Soup and Shells

I decided to call this blog Soup and Shells. 

It is such an essential comfort food in my family.  Because it was the thing you had after coming in from hours of sledding on the Holden Hills golf course, because it was one of the first things I was able to make on the stove, because even picky kids (my sister) ate it, because it is the easiest thing to make when you are a poor college student, because it is good in hot weather or cold, because it is good with a sandwich or without, because the ingredients were often wrapped up and presented as a wedding shower gift, because it’s the meal so many of us had three weeks ago when we didn’t have her to talk to anymore… because it’s tomato soup and shells.

(Photo note - I set down this box by the stove, not realizing it was beside my grandmother's water mug in which I had taken home flowers a few weeks ago.  A Jungle Book mug is not required to make this - but if you have one, it will make you smile.)

The recipe isn’t complicated.  Basically, it’s

1 can of tomato soup

½ box of pasta shells (I used whole wheat)

   1.Cook the pasta. Do not drain. 

   2.Add the soup.

   3.Put in a bowl.  Add cheese.  Or don’t.

The most difficult part of this recipe, of course, was saving the Campbell Soup label.  I remember inside the cellar door, on the hooks where the aprons hung, was a plastic bag full of Campbell’s labels.  My mother would take them and give them to my school… which apparently was some sort of magic exchange program for supplies.  And in spite of the fact it’s been thirty years since we took that bag to Chaffins School, the labels are still good for a point that can earn educators supplies.  You can find out more about that here.

The best part of this recipe is how just one bite is comfort.  The perfect antidote to being confined in the house during a hurricane.  The perfect way to remember how easy it is to get warm after feeling cold.

Paste

I have a vague memory… and I confess it is a little hazy with the details of so many loud voices, buffets so long we have to cover the sink with a board, the warmth of so many bodies the door and windows are left open in 20 degree weather, the high-er chair with the 1960’s yellow flowered vinyl, cookie tins, the blackboard blanketed with important dates and children’s scribbles, 9x9 baking pans covered with foil hiding some treat so decadent your tongue drools from just a glance, the ‘Bless This Mess’ sign over the sink, so many photos on the refrigerator you aren’t exactly sure the appliance is white, the cupboards that sounded like an elongated one beat maraca when they slid open, the double stove with its nuanced temperature gauge, the gray specked table and its six red backed chairs, the place mats, the Corning plates with the brownish golden flowered rims, the all too soon empty pitchers of Bubby tea, the meat grinder used to crush ice, the dish washer with the on button left safely on the window sill, the piles of pots and pans to the left of the sink for babies to pull out and clatter on the floor, the spoons in a mug in the cupboard with the plates, the tea pot, the door into the hall with an Irish calendar and more photos, the clock that kept time with bird calls, the window with a glance of the driveway to see who was arriving and decide who was still … inevitably… going to be late, marshmallows in hot chocolate after taking off soaked through snow pants, the door into the breezeway with egg cartons of golf balls, the smell of bacon frying, a whistle, the laughter, the eyebrow raise, the pointed finger, the LOVE, LOVE, LOVE……

All those things are so real I can practically taste them, though I’m sitting in my living room watching the wind strip the trees of their leaves.  But in that vivid cloud, I see myself making dough with the mini pie plate, the kid's size rolling pin and blending together flour and water.  Perhaps in that specific moment there was a goal to make a pie crust for some apple or a lemon meringue.  Perhaps this discovery was a tedious waste of materials.  But I think it was at that kitchen counter – maybe even using that yellow flowered chair as a boost to be at eye-level – that I realized flour and water becomes a paste.  That paste that holds things together.

Maybe that is an unusual segue from the memories of buffets and pies and casseroles and voices.  But, in reflecting on that kitchen and its memories, I realized that kitchen is really where so many things came together and stuck together through every Christmas I can remember, weddings, sickness, new babies, loved ones moving away, death, birthday parties, and so many cups of tea with unexpected stories.

The stories of that kitchen connect me to my grandmother as much as the food.  But the recipes, in and of themselves, have their own stories.  Some I know.  Some I piece together from pictures and notes scribbled on a recipe card.  Some have yet to be told.

So I am going to make paste.  I am going to write this blog using recipes from that kitchen and weave them together with the details of those who made them decades before...and the loved ones that help me to eat and enjoy them now. Some in fact may even require some flour and water, but I hope to find through this experiment that magic connective element between that kitchen, its memories, my family... and me.