Tables full of memories................

I have many memories of spending time on Gwynn’s Island.  However we moved to Portsmouth when I was still very little, high chair age for sure.  We lived in an apartment complex called Williams Court.  Fond memories of Moma’s friends and their kids coming and going all day linger.  There was always a pot of coffee on the stove and a kitchen table to sit around and discuss topics of the day or hour. I had lots of kids to play with and it was a good place to live. In the early 50’s that area was full of growth. Downtown Portsmouth as well as Norfolk was bustling centers of commerce and Mama added to the coffers of all the merchants she could.  She loved a sale.

Mama used to make cinnamon buns, from scratch that put those store bought buns to shame. She and her friends shared goodies and even though she didn’t make these much when we got older I can still smell the aroma of the cinnamon coming from her oven.  I have started using a recipe for my bread machine that makes wonderful Cinnamon Rolls that rival the mall shop.

Cinnamon Sweet Rolls for the Bread Machine

 Ingredients

Bun

1 cup milk

1 egg, beaten

4 tablespoon melted margarine

4 tablespoon water

½ box instant vanilla pudding (3.4 ounce box)

4 cups bread flour or 3 cups bread and 1cupwheat

1 tablespoon sugar

½ teaspoon salt

2-½ teaspoon bread machine yeast

Filling

½ cup butter or margarine, softened

1 cup brown sugar

2 teaspoon cinnamon

¼ cup chopped walnuts, optional

¼ cup raisins, optional

Cream Cheese Frosting

1 3oz package cream cheese, softened

1 T butter or margarine, softened

1 t vanilla

2 cups confectioner’ sugar

In mixing bowl, combine cream cheese, butter and vanilla.  Beat at low speed on electric mixer till light. Gradually add sugar, beat until fluffy.  Milk may be added to make a good spreading consistency.

Instructions

Place all ingredients in your machine in order recommended by your machine's manufacturer. Place the pan in your machine. Select the dough cycle and press start. When cycle is finished, remove the dough, knead enough to punch down and roll to 17x10 rectangle. Combine first three filling ingredients and mix well. Heat in microwave 10 sec. to make it spread able. Spread over rolled out dough with rubber spatula. Get as close to the edges as possible. Sprinkle nuts or raisins over dough. Starting with widest end, roll the dough into jelly roll style. Cut into ½” slices. Place in a lightly greased baking dish with sides. Put in oven that has been heated to 170 degrees and turned off. Cover with towel and let them rise 20-30 minutes. When risen, take out of oven and heat oven to 350 degrees. When oven reached temp, returned uncovered roll to oven and bake at 350  degrees for 15-20 minutes until brown. Remove from oven, let cool slightly, then top with frosting. Yield: 9x13 pan

Mama’s cousin Doris Hudgins Ward lived near us and we were always spending time together.  She had a son close to my age and I remember playing together often.  I can remember going shopping with them and having my arm jerked more than once when I tried to follow him through a cloths rack.  I can see him now with his hands full of tags from the cloths as he held his hand open, grabbing tags as he ran and finally jerking them off as he came out into the light.  The sales people must have loved to see us!

Picnics were a fun past time for us in Portsmouth.  We would go to City Park or just behind the apartments and have an outing.  Peanut Butter and Jelly sandwiches were my fav as a child.  Sometimes we’d take a basket with chicken and other items to share while we sat on the ground.  I would discover later in life what a learning lesson making PB and Js were when my daughter brought the assignment home from school to practice.  Here is an example of the way to make BB&J sandwiches;

How to make a Peanut Butter and Jelly Sandwich

Gather material

  Peanut Butter Jar

  Grape Jelly Jar

  Sliced Bread

Gather Tools

   Butter Knife

   Napkin

   Plate

   Organize Material and Tools  on your counter top

Assemble sandwich

   Open the Jars of peanut butter and jelly

   Open the bag of bread

   Lay two (2) slices of bread side by side on plate, from bag.

