven fast or a filler before Sunday Dinner – it is for shear gluttony!
So much of my baking is as a result of memories or influences of my Grandmother and Mother. My Aunt added another point of view and was always my favorite person. My mother carried on the Sunday dinner tradition until the time just before she passed. She still set a dining room table and served her usual meal of rare roast beef, potatoes and a vegetable and many, many times her chocolate/chocolate cake – always made from scratch. She was a very good cook and there were always good things to eat in her kitchen.
Today, the bakery is just about gone. Nobody has to fast more than an hour before Mass in order to receive Communion, and sadly, there is no need to break the fast before Sunday afternoon dinner. My daughter and granddaughter are very busy people – and don’t have a lot of time to cook or bake. Their children have so many organized activities that it is almost impossible to have all members of the family at a table to eat together.
When I was a girl, we ate every night at 5:00 p.m. at the kitchen table (a lot of other stuff – all important – happened at the kitchen table too. It was used to prepare food, do homework and a place where my parents had an extra cup of coffee. We didn’t invite friends over for dinner in those days because all of our friends were eating at their own kitchen tables at the same time. Life was different then – mothers spend a lot of time preparing food and making home a very safe and comfortable place.
I think a home is what you make it, and mothers today, regardless of shape or size, status or age, continue to provide good nourishment for their families. It is a difficult balance partiulalry for the multitude of women who work today.
I was influenced by strong women – and there was no plan for me to have a career when I was a young Mother. But I did have a career – a very fruitful one – and still enjoyed cooking and baking all the way through to my retirement. But it was exhausting. Today, I cook in a totally different way – I take my time, study recipes, set up a true mis-en-place and keep my workplace very clean as I move through my cooking or baking. To me it is incredibly satisfying to prepare, cook and share a meal with Doug almost every day.
But cooking and baking doesn’t make a mother.
The best part of being a mother to Larry and Karin (when they were little) and a grandmother to Conlan, Claire and Keira is to curl up with them to read a book, or better yet (at the requst of all of them regardless of age) is to tell a story of when I was a girl.
Happy Mother’s Day!
Till next time,
E
Paradise Found 