Instant Chazerai

I was shopping at Key Food one afternoon with my three-year-old daughter Esther, and I saw Archway cashew cookies. My mother used to buy these when she had parties at our house. She never bought sweets unless she was entertaining, so every time I tasted a cashew cookie, it was usually bridge night. My father would take out the card tables and set them up in our living room. The scrumptious spread of goodies was laid out on our dining room table. My mother Ruth always cooked the same menu - Swedish meatballs, stuffed mushrooms, and crab dip with tiny pieces of rye bread.

For dessert, Ruth made her specialty, apple cobbler. It was my grandmother's recipe, and it was delicious. She used only Granny Smith apples, so it was tart, not sweet. Ruth brushed the crust with milk and sprinkled sugar on top, and the sugar would caramelize when the crust was baked. She used Betty Crocker crust mix from a box. It wasn't homemade crust, but it tasted great - a perfect combination of moist, sweet and salty.

It was such a treat to have delicious food in our house because my father Phil was always on a diet. He was thin as a young man, but was a heavy smoker. When he was in his thirties, he contracted walking pneumonia and almost died. Phil had to quit smoking after he was sick. His new addiction was to eclairs, mallowmars and ice cream. Year after year, he put on weight, until he became obese.

So instead of the usual junk food that all kids ate in the 1970's, we had diet food in our house. Our snacks consisted of Jello, Rice Krispies and American cheese slices on melba toast. I craved the delicacies my friends had in their lunch boxes: Twinkies, Yodels and Snack Pack pudding. I begged my mother to buy me a box of Twinkies once, and my father ate the whole box in one day. I later hid food in my closet, so my father wouldn't eat it.

My mother Ruth was the queen of convenience food. She went back to work full time when I was in second grade, so she had no time to cook savory meals for us. Our typical meal was Jennie-O turkey roast, which was so salty, it was barely edible. My lunches included instant Giggle Noodle soup, which was basically yellow powder until you added hot water. Other lunches were frozen pot pies and macaroni and cheese. I actually liked the macaroni and cheese, it had a nice brown crust on the top and was creamy and cheesy.

One particular dinner was so disgusting, I can't believe I actually ate it. She made porcupines, which were meatballs mixed with tomato paste, and rolled in uncooked rice. The rice was supposed to be cooked first, but my mother didn't have time for such preparations. The porcupines where crunchy on the outside with pieces of burnt rice stuck to them.

Ruth hated cooking and periodically she announced, "If you had to cook meals for twenty years, you would hate it, too." I never learned how to cook, and I still don't cook much. My husband Kevin doesn't like my cooking, and neither do my kids.

That suits me fine. I think I'll just open a box of chicken nuggets or fish sticks for dinner tonight.