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| Easy Cheese Fish Fillet |
A Recipe From The Past
The box sat on the kitchen shelf like a shining beacon. It was filled with a mish-mash of various-sized recipe cards bearing an assortment of people’s handwriting. Some cards had faded newspaper clippings taped onto them, the yellow tape barely sticking to the various-sized snippets of recipes.
It wasn’t your typical old-fashioned recipe card box that you’d expect an octogenarian mother to have. It was made of thick plexiglass with a modern look, extra large and unbreakable. I’m sure it would last several more lifetimes. Inside were perhaps up to 50 years worth of recipes that my mother had accumulated throughout her life.
“Can I have that?” I asked my 86-year-old father, the guardian of the box.
“Why of course, take it, I can’t understand it.” He replied.
He is a man whose cooking skills consist of boiling an egg, a hot dog, making a cup of coffee and a peanut butter sandwich.
When my mother passed away four years ago, he also mastered the skill of heating up frozen pre-made dinners from the upscale deli down the street.
I was keen to find that one recipe that in my memory, was an all-time favorite. A white fish smothered with a Dijon mustard and mayonnaise sauce topped with melted cheddar cheese.
A dish where each bite brought you an element of satisfaction with a blend of rich taste and smooth textures, a real delight.
I scooped up the box like a squirrel with a new find and headed out the door.
These days’ recipe cards are like old photographs, they have disappeared with the click of a keyboard. Recipes of generations are slowly sinking into the abyss of landfills daily and being replaced by the expansive cyberspace and virtual clouds.
I thumbed through the fish section with anticipation and suddenly realized how simple cooking was back in the day – often just a few ingredients, with salt, pepper, and usually butter.
It was everyday cooking with no expectations to perform. Nothing fancy, complicated, or fussy. Its sole purpose was to feed, nourish and be tasty, although somewhat bland.
Today there seems to be plenty of anxiety around everyday cooking with the perception that we, the everyday cook, have to be superstars in the kitchen and produce picture-perfect meals as seen on T.V., websites, food blogs, and in magazines.
Perhaps we should turn back time and bring back these old recipes, refresh them with some herbs and spices and make preparing super-simple meals the new normal. Then just maybe, we will all be superstars in our own kitchens and produce tasty, stress-free meals.
I didn’t find the fish recipe I was looking for, but I did find the following yummy fish cheese fillet recipe that I have made many times since. It was written in my mother’s handwriting and was from the “Kitchen of Sheena Mitchell,” a dear old friend of hers.
The entire box is filled with a lifetime of memories around food, people, and experiences, the things you just can't find from a click of a keyboard.
