The Sunday Memory Drawer - The Great Cranberry Scare and Other Food Phobias

In the spirit of Thanksgiving, let's talk food.

When I was a kid, my favorite dish on the holiday table was always cranberry sauce. Still is. Now I'm enjoying a homemade concoction of this fruit, usually mixed with oranges or cherries. But it didn't get that fancy years ago. Nope, my family always opted for the can. The Ocean Spray can. The one you opened with a can opener and the cranberry sauce slid out in one gloppy mold. Just like we used to slip the dog food out of the Ken-L-Ration can. With the cranberries, they didn't even bother to use a knife to slide it. Somebody would simply take the metal lid and use that to cut up the mold. If Martha Stewart had witnessed this scene, she would have used that same metal lid to slice her wrists.

But that is what I knew about cranberry sauce and I loved it nonetheless. Except, of course, when there was a much publicized recall of Ocean Spray Jellied Cranberries one Thanksgiving. Seems there was some poison embedded or perhaps a little soupcon of botulism. Whatever the case, I was petrified. The moratorium was quickly called off within a month, but that didn't assauge me in the least. I would pass on cranberries for the next five years. I was convinced that there was still one can out there that had been ignored by the inspectors. Food poisoning was no doubt lurking right around the corner of Grandma's pantry.

Mashed potatoes scared me in another direction. One day during a family dinner, there was a pile of horseradish on the plate right next to the smashed spuds. It all looked the same to me. You know what happened next. I drank enough water that afternoon to sink the Bismarck. For the next several years, even though there wasn't a sprig of horseradish within a twenty five mile radius, I would not eat mashed potatoes. I was convinced that the dreaded hot stuff was lurking right around the corner of my dinner plate.

To this day, I am a tomato-phobe. Okay, I'll eat tomato sauce, ketchup, salsa, and stewed tomatoes as well drink tomato juice by the half gallon. But, a single slice of a ripe juicy tomato makes me nauseous. I will never forget how this started. Late summer in the Northeast was the time of year when fresh tomatoes could be purchased from an roadside stand. And I loved to just dump a little salt on one and bite in. Until one day, when I bit into a tomato that was pretty rancid. I heaved up oatmeal that I had ingested years before. That horrible taste has stayed with me ever since. I cannot get it out of my sensory perception.

But, explain to me how I will eat a slice of tomato when it's buried in a bacon, lettuce, and tomato sandwich covered in mayonnaise.

I never said this blog was going to make much sense.

Dinner last night: Sausage and peppers at Carlo's in Yonkers.