Memories .... granddad's favourate meal

[Ian Robinson]

My granddad - born at the turn of the 19th century , who served in WWI , ran away from home and fibbed to join the AIF, and became a coal miner prior to the after the GD , then after a long time with no work , much like a lot of his generation at the time.
Then he became a manufacturing jeweller watchmaker and made good money , even employing several men at one stage and despite having money when he retired still loved lard or dripping on toast.

Never really knew my other granddad much - died when I was little.

[acropolite]

that brings back memories, Mum used to have a tin with dripping near the stove, I seem to remember all the juices from the cooked meat went in there; we too had it spread on toast, sometimes we fried bread in the frypan with dripping.

I had little to do with my grandfather, for some reason he kept away from our family and favoured my uncles family, I suspect due to a long running dispute with my mother, the reasons for which I never knew. I saw him only a handful of times during my childhood and teens.

He was apparently a character, rumour has it that he had 2 families in seperate parts of the north east of the state.

One day when I was in my early twenties I spotted an old man over the fence next door, he was gardening and often spoke to my partner. I went binside and said to her indoors, I believe that is my grandfather, and it was.

Small world when after all those years your grandfather ends up next door in a small cottage and you don't even know it.

I didn't bother to ask why he hadn't been the grandfather that most people experience, the past is gone, we continued to exchange polite chat over the fence until I moved away.

[Dog Star]

Bread fried in dripping? Loved it!
A generous sprinkling of salt and pepper and a dollop of tomato sauce and you had a meal fit for a king.
Haven't had that in years.
I guess if you made it these days you'd have the Health Police and sundry other permit-wielding spoilers of good fun and upholders of correctness and public boredom descending on you in droves.
Damn their flamin' eyes!
(I think I might start collecting meat drippings in a billy again)

[Ian Robinson]

I guess I got the taste for it , though I don't remember ever actually eating dripping on toast , or bread fried in dripping , BUT >.... I can't resist the lamb seasonings that wind up being fried in the juices that come out those roast legs of lamb I am so fond off and which I do the preparation and roasting off to make sure they are done RIGHT ..... absolutely beautiful .... and probably doesn't help my obesity .... the caramelised sticky solids in the hot dripping fluids that accumulates under the baking rack in the baking dish is VERY YUMMY and NAUGHTY scraped off hot with knife and eaten ....

The dripping thing seems very appreciated by those of scot, irish and welsh decent .... known lots of immigrants who love eating the stuff or cooking with it .... makes very tasty meals .... the fat police and food nazies have a lot to answer for.....

I also remember my wife's pop being partial to dripping used in cooling.

My dad was fostered out in the GD after his mum died and granddad had no job or means of supporting them so he and his sister were fostered out , hated the people who he was fostered to, ran the farm on Ash Island so he told them what he thought of them and ran away and headed to Normanton to hunt and shoot crocs and became a stockman as a teenager and young man duing the GD, and when WWII broke out he road a horse to Brisbane to volunteer for the AIF.
After WWII was over he went looking for his dad and after a few years found him and showed up and introduced himself as his son , granddad's response was so what , and told him to nick off, dad persisted and evenly was accepted by him and they became inseparable.

My wife pours the liquid dripping into an an empty beverage bottle to toss in the bin, next time I do a roast leg of lamb I might rescue some the dripping before I carve the meat and save it for use later.

[Ric]

Only just knew my grandad on my mums side (English), he died when I was young but his favourite meals was kippers. It must have rubbed off on me because I love them as well.

I never knew my grandad on my dads side (Italian), he died in WWII fighting in the Italian Resistance. My grandmothers cookbook was given to my wife many years ago as she is a Chef and judging by all the dog eared pages I think he had a lot of favourite meals.

[Ian Robinson]

Haven't had kippers for ages , dad loved them , and he loved fried mullet and fried mullet roe ..... he always insisted on having mum buy tinned sardines too (the real stiff in oil), I love norwegian sardines in oil on toast (lashings of salt and vinegar mixed through prior to laying the broken up meat on the toast) , nice tasty snack late at night , very healthy - loaded with Omega 3 and calcium and other good things.

Another favourite of his was dried dates and dried prunes - I love them and sultana too....

Don't often see kippers in Coles or Woolies when I'm there.

