My Comfort Zone

Food is everywhere.

Food is sustenance. Food is important. Food is your body’s fuel.

Food is feelings.

You get a promotion? Take your husband out for a celebration dinner.

You got fired? Bury your tears in a Peanut Buster Parfait.

Family get-togethers are all about food. Grandma’s chocolate birthday cake, Grandad’s famous grilled steaks, Aunt Bettie’s apple pie. What’s Thanksgiving without the turkey, stuffing and cranberry sauce; and the pumpkin pie piled high with whipped cream?

I was a child of the 70s, and a teen in the 80. My comfort foods are all about high carbs, high fats and sugar. Forget fiber, and if a vitamin comes near them, it’s entirely by accident. Plates were piled high with meat, potatoes and bread. Dinner began with "Go get a pound of ground beef out of the freezer." Vegetables came from a can, and “lettuce” meant iceberg. Period.

Biscuits and gravy

Bacon on Sunday morning

Spaghetti with meat sauce, iceberg lettuce “salad” and Roman Meal wheat bread with butter

My grandmother’s rolls

Tapioca pudding

Jell-o chocolate pudding cooked on the stovetop with that skin on it from the fridge

Tater tot casserole, made with canned cream of mushroom soup and TONS of cheese

Homemade waffles with warm Golden Griddle syrup

Fresh buttered popcorn – preferably while watching Star Trek

Tin roof sundae ice cream

Peanut butter and honey sandwich and a Red Delicious apple

Velveeta cheese dip with Ro-Tel tomatoes

Fried chicken, mashed potatoes and country gravy

Yellow cake from a box with chocolate frosting – that’s still the first thing I think of when I talk about baking a cake.

Chicken. Pot. Pie.

When my husband and I were dating, we saw the marvelous film “Life is Beautiful.” We left the theater in tears. We stood outside in the parking lot sobbing, then, we looked into each other’s eyes, and simultaneously said “Ice cream?” We drove to Baskin Robbins and ate our sadness away.

When I stand at my kitchen counter carefully portioning yeasty bread dough to make my grandmother’s rolls every Thanksgiving, I’m back in her kitchen, helping myself to two, or three or four of them, knowing she made them just because I was coming.

When I teach my son how to mix a jar of pasta sauce with browned ground beef and pour it onto spaghetti, I’m back at my parents’ dining room table, discussing Carl Sagan and arguing about relativity.

These days, the salad I serve on the side will probably be romaine and spinach with a homemade dressing, and the pasta will probably be whole wheat. My kids eat fresh or frozen vegetables every dinner. We keep fruit on the table every day. They know about food groups, fiber, lean proteins and trans fats. They have fish, not in stick form, on a weekly basis.

Which makes me wonder, what foods will my children associate with comfort and familiar times? Will it be the old familiar grilled salmon and steamed broccoli, or will they still turn to the high fat, high sugar foods I make when I’m stressed, or happy, or sad?

What are your comfort foods? What do you eat to feed your soul?