Last fall, Dad and I went out to dinner — one of our infrequent father/daughter dates that I cherish so much.
We were just tucking into our salads when a face and a voice from the past approached our table. It was Terry, a longtime friend from our hometown, and my dad’s former boss before he retired years ago. He and Dad exchanged hello’s, then Dad pulled the old “Terry, you remember my daughter Laura?” thing — you know, the you’re-not-sure-whether-they’ve-met-so-you-give-them-both-an-out thing.
Oh, I definitely remember Laura… and her poppy seed tea rings!, Terry said. That’s actually why I came over.
I suddenly remembered — Terry was one of the best customers of my unlawful cottage bakery enterprise from 20 years ago. Any time I got an order for poppy seed, I assumed it was from Terry. He loved those things.
Terry went on to explain how his daughter was getting married at the end of January, and while they were planning to serve “fancy wedding food” for dinner, he also wanted to have a buffet spread of casual down-home selections for the guests to snack on while they awaited the arrival of the bride and groom.
You know, the good Bohemian stuff we grew up on, he said. Stuff nobody makes anymore. Stuff with love stirred in.
He actually said that: with love stirred in. Was this a joke? I started checking the periphery for Ashton Kutcher.
Anyway, I would really really love to have some tea rings for the buffet, he continued. Would you be willing to make some? It would really mean a lot to us.
There are many reasons why I don’t cook for a living, and it just so happens that wedding caterer is close to the top of the list of nightmare jobs for me. (I’m way too much of a tomboy to deal with brides on a regular basis.) But if ever there were an exception to be made, this was it.
That’s why, several weeks later, I spent a Saturday afternoon making three giant batches of rich yeast dough. It was like being back in the kitchen of my childhood home — a dusting of flour covered every surface, bowls of fruit fillings were scattered on the countertops, lumps of dough were rising in random places under protective kitchen towels. Why hadn’t I ever installed that second oven?
Dad came over to help me deliver the six colossal pastries to the old Knights of Columbus Hall. How many parties and wedding receptions had I attended here? How often had I kicked up my feet to the Cotton-Eyed Joe on this floor? And — gasp! — remember The Chicken?! It was very much like the time I visited my elementary school as an adult, after several years away. Everything seemed so foreign, yet incredibly familiar. Places like these are part of my DNA.
Dad and I made a successful hand-off to the wedding planners, and then left them to finish their work. We attended vigil Mass together across town, and then dropped back by to make sure everything had gone as planned. By the time we returned, the party was in full swing.
Terry’s 80-year-old mother, Mary Catherine, came straight over to tell me how thrilled she was with the tea rings. Terry soon joined us, waiting politely for a break in the conversation, but none came, because Mary Catherine was telling me her personal Food of Love story.
She told me about how tea rings reminded her of visiting my grandmother’s house, and how no one cooks like that anymore. She told me about her trick to making good pork chops and sauerkraut (get a good sear on the meat, then add the drippings to the kraut and simmer long enough to meld the flavors). She told me about how she still makes chicken soup with homemade egg noodles, served over a dollop of mashed potatoes in the bottom of the bowl, and did my family do that, too?
Mary Catherine also told me that although she’d passed down all these savory recipes to her children and grandchildren, she’d never quite mastered yeast breads, and as such, no one in her family can make kolaches or tea rings. We spoke of it as a dying art, which it is.
Later, the gravity of that occurred to me. While dozens of the ladies in my mother’s generation baked these old world pastries, I’m the only person I know under age 50 that can do it. Dad says that Mom taught Stacie, my sister-in-law, how to bake tea rings, and if that’s true, that makes two of us. What exactly is happening here? In two or three more generations, will my great grandchildren even know what a tea ring is?
To many, this probably seems like a trivial concern. Who cares about old Czech baking traditions in this modern world? Here’s the point: we’re losing a connection with our heritage. America is a cultural boiling pot, and that is wonderfully incredible on many many levels, but assimilation has its downsides, too, as our cultural history slips through our fingers.
There are others with stories like mine — stories of how food connects us to our history, and how those foods are slowly fading away. Some of the foods, I’ve never heard of. Some, like seafood from the Gulf, I take for granted.
That is exactly why I’m about to turn off my laptop and pack for a trip to Galveston tomorrow. I’m headed to the First Annual Foodways Texas Symposium. I was ecstatic when Foodways Texas was founded last summer with a mission to preserve, promote and celebrate the diverse food cultures of Texas — but my excitement was because I know we have so much to celebrate, and I personally have so much to learn.
But now, thanks to Terry and Mary Catherine, I realize that I might actually be carrying a small torch for one of those diverse food cultures. Now it’s personal.
I hope to see you in Galveston.