[xelasnave]

Dripping yes indeed ...
What about bread, sugar and warm milk...or soft boiled egg in bread... poor farmer meals...vegimite in hot water with bread... if you eat that day I mean.
My grandfather was extrodinary fella...tuff as...when I was 22 and he was 72 he could beat me in an arm wrestle ...later no one could beat me but he was then not around to see if I could match him...

There was a country show and as was the custom a greezed pig was let loose in the ring..who caught it got to keep it..a wonderful prise in those days...a young fella caught it but two outta townwers (in a horse and sulky so they were slick) took it and no one would stand up to them ..except my grandfather...dropped them both and gav e the pig back to the kid who caught it fair and square.

He would get me each year and I had to tell him blow by blow each fight I had since I saw him last...
He did me such a favour...he told me if I started a fight I would get a flogging but if in a fight and I lost it I would get a real flogging...as a result I always had to block the first flurry of punches when someone picked on me ...but after that I could cream them... but I developed a great defence cause I did not want to get the greater flogging.

He was an inspirational person.

alex

[Ian Robinson]

I happen to quite like Vegemite in lots of ways , and Vegemite dissolved in hot water is a wonderful drink .... one I've not had for a long while.

I like Vegemite straight out the bottle on a spoon or bread and butter knife too .... very very tasty and moreish //// my wife just shakes her head when I do that .....

[GrahamL]

I have lots of fond memmories of the old boy .. his eating habbits wern't one of them :).. oxtongue , brains :P makes me sick just talking about it
And dripping !!.. I recently while clearing the table mistakedly licked the smallest amount of fat off my finger thinking it was mashed potatoe and
had to go hurl my dinner over the back railing :) ,, scared for life over ofal I'm afraid :)

[Glenhuon]

My mum used to keep the roast dripping too. When she made "Stovies" (Sausage meat, onion and potatoes with lots of black pepper. Simmered untill the spud broke down into a lumpy paste) she would add the dripping. Gave it a great flavour. :)
Never been too fond of the ofal, although I don't mind a steak and kidney pie. But the tongue, brains and tripe are complete turn off.


Bill

[PCH]

My Dad came from the poor side of town in the northeast of England and even now takes a certain pleasure in regailing us with stories of the economical crap they used to somehow consume.

Sheep's head stew with eyeballs floating around on top (yuk!) was common in their household (and glad they were to be first in the queue too, it seemed), along with some of the other things already mentioned here like tripe, dripping on bread and pease pudding etc. Most of this plop had disappeared off the menu (his menu - we never ate any of this god-awful guff :P) by the time we came to Oz in 1982. But until that time he was still bringing home the odd plate of tripe. I tried it once and it was instantly obvious why it was called tripe - gag, wretch, - it was absolute tripe.

Actually, pretty much the worst thing I've ever eaten personally was something that I've yet to identify. I used to be a ship's officer back in early days, and on one ship the Korean crew, gentlemen that they were invited us down to their rec room for an hour of convivial chat and a get together one Christmas Day. Because of my shift timing, by the time I got down there, pretty much all the other officers were already there and had already done what I was called upon to do now!!:P

I was first informed that I had to sing a song - cos I'm really good at that - NOT. But first I was to sample their hospitality in the form of this particulat food concoction. It looked raw and it looked horrible whatever it was, and the skipper quietly said to me that it tasted absolutely abysmal, but to eat it respectfully as they would be most hurt if I didn't.

Well, I bravely put this stuff into my mouth all at once - it was quite a large lump and dipped in some equally horrible looking sauce, and I instantly realised that I would rather have my tongue beaten paper thin with a meat tenderiser than suffer this. Boy was it awful. And worse, it wouldn't go down. Try as I might, it sort of half went down and then came back up again - several times. I signalled for a beer and tried to wash it down like that. By now, all the fellow officers were peeing themselves laughing but the crew were looking more than a bit either concerned or offended - I couldn't tell which. Trying desparately to do the right thing, I tried a couple more times to wash it down with a swig of beer and eventually it went down. At this point, the officers were just about having hernias, and the crew had begun to see the funny side of things too and offered a great big round of applause.

After that, the singing seemed a walk in the park :D

Oh - happy days :)

Cheers,

[acropolite]

Seeing we're on to offal dare I mention "black pudding", mum used to devour the stuff, made from dried animal blood. Yuk...

