Who says procrastination doesn’t pay? Why did I have a plan for what I’d write about even 12 months ago and just didn’t get organised? I guess like others I wondered if life wouldn’t get in the way of my ideas and blogging timeline.
My theme for this year is Family Food Fare and Favourites.
This arose as I sorted through my mother’s belongings after moving her into Aged Care. Among the myriad items were her all cookbooks, some of my aunt’s, some of my cousin’s, and even a few of my maternal grandmother’s recipes. Recipes were shared among friends, written down from magazines or the newspaper.
We also discussed the food our ancestors ate during one of our @ANZAncestryTime twitter sessions as summarised by our generous official blogger, Sue Wyatt.
In my view, family food has changed enormously in Australia since I was a child and it seemed like a good idea to try to highlight some of the changes, the traditions, and the food we enjoy. The influx of our immigrants has brought amazing variety to our culinary outlook and eating habits.
Where once upon a time, a take-away was rare and likely to be fish and chips, now it’s common to see families including all ages eating in restaurants of all standards.
Then there’s the coffee culture to which we were introduced by our Italian immigrants. Once the worst thought for an Aussie (men especially) was there’d be a Pub with no Beer, now it would be the loss of the myriad coffee shops and cafes that seem to be on every corner.
And what of the gender roles in the kitchen? They’ve certainly changed in our family…what about yours?
Will you join me on this culinary tour as I retrieve memories of food habits when I was a child and the dishes and food our family loves to eat today? Why not comment on the similarities and differences in your family’s culinary heritage? Sharing food is fun, in the virtual world as well as the real world.
Family history across the seas 
Excellent, I’m glad that CBB syndrome did not get in the way. I will enjoy your series.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks Carmel. Yes, can’t be bothered has been deferred by our little holiday jaunt. Just hope I can keep it at bay during Spril 🙂
LikeLike
Great theme choice! I am also participating this year, writing about my early teen years. My letter P post will have a culinary twist. Look forward to your posts and visits.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I’m saving my reading until Sunday given I’ve started late. Look forward to following along.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Great theme! One food change I’ve noticed between now and growing up is how much more prevalent soda is now. When I was a kid, it was kind of treat when we bought Coke or Pepsi or the like. Now, it’s rare that a day goes by when I don’t have a fizzy beverage.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Love the theme. I wrote an A to Z on my Southern foods and memories and also my husband’s Italian foods and memories. It was fun to write and remember. Looking forward to reading more.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks for visiting Jeanne – I’ll have to look up your food memories, sounds fun.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Great to see you on board with A to Z Pauleen. Every year I say it’s my last and then it comes around and I can’t resist. I love you theme, and can see there will be so much for you to write about. Looking forward to your posts. I do often wonder what our ancestors would think of us lining up at coffee shops for our morning fix.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I agree Jennifer – dad became a coffee convert but to this day mum still doesn’t drink tea or coffee.
LikeLike
I don’t know how your Mum survives without tea. And presumably tea cosies. Pauleen I just love the image for your theme. Well chosen indeed. It lured me in. Yes I remember thinking that my mother’s peasant lunches on a Saturday was so avant garde. Black bread and salami and cheese. Wow! We were early adopters of delis back in the 70s 🙂
LikeLiked by 1 person
Well I can see why not having tea cozies might be startling to you 😉 love the idea of peasant lunches…should be more of them.
LikeLike
What a great idea! I look forward to it. I have my Great Grandmother’s recipes (she had a little cafe). It was my intention to cook them all, photograph them and put them into a recipe book for family….but I never got around to it! One day!
LikeLiked by 1 person
That was my thought last year but Nope. How wonderful to have those recipes.
LikeLike
Those one-day lists just keep growing don’t they? I have far too many!
LikeLike
My diet now is so different and so much more varied than my childhood diet. Last night for example we had tagliatelle with an avocado sauce. Tagliatelle and avocado were words I had never heard as a kid.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I suspect that’s true for most of us. Culinary habits have certainly changed in all sorts of ways. We couldn’t even have pronounced tagliatelle back in the day 😉
LikeLike
I do almost all the cooking (99.9%) for my wife and I. We don’t get very elaborate with meals anymore–not like when our daughters were still living at home. My father very rarely cooked (like maybe twice in my life that I remember). I sure went a different route as I always cooked for my household.
Arlee Bird
Tossing It Out
LikeLiked by 1 person
Times have certainly changed in terms of who the chef is in the household. I remember one man who was a decided aberration for his love of cooking in the 50s.
LikeLike