   Pick up knife with the handle keeping serrated edge facing away from you

   Remove peanut butter from jar with the knife

   Spread peanut butter evenly on the left piece of bread

   Pickup napkin and use to clean knife off after spreading peanut butter

   Throw napkin away

   Use knife cleaned knife to remove grape jelly from the jar

   Spread jelly evenly on the other slice of bread without  peanut  butter

   Put knife down on the counter top

   Stack the two sides of bread on top of each other with covered sides together

   Cut sandwich in ½ or use cookie cutter to make cute shape 

   Enjoy your peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

It seemed Daddy worked all the time.  We’d have to take him to work because there was only one car.  He had a job at the Norfolk Naval Shipyard and one with Texaco working on a tug.  He tried real hard to help his Mama and Daddy at home and also had to keep up the house we had on Gwynn’s Island going.  Guess we moved up in the world while living in Portsmouth when we rented a house in Craddock.  Craddock was one of the first planned communities in Virginia and was a cool place to live.  We rented on Farragut Street from a nice lady and next door neighbor Miss Mary Sawyer.  A few years ago my son Jay took us back to Craddock on an afternoon ride.  We rode down the street where we lived and I remembered it being wider.  Our house was still there looking the same as in the ‘50’s.  Things around there had gone down but the town square, not so busy and the school still stands as a reminder of the good ole days.  We of course visited the Fire Station to see some of Jay’s friends as he is a Portsmouth Firefighter himself.  He has a mean hand at the stove at the station,too, wonder where he got that from?

I was about 4 when we moved.  On moving day I had the chicken pox and had to stay with Cousin Doris which I didn’t mind because she always had fun things to do.  I could spend hours watching her sew.  She made beautiful doll clothes for my doll and dresses for me.  She and Mama sewed together at times and boy the things they made were so wonderful.  Often for holidays they made a dress for me, my doll and my cousins Willis Ann and Lillie.  They were the youngest daughters of Uncle Willis, Mama’s brother and his wife Hazel.  Willis Ann was the one who Aunt Hazel was expecting when she took Mama to Richmond to have me.  She arrived 3 months later.

Moma, my sister Marlene and me wearing a dress Moma and Doris made me for Easter

It was in Craddock I learned about the poor starving children in China.  I’d sit at the table for hours because they didn’t have any food and I wouldn’t eat mine.  Green peas and carrots would be stone cold when I’d fall asleep waiting for them to disappear or Mama would give up and put me to bed.

On my 5^th birthday Daddy’s Mama came to stay with us.  We celebrated my birthday at the Circle Restaurant in Portsmouth.  To me then it was a grand place. I remember the packages all lined up for me to open.  One contained a doll that squeaked, it was from Grandmama Hodges.  It was the only present I remember getting from her until I was married and Aunt Louise,

Daddy’s sister, Aunt Louise gave me the last quilt Grandmama made.  Those presents made an impression on me.  She had a lot of kids to keep up with and me being one of the last made those presents even more special.

My child hood  memories of Christmas really started while living on Farragut Street.  I remember the year I got my Revlon Doll and the fuss that was made the morning, when I discovered her.  I got up in the early morning to go to the bathroom, when I cut the light on, sitting under the tree was my doll, her eyes reflecting the light from the bathroom. She scared me to death!  Nothing doing, whole house up and we opened Santa’s presents at 4 in the morning.  I loved that doll and she’s here with me today.

I remember before Christmas helping Mama make cookies for the neighbors.  She had this recipe for Cornflake cookies with cherries in the center.  I can see her stirring them up in a big bowl with a wooden spoon.  I would find out later she made sugar cookies because they were her Mother’s favorite.  I stumbled across this when I made sugar cookies for the first time after being married.  Mama had one and looked at me and said “they taste just like my Mama’s.”  Well she’s in here somewhere!!!

Cherry Corn Flake Cookies

2 ¼  cup flour
1 tsp. baking powder
½  tsp. baking soda
½  tsp. salt
¾  cup shortening
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
2 tbsp. milk
1 tsp. vanilla
1 cup chopped pecans
1/3  cup maraschino cherries, cut in half

2 ½ cups crushed corn flakes

Sift together flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Combine shortening and sugar; cream well. Blend in eggs. Add milk and vanilla. Blend in sifted dry ingredients; mix well. Add pecans mix well. Shape into balls using 1

12

level tablespoons of dough for each cookie. Roll each ball of dough in corn flakes. Place on greased baking sheet. Top each cookie with maraschino cherry half. Bake at 375 degrees for 10 to 12 minutes. Cool on bakers rack before storing.