[Ric]

Hi Ian, they are more a speciality thing these days, I'd try the markets.

I haven't seen kippers in the supermarkets for about 10 years.

Cheers:)

[Glenhuon]

I still love black pudding. Fried with the Bacon and Egss for breakfast. Yummy. Our local IGA used to stock it, but not any more :(
Haggis gives me rampant indigestion. Not many Scots would admit this :)

Bill

[Ric]

Yep, don't mind the old black pudding either.

Has to be cooked right through and crunchy for me though.

[Ian Robinson]

Black sausage was very nice ---- mum used to get it for dad, and I used to raid it and boil it up if I spotted it.

[Glenhuon]

Medium rare for me :) Crunchy on the outside and soft in the middle.

Has a long history in the north of England, favoured weapon of the followers of the Martial Art of "Ecky Thump" (Well, the Goodies said so) :)

Bill

[Ric]

I remember that episode Bill, absolutely brilliant.

[Dog Star]

Ah, the Ecky Thump episode!
And what about the Bun-fight at the OK Tea-room Saloon? (I think that's what it was called)
Jeez those blokes were funny!
Might be time to start a Goodies thread?

[jjjnettie]

"My Mums black pudding was so black, even the white bits were black."
Eric Olthwaite (Michael Palin) from Ripping Yarns.

British humour is the best.

[leon]

Isn't it always the things we really like that are no good for the waist line. :whistle:

Leon :thumbsup:

[Ian Robinson]

True .

If it looks nice to eat, tastes nice, it's a no-no.

That doesn't stop me from eating them , despite being fat , why should I have a mizerable and bland diet and do without enjoying nice treats and meals just because I happen to be fat .... oh the looks I sometimes get if my wife and I eat out (by young mostly , by string beans and by those who seem to think fat people are subhuman or stupid).

[Jen]

:lol::lol::lol: i do that too :lol::whistle: i loves me vegemite :) it puts the rose in every cheek :ashamed:

[GeoffW1]

Hi,

I liked to eat raw tripe when I was a little bloke, and also used to steal the dog biscuits (from the packet :P). The black ones were best.

Anyone liked those cholesterol bombs called Scotch Eggs?

Cheers

[Ric]

Vegemite, now that is one food type I have never got the hang of.:scared:

I reckon you need an iron constitution to eat that stuff:lol:

[Dog Star]

Agree strongly Ric.
It's almost un-Australian to admit to this but I've never been able to handle that muck. I've never tried black pudding or haggis but I reckon they'd have to taste better than that burnt beer.
Bleah!

[JimmyH155]

Hey, there are plenty of kippers about at Woolies and Coles. They are called "Kippered Fillets" and come in an oval tin. Not quite like the old days, but at least the taste is there. My 19 year old son loves them, Most up-market shops like David jones and Meyers Deli's have kippers. - usually frozen though.:D
As for black pudding - YUM YUM. I found a deli in Redcliffe only last week and bought a large piece. Am going back for more before Xmas. :lol::lol:
My childhood, lots of dripping and even sugar sandwiches. Also we had baked apples for breakfast, with sugar and sultanas in them, and lots of cream mmmm mmmm;)

[spacefish]

Is it wrong that the thought of dripping make me hungry?

[Glenhuon]

As the old saying goes. If you like it its either Illegal, Immoral or Fattening :)

Bill

[Glenhuon]

I make them with a curried minced lamb coating. (Indian dish called Nargis Kebab). Nice little side salad, Hot Mango chutney, Basmati rice and a squeeze of lemon juice over the top of the egg before you devour it :)

Bill

[Glenhuon]

I liked the Patagonian Nose Vole bit. Graham Garden with the tail hanging out of his nostril. :lol:

The Goodies almost came to a sudden end. I was charging across the heather on an island in Shetland in the lighthouse Land Rover . These two guys suddenly popped up in front of me, one of them was Bill Oddie. Darn near ran him over :lol: He's a keen Bird Watcher and was a regular visitor to Fair Isle back in the 70's.

Bill

[Dog Star]

Hey Bill,
you worked on a lighthouse in the Shetlands?
Any chance of starting a separate thread and telling us a little more?
I reckon that would have been a great experience (to say nothing of running Bill Oddie over.):lol: