Hope SPRINGS Eternal

In 1 of life's sweet little ironies, yesterday, the Winter Solstice (aka 1st day of Winter), saw me find the 1st 2007 seed catalog in my mailbox. With the weather being so nice here in DBQ & feeling more like Spring, it didn't have quite the impact it would have had if there had been snow on the ground.

Actually, this is the earliest I can remember getting the new seed catalogs. But, I'm not complaining. The truth is they are a great connection with my childhood. Where I am at right now, I can't put in a garden, but I can still dream.

What is the real joy of looking at the catalogs is the memories they bring back of the garden my Italian Grandpa always had when I was a child. & his was 1 of the many in the Italian neighborhood of Oelwein. I will admit that I didn't enjoy the chores involved with a garden, nor was I very good at them (probably because I didn't enjoy them.). But that isn't the main thing I think of. I think of the loving care Granpa put into that garden, I think of the pride he took in producing the vegetables that he grew. & the fun of our front yard tomato stand.

Our house was only about 3 blocks from the Chicago Great Western RR roundhouse. So, every evening there would be a good number of men driving by to go home to their families. We would set up a table with a sign that said "Tomatoes, 25 cents a pound". (This was the 60s.) & we would wait for the men to stop. We had our kitchen scale & plenty of paper bags. After we weighed out the tomaotes we would always add an extra tomato. That is something I never see at the Farmer's Market today. Nor do I see any tomatoes anywhere near as red or tasty. Sometimes we would sell peppers as well.

1 thing I can guarentee is the beefsteak tomatoes we sold back then were much better than the pink tennis balls that today's hybreds are. Those tomatoes were each fairly unique in shape, unlike today's uniform shape. In breeding them for shape & shelf life we bred the taste out. Fortunately heirloom tomatoes & other plants similarly overhybredized to the point of no taste are making a comeback.

& those tomatoes made a great tomato sauce for our Sunday pasta. Homegrown peppers were of a decent size to be stuffed & cooked on the stove. During the Summer we went out back to get fresh basil for the sauce, we would trim the tops of the garlic plants & get a taste just as good as you could from a clove of garlic. Going out & gathering new potatoes to make creamed potatoes & peas. Shelling the peas was fun, & at times a contest to see if you could resist eating them raw. Bringing in a zucchini, slicing it, dipping it in an egg batter & frying it is a taste that can't be beat. Many of the vegetables & dishes we called by their names in the regional Italian dialect that would only leave people wondering what I was talking about, so I've been nice & using the English equivalents. After all, how many people would know what I was talking about when I talked about a cacuza, a zucchini or an nickname that could be endearing or an insult depending on the circumstances. On the other hand a patata you might guess rightly is a potato. Vasalico, basilico in standard Italian, you might guess is basil.

The point of all this is simple, a huge part of this Christmas season is the happy childhood memories we have. They are something to be thankful to God for. & a part of those memories are of the foods we enjoyed as a child. Many of the foods I remember are those foods grown by Grandpa. Tomatoes would be canned whole or made into paste or sauce before canning. In the basement we had a whole room with canned goods. There was this huge bin filled with the potatoes we grew, elsewhere, the onions were kept. In the freazer was frozen stuffed peppers as well as corn & peas (besides the canned ones). These memories are of the blessings of God's providence. Memories brought back by that catalog I got yesterday.

I will admit that I did see some neat new variations like the pool ball shaped zucchini, the green & gold corn that reminds me of the John Deere tractors I'd see in the rural Oelwein area or the white & green skinned radish with the red interior. Then there is the bloodshot eye-ball pumpkin.

Winter may just be starting, but Spring is not too far off & with it the promise of fresh veggies once again.