Do you know how to cut up a whole chicken for frying?
Pick out a melon?
Make a perfect meatball?

I didn’t think so. The grocery industry does most of that for us now, and I think it’s a crying shame that many of us can whip up a sushi roll in no time, but we don’t know how to properly make a white gravy.

My friend Stephanie lost her mama a few years ago, far too early. Steph got married last summer and she’s a sweet young thing of only 25, and hadn’t yet sapped the family treasury of recipes from her mother’s brain. Like most of us at the onset of our cooking journeys, she’s been stabbing in the dark with her new wedding cutlery.

This weekend, she took charge of her situation and visited her only living grandmother, determined to start collecting the recipes she knew and loved while she grew up. She’s been missing her big Italian family dinners and figured she could at least replicate some of the recipes, while also earning points with her new husband, who has up until now subsisted on convenience mart food and frozen burritos.

We often take for granted the simplest recipes. Stephanie struggled this summer to replicate her grandma’s basic potato salad. She didn’t know how to make her flavorful green beans or her home made spaghetti and meatballs.

She started with the beans. We thought we’d share the basics here with you, since as I’ve said before, sometimes I tend to try to skip cooking 101 and go straight to cooking grad school.

Grandma’s Delicious Green Beans

From her grandma’s script…
• 1 lb green beans
• ½ of an onion
• 3 tbsp bacon drippings
• 1 cup water

1) Cut off ends of beans and let soak in water.
2) Melt bacon drippings in pan over medium heat.
3) Stir in beans.
4) Add 1 cup of water and ½ of an onion and cover.
5) Bring water to a boil.
6) Reduce heat and simmer about 45 minutes.
7) Check water level, add a little at a time if needed.
8) Add salt to taste.

Stephanie was dismayed that she hadn’t been saving bacon drippings for use in, well, everything, all these years. I instructed her to start a jar now and use it for eggs, veggies, on top of cereal, whatever. Everything is better with bacon.

And what about perfectly cooking fresh corn? Again, we take our basic knowledge for granted.

Grandma’s perfect corn

Steph’s grandma says the key is in the sugar…
• 4 cobs of corn
• 1 tbsp sugar
• ½ stick of butter
• ¼ cup half and half

1) Cut kernels off the cob.
2) Scrape the cob to get the juices.
3) Add corn to the pan.
4) Add sugar, butter, and half and half.
5) Heat to a boil.
6) Reduce heat and simmer 4 minutes.

And what about the elusive pot roast? I served Mr. Meat and Potatoes’ mother and grandmother a pot roast one Christmas that would rival the leather strap I’ll bite on in delivery for toughness. NO ONE EVER TOLD ME HOW!

Mama’s potroast

According to my mama, a good pot roast goes something like this…
1) Braise it quickly in the roaster on top of the stove.
2) Pour a can of beef broth over it.
3) Pepper with coarse pepper.
4) Rub a half a package of dry onion soup mix on the top.
5) Cover it with foil inside a roaster.
6) Cook at 350 for an hour, and then lower the temperature to 225 for another couple of hours.

She also recommends buying a good top sirloin roast. My finding is that the more fat or “connective tissue” there is in the roast, the longer the braising process needs to be. You want to break down all that stuff that holds the meat together until it’s falling apart on its own. I also find that we kinda like a cheap roast, cooked for a long time. I usually use the crock pot, but that’s mostly because my mother has my grandma’s roaster and no roaster except that one will suffice.

What things did your mother and grandmother do that they neglected to teach you?
Who has the secret pie crust recipe?
Who knows how to make sandplum jelly? That recipe, for me, died with my grandad.

I’m going to stop the madness right now, and make it my mission to cut up chickens and learn to can something before I reduce another wine sauce. Do your grandmas proud.

Lagniappe
You long-time lawrence.com readers may recall Tom King’s food blog here…well, he was mentioned in this curious NY Times blog about food and William Burroughs.