Food memory
At the supermarket today, bay shrimp was on sale for under $4 a pound. My intention was to make shrimp salads for dinner, but on the way home my memory went into overdrive.
When I was little, I went to visit my aunt in New York. It was just me, and one night she took me to dinner at a very fancy place. I remember a huge crystal chandelier and white linen tablecloths and napkins, and I wore a dress that flared out when I spun. You ladies remember how awesome it was to have a dress that flared out when you spun? I remember a place setting with a laughable amount of silverware and a tiny fork on one end. My aunt informed me that it was a shrimp fork, and I couldn't believe that shrimp would be so fancy that it called for its own fork. I couldn't remember ever having shrimp, and my aunt suggested I try a shrimp cocktail. I don't think I had heard of anything that sounded so grown-up or elegant in all my 7 years.
I remember it being brought to my table on a tray, in a tall glass with saved ice, and a little indentation for the sauce, and these enormous shrimp hanging off the rim. I remember feeling like a fraud, that surely they would never place it in front of me...hadn't they heard? I spilled things! I broke things! A glass like that with so much precariously balanced fare was surely an invitation for disaster at my hands!
But in front of me it was delivered, by a very thin, tall man in a dark suit, and I could not believe my good fortune that my reputation didn't precede me.
No need for the shrimp fork, I can tell you. My aunt showed me how to eat it (with your hands? NO WAY!) and she suggested I indulge in a Shirley Temple. I really thought I was the height of sophistication.
So as I sit here, my baby bay shrimp smothered in cocktail sauce, (not intentionally but rather amusingly piled in a "Finding Nemo" plastic bowl) I'm grateful for that cook who didn't know what an amazing memory he provided for a little girl traveling alone, and to my Aunt for not presuming what I'd like or not; just letting me discover it on my own and letting the experience be one to remember.
I hope as an aunt, mom and cook I get to do the same for someone else some day.
When I was little, I went to visit my aunt in New York. It was just me, and one night she took me to dinner at a very fancy place. I remember a huge crystal chandelier and white linen tablecloths and napkins, and I wore a dress that flared out when I spun. You ladies remember how awesome it was to have a dress that flared out when you spun? I remember a place setting with a laughable amount of silverware and a tiny fork on one end. My aunt informed me that it was a shrimp fork, and I couldn't believe that shrimp would be so fancy that it called for its own fork. I couldn't remember ever having shrimp, and my aunt suggested I try a shrimp cocktail. I don't think I had heard of anything that sounded so grown-up or elegant in all my 7 years.
I remember it being brought to my table on a tray, in a tall glass with saved ice, and a little indentation for the sauce, and these enormous shrimp hanging off the rim. I remember feeling like a fraud, that surely they would never place it in front of me...hadn't they heard? I spilled things! I broke things! A glass like that with so much precariously balanced fare was surely an invitation for disaster at my hands!
But in front of me it was delivered, by a very thin, tall man in a dark suit, and I could not believe my good fortune that my reputation didn't precede me.
No need for the shrimp fork, I can tell you. My aunt showed me how to eat it (with your hands? NO WAY!) and she suggested I indulge in a Shirley Temple. I really thought I was the height of sophistication.
So as I sit here, my baby bay shrimp smothered in cocktail sauce, (not intentionally but rather amusingly piled in a "Finding Nemo" plastic bowl) I'm grateful for that cook who didn't know what an amazing memory he provided for a little girl traveling alone, and to my Aunt for not presuming what I'd like or not; just letting me discover it on my own and letting the experience be one to remember.
I hope as an aunt, mom and cook I get to do the same for someone else some day.