Granddaughter thinks her grammy is a great cook.   I haven't told her the difference yet.

My mother was an average cook of everyday things, but she made the best homemade bread ever....mouthwateringly delicious.  Fresh out of the oven it filled the house with a heavenly aroma.  She also made chelsea buns, butter tarts (from a recipe she concocted for the ingredients), and pies with her never-fail pie-crust recipe. 

My mom is brilliant in making a meal that will nourish the masses with nothing much in the cupbaords. She is however not a good cook. Not the worst by any means (that distinction goes to a gf's mom who made tuna niddle casserole by putting all ingredients, undrained in a pot and simmering until noodles were done) I still gag thinking of it.

I do recall my ex saying "can we stop on the way to your mom's to get something". It was to be able to say, "we already ate" and the not have it met by kids saying "We did? What did we have?" or  "No we didn't"

I was asked what vegetables I liked. I said, "corn". She looked at me... My mom bought canned vegetables because of cost and living in the city. She put them on the stovetop with everything else and they boiled to mush. I did not know they could be made without being mush.

Gecko, my mom also was gifted at homemade and handmade bread, rolls, buns, sweet breads.... and had the guns to prove it.

I'm the type of cook who would rather make homemade beef vegetable soup for twenty than the fancy squares to serve for dessert.

One of my favourite comments from Seelergirl as a teenager was "Mom can make good suppers out of nothing."   Ask what she meant she explained:  "I get home from school; look in the fridge and there's nothing to eat.  Mom comes home 1/2 hour later; looks in the fridge, and in 20 minutes there is a good supper on the table."   I'm pleased.   I could pull out a bowl with a couple of left over boiled potatoes, chop them with half and inion and a bit of celery, add a beaten egg or two, make them into cakes to fry beside a few sausages, or add a can of tuna to the potatoes and make fish cakes.   No potatoes - use rice.    And maybe there is a chunk of cabbage and a carrot or two to shred for coleslaw.   Somehow, even on the day before grocery shopping I could put a meal on the table.

People who visit the "Room for All" might think I'm a good cook - but if they look at what I offer for breakfast or brunch its pretty simple.

Pioneer spirit! I love it!  I strive to be like that. Am still working on getting my hubby over his fear of leftovers, having been traumatized with them as a child...Some foods were never meant to really go together or to be served so many times over.

Their mom helped out at a wedding or some other function and brought home ice cream buckets full of left over Chicken a la King which she put in the freezer. The kids lived in terror of when she brought out a bucket because she'd be feeding it to them for DAYS. 

Finally one day while Mom was out the eldest grabbed the offending stuff and pitched it off the balcony down the embankment in the back yard, over the fence.  All hail the Hero!

My mom was a wonderful cook.  My favorites of hers that were excellent (and I can't make mine taste like hers did no matter what I do) were:  homemade hamburgers, french toast, dumplings, stew, potato salad, and meat loaf.  She didn't bake lots, but when she made cookies they were wonderful.  Long, long after I left home and was working she would occasionally phone me at work to come to her house for lunch if she was making french toast or hamburgers.

My mom had a meat grinder and would grind up leftover turkey on about the third day of it, mix it with mayo, and onions - it was scrumptious.

Her stuffing was out of this world too.  I keep trying to make, but have yet come as close to what hers tasted like.

What can I add to this thread?  Oh - I know - I can say "We were fed.  We were reasonably healthy". 

I have good memories about the things my father made - mom's was just food - adequate, economical, unmemorable.

My mom was a fine cook-but a memory sticks in my head.

We were visiting friends at their cottage for a few days. Dad was a widower L was engaged to P. Hey Tabitha's mom could you please show P how to make your delicious lemon meringue pie? Sure I'd be delighted to. We'll do it later this afternoon.

And somehow a boat ride to the local store got arranged. The excuse may have been to get lemon juice or eggs. It was a small general store-but luckily it stocked Sheriff's lemon pie filling! and mom passed her recipe on to P.

The pie was great!

Tabitha,

My mom made GREAT lemon pies using Sheriff's! It was the best ... can you still buy it. do you know?

Beloved,

My mom had one of those meat grinders, too. She made Shepherd's pie from the leftover roast beef. The leftover ham was ground up for ham and pickle sandwiches.

Trishcuit, I love triffle!  I've never been bothered to make it, just buy it from time to time and it always has fresh fruit (with the exception of the oranges) not canned.  I've been thinking about making it but then I have to make a cake, custard, and maybe jello, then layer it all - too much work!

My mom is a good cook, but I can't think of anything as a special favourite that she does.  Lately, most of the stuff she cooks is boring and a little flavourless due to health problems that both she and my dad have.  My grandma on the other hand - I love the Ukrainian food!  My other grandma does a lot of baking and used to make angle food cake with a pineapple jello sauce that was really good.  I think my mom made it a few times too.

