You Remember What You Eat

After reading the articles by Ahn and Nicholson I gained a new take on what significance food has in our lives. Before the articles, I viewed food as something everyone needed to sustain their lives with. It was used as a means of energy, which would put it high on the scale of significance because it’s something that is daily necessity. After reading the two articles I not only kept this view but was also realized that food has a large part in your memories. Whether it’s the food that your English or Korean parents always ate or just something you can associate with a member of your family, food links different people, places, and events. Certain foods can hold more significance because you can associate them with someone or something that you value. The remained of this short essay will explain the foods I find significant and what memory I associate them with.

I have to start with a personal favorite, and a favorite that everyone on my mom’s side of the family seems to love. My grandpa was born in Georgia and since I was little he's raised us eating Brunswick stew. Around the time I was nine years old I had my first bowl, and at first it was too spicy for my taste. I only struggled through small amounts because I didn’t want my cousins to notice I wasn’t having any. As I aged and began to enjoy the heat that came along with the stew I began to associate the stew with my grandpa. When he died, we had Brunswick stew and Gazpacho at his Shiva because those were two of his favorite foods. Every time I'm at a family occasion on my mom’s side, there is usually a container of Brunswick stew that has been thawed out and made with dinner.

There are two places for every event that was help there, I would say 95% of the time we had the same two meals at each of the houses. I can associate a big tray of deli meat along with usually two types of salad one being either pasta or potato and the other being lettuce and a bowl of potato chips to my Uncle Bruce and Aunt Joy’s house. Technically Bruce is my mom’s cousin, but we all just call him and his wife aunt and uncle. And two large casserole pans with a regular and barbeque brisket along with a bowl of fruit and usually some sort of cake for desert at my Grandma Barbara’s. No matter what the occasion was, the meals consisted of that. On birthdays, Hanukkah, and after Passover ended there was the same meal at each of my respected relatives houses. Eventually we all got sick of the same meal, but no one said anything, it was the time we were spending with each other that everyone cared about so the meal of cold cuts and chips became bearable for all of us. That is why I hold a tray of mediocre cold cuts and brisket, cooked the Jewish way in the oven, significant in my memory, because of all the fun family events that took place at each of those dinners.

A few other foods that hold value because of my memory are pancakes, corn beef sandwiches, and this one sandwich called the bacon Loretta from a local high school favorite joint. There was a family favorite restaurant in the neighboring town that I grew up in, Highland Park, called Walker Brother’s Pancake House. My family of four, my cousins family of four, my two grandparents, and usually my uncle would all go on a Saturday or Sunday and enjoy a big breakfast. We all ordered the same thing, and rarely needed to look at a menu before ordering. To this day I still get a kids menu to do the word search and since I’ve completed the same puzzle year after year I can complete it in a matter of minutes. Another restaurant that I hold a special place in my memory for is called Manny’s Delicatessen. It offers one of the biggest most delicious corned beef and pastrami sandwiches I’ve ever eaten. Once again I grew up eating at this place because it was on the way to the airport when we flew out of Midway airport to go to Florida each winter to go visit my grandparents. When I was young I could barely muscle down half of the sandwich and then be too full to continue, nowadays I finish the entire thing without a problem except that I feel as if I have a small food baby after finishing. A final place that is specific to the suburbs surrounding Chicago where I’m from is called Sarkis Café. From the outside, the place looks like a run-down, dumpy place where some illegal drug could have probably been produced at some point. On the inside it’s not that much different; the place is small but legendary. You order at the counter and within ten minutes your food is in front of you. Orders vary on the type of Loretta you get. Whether it is from bacon to turkey, I’m sure they’d all be good if only I tried something other than the bacon Loretta with an egg and cheesy hash. This meal is made up of a sandwich made on French break with bacon, egg, mayo, cheese, and a mix of diced tomatoes, onions, and green peppers. A big pile of hash browns to the left or right with more provolone cheese melted on top and you’ve got my order ready to eat. The place only takes cash and sometimes it is so busy you have to order to go and eat in the car. It’s infamous for being the breakfast place for many high schoolers to go if there is every a day off or delayed start. It’s incredibly bad for you, but that never seems to stop anyone from going there.

Food can cause you to go back to a certain time in your life just from the smell. It holds a physical and mental value that I feel is one of the most important things in our lives. Not only does it sustain our lives, but it enriches it with new experiences. It can spark conversations if multiple people have ever been to or had the same thing as you and become a tradition if you make it into one. Now I have to go do something I’ve been waiting to do since I started writing this, eat.