Momsie’s Mama’s Sugar Cookies

1 2/3 cup sugar

½ cup butter

½ cup Butter Flavor Crisco shortening

3 ½ cup flour

2 ½ tsp baking powder

¾ t salt

2 eggs

1 tsp each, vanilla, butter and lemon flavorings

½ tsp cinnamon

Granulated sugar

Mix sugar, butter and Crisco until well creamed in the bowl of an electric mixer.  Add remaining ingredients, mix well.  Place in fridge for about 1 hour. Remove from fridge and make into 1 inch balls.  Roll balls in granulated sugar and place on cookie sheet.  Spray bottom of med size glass with Pam and dip in sugar, flatten cookies with bottom glass, repeat.  Bake cookies at 400 degrees for 8-10 minutes or until edges of cookie are lightly browned.  Dough may be rolled out onto a floured surface and cut into shapes with cookie cutters.  For festive occasions sprinkle with colored sugar or other sprinkles.

Craddock had a town center.  In the middle of the square was a band stand with an open place for people to gather during special occasions.  There was a drug store that had the best fountain cherry cokes and floats, and A & P grocery store and several other stores.  Afternoons after school my sister would take me to the drug store sometimes for a float or a Cherry Cola.  We’d stroll around the circle, I thought it was fun but I think she and her friends were checking out the boys.

 One night Mama and I went to the A & P, I was about 4 or 5.  While I was there I wanted a pack of gum real bad, but Mama said no so she didn’t buy it for me.  When we got home and she hung my coat up in the closet I kept bugging her to get it down, because………….inside my pocket was that pack of gum.  Well, when she found out I had taken the gum, she put that coat back on me and we went right back to the store.  I had to hand the pack of gum over to the manager and say I was sorry.  He felt so sorry for me he wanted to give me the gum but Mama said “NO“.  That made a lasting impression on me to this day.  Thanks to a smart Mama and nice store manager I learned one of life’s lessons early in life.

We stayed in Cradock until the beginning of my second grade.  On weekends when it was nice we’d head to Gwynn’s Island to stay at our house and visit with neighbors and family.  Sometimes Daddy would go to the seafood market in downtown Portsmouth and buy seafood for us to take home.  Huge Maine lobsters were his favorite things to get.  I can remember the claws on those things being bigger than Daddy’s hand.  I can see them now trying to get them into a big pot to steam them.  They were so active they’d have to put a brick on top of the pan to hold the lid down.  When they were done what a feast to be had.  Mama and Aunt Hazel would make lobster salad out of the claw meat and we’d have the tails with drawn butter.  The place would be full of lobsters and our tummies soon would be too.

LOBSTER SALAD

3 c. cooked lobster, claw meat is good for this, cut into bite-size pieces
½  c. celery diced
2 tbsp. sweet onion, chopped fine
3 tbsp. prepared French dressing
1/3  c. mayonnaise
1 tsp. white horseradish (or less to taste)
Paprika
Green onion tops, sliced small
Lettuce leaves

In mixing bowl combine lobster, celery, onion and French dressing. Chill for 30 minutes or longer. Add mayonnaise and horseradish. Toss lightly. Line salad bowl with lettuce and fill with lobster mixture. Or fill six fresh rolls with lobster salad mixture and serve. Garnish with green onion tops and paprika. Can also be mixed with torn lettuce leaves as side salad.

Later I would find recipes for Lobster Tails and one that we all seem to like was by grilling them outside.  Here’s an adaptation of a recipe I found.

Grilled Lobster Tails

4 (7-ounce) lobster tails

1 stick salted butter, at room temperature

2 tbs. chopped chives

1 tsp. dried tarragon

Ground black pepper

Salt

Lemon wedges, for garnish

Directions

Preheat your grill to direct medium-high heat.

In a small bowl blend butter, chives, tarragon, and black pepper with a rubber spatula. Blend thoroughly. Cover with plastic wrap and reserve. Using kitchen shears, butterfly the lobster tails straight down the middle of the softer underside of the shell. Cut the meat down the center without cutting all the way through. Insert a skewer down the lobster tail so the tail stands straight. Brush the tails with butter mixture and season with salt, to taste.

Grill lobsters cut side down over medium high heat about 5 minutes, until the shells are bright in color. Turn the tails over and spoon a generous tablespoon of herbed butter onto the butter flied meat. Grill for another 4 minutes, or until the lobster meat is an opaque white color. Remove lobster tails from the grill and serve with more herb butter and lemon wedges. 

Gathering around the table full of wonderful food was surely a way our family show it's love.  Love for our family and love for our food.  As we bowed our heads and said our "God is great.......we knew it was also "good" to be together if only for one more time.