Friday, November 1, 2013

Just a bit of tradition

   Anyone who knows me knows, personally or from my other blog, Food Flavors and Fun, I am of Italian and Irish descent. When it comes to food, however there are many more good things on the Italian side. No offense to the Irish side, and we will get to that in a later posting.
    Today my husband, the big "E" as I affectionately refer to him, wanted a big Italian dinner: pasta, braciole, meatballs, sausage, homemade tomato sauce, homemade bread, stuffed artichokes, and salad. I just thank goodness he does not want the antipasto, soup, roast beef, fruits and nuts, and pastries. But still, we call our version traditional because it is a big dinner that we request all our kids --all in their 20's now, to be home for. And best yet, we are having cavatelli and gnocchi. Okay #3 son is 4 hours away in Potsdam, at college, so he is excused. All others and girlfriends/fiances are expected to be present.
   Cavatelli is the traditional ricotta pasta shaped like little hot dog rolls, and gnocchi is a potato-pasta dumpling little thing that my kids call "brains", because of the ribs in the little dumplings look like a brain. I have home-made both, but when you make braciole, meatballs, sausage, bread, salad, stuffed artichokes all in one day, well you have to go with the frozen version of the pasta. I do have a life and many other things to do; including posting on this blog.
                             Here is a photo of my homemade cavatelli:
                                  Don't they look like little hot dog rolls? 

     The major problem with making these little beauties is that you literally make them one at a time, although I did devise a way to shape about three at a time--still labor intensive. But that is what my Italian Grandmother did: lived in the kitchen making sauce, pasta, bread, pastries, soup. Grandpa, on the other hand, after he stopped working, spent time tending to his garden plot, complete with a fig tree, tomato plants, and grape vines, or in the basement making homemade wine. Life was a bit simpler, even back in the 60's and 70's.
    It seems, however, that immigrant families were very much different than families of today. Most of us, now, have two income households, so many of the traditions have taken a back seat to the more convenient food fare. We have to, so we can make do, and get ready for another day of work, household chores, shopping, laundry.
   When I announced to my kids that we were having a "traditional Italian Sunday Dinner" they knew what it meant, and it was humorous to watch them alter plans to be present--without having to be asked. Since they started going off on their own I have let them know that their dad and I would give them room, but there will be times that their attendance is required.  Today was one of those days.
     Sometimes you just need to put your foot down and let them know "this is the way it is going to be" and it seems to be working here, because we give them a lot of their own space. Some families just have that tight bond, I guess, and the kids want to be home to share family time. Sometimes they just need a little "push".
   If you have any tricks for getting your family to honor your requests for their presence here's the forum to share. Love to hear your stories!

1 comment:

  1. You are so much better at the whole made from scratch thing. The best I can do is homemade pizza and sauce. Perhaps now that my nest is almost empty I can do things a bit different. Calling the kids back home, well, we'll see.

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