My dad is a decent cook too, but not quite as good as my mom.

My ex-mother in law is the best cook I ever met in my life.  She is Russian, born in China, so she makes some mean Chinese food as well as the traditional dishes. Nothing like Perogies from scratch.

Christmas and Thanksgiving feast at their house is exactly that: a feast. Full traditional turkey dinner with fixings as well as all the cabbage rolls and other things like that. More than once I ate to the point of extreme groaning discomfort, haha!

She kept an enormous garden  out of habit, with her children all grown  up and gone. But we'd still go over to eat and raid the deep freeze. She did lots of canning of course. 

She was the one that turned me  on to gardening. The first time I ever saw a pepper actually growing on a plant in somebody's garden was at her place. I was in a state of wonder. (what, you can grow them here?)

I believe I have her recipe for meat perogies around somewhere.

My MIL makes the very best rice pudding with evaporated milk.

Perogies from scratch!!!!   You have my mouth watering.   When we lived in Stoney Creek ON we had friends, the husband Ukraine from Manitoba.  His perogies were something to die for. 

A few years after we came back to NB, we visited the area, phoned and made arrangements to visit the next day.  You can imagine my disappointment when he ordered out for KFC (he had taken early retirement and kept house while his wife worked - so he was responsible for dinner).   It was a few years later that I learned of his death that I realized he might not have been up to cooking up a spread.  I'm glad we had the visit - even with KFC. 

But I still remember the many times we got together to enjoy his perogies. 

My family did the meat and potatoes thing.

Meal-wise, we were pretty meat and potatoes and Mom was pretty good at those basics (roasting, frying, etc.). Still use a few of her recipes today. Did a mean slow-cooked stew when we had a slow-cooker in the eighties.

Where she really excelled, though, was baking. Weekends often included a cake, pie, cookies, or some other yummy. At Christmas, we had squares, shortbread cookies, and fruitcake (delicious real fruitcake, not the bricks they sell in stores). Even did bread for a while (this was when I was little, well before the advent of modern bread machines like the one I use).

I never got into baking and my wife, being Chinese, doesn't bake either, so it's pretty rare to have homebaked stuff in our home. We generally only bake for company. So, with Mom gone and us not into baking, this is all pretty much memory now.

Mendalla

My grandma's homemade perogies were great, but not my favourite.  I don't think I ever got the proper Ukrainian word, but it starts with a P.  They are similar to perogies, but are baked and my favourite were the sauerkraut ones.  I think she used to put garlic butter on them too.  As she got older, Christmas Eve became a little more bought stuff (from the churches, not stores) and less homemade.  She was still willing to make those little bread filled pockets for me when we came out though.  I wish I was able to find some, there are Ukrainian food stalls at the farmers market but the closest things I can find are filled with cottage cheese.  I'll have to get the recipe, even though I'm not much of a cook.

My grandpa didn't do much cooking, although I think the vegetable garden was his project, he will bbq on occasion and I think he also takes care of deep frying the fish he catches.  In the summer, there are always tomatoes and cucumbers from the garden and my grandpa is always the one peeling the cucumbers with a knife and slicing tomatoes.

*Sigh* It's been too long since I've made a trip out there.

This is a mouth-watering thread!

My mum was a good "plain" cook. Her meals were usually inexpensive and always used simple and easily-available ingredients. Meat loaf, shepherd's  pie made from leftover roast, beef and barley soup, creamed salmon, fried chicken. She made wonderful pies too. I loved the sour cherry and rhubarb custard.

Her main seasonings were salt, pepper, onions and the odd bay leaf. Everything was really good though.

This memory lane stroll made me think of an elderly woman who was like a grandma to me who lived in our neighbourhood. I would go to visit her and she used to make these things that looked like hand pies rather than tarts. She took dough rounds and put a raisin mix dollop on one and topped it with another and crimped it closed. They were ooey gooey goodness that would drip on my shirt and mom would know I ate dessert before dinner.  I have never seen them since. MMMMMM

my friend had this Scottish step-grandma who used to live on our way home from school.  We used to stop there for tea weekly or so.  She always put out a big spread of baking.  Scones, cheese biscuits, SHORT BREAD.....

She also made a mincemeat square that she jokingly referred to as Fly Cemetary. My girlfriend used to freak out when she called it that.  (so Grandma Hudgin, with a twinkle in her eye, would push the envelope just a LITTLE further.)

My Mom likes to cook. Her food is usually great, though occasionally too adventurous. She knows how to do everything cooking-wise. It's from all those years of being a pampered housewife having to make herself useful and having nothing more important to do than swap recipies with equally cooshy, well looked after, innocent women.. (Can ya tell I'm a little miffed at her right now?)

Her lasagna rules though.