Have you ever wondered “Why do we eat what we eat?” The answer depends, of course, on where you live, where you used to live, or even where your grandparents lived. Food brings up memories and we build our food patterns around these things.

For instance, my dad’s people were farmers and they emigrated from . Grandpa was up every morning by 5 am and started his day by getting the animals fed. I loved visiting their farm in . I liked to get up with Grandpa and “help” him (as much as an 5-year-old girl could help) pitch hay to the milk cow, slop the hogs, and feed the chickens.

So with that background in place, you can see it’s no wonder that they had food from their farm on their table daily. There was always whole, fresh milk in gallon jars in Grandma’s refrigerator. It was fascinating to watch her skim the cream off the top of the milk and make butter. That very pale yellow butter was incredible on Grandma’s homemade whole wheat bread (wheat that had been grown on my Uncle Orville’s farm, not far from Grandma and Grandpa’s farm).

Their real, grass-fed butter was all Grandma cooked with (well, other than the bacon fat she saved from frying up the bacon from the hogs they raised during the year). And this real butter was all she baked with, too. Her butter sugar cookies were the most amazing cookie I’ve ever had. The Swedes have a saying: “Food tastes better made with butter and love.” It’s all true, and to this day I can’t get enough real butter.

Then there was the whipped cream. Grandma always saved some of the cream for making sweetened whipped cream. Then she’d make cream puffs (using her real butter, of course). My cousins and I would load those things so full of whipped cream that we could hardly heft them up to our mouths! Let’s pause a minute and look at Grandma’s recipe for cream puffs. Some people fill them with custard, and that’s good, but we just filled ‘em with Grandma’s REAL sweetened whipped cream, and that was better!

SWEDISH CREAM PUFFS

1 cup water

½ cup butter

1 cup all-purpose flour

4 large eggs

Place oven rack one place below middle. Preheat oven to 400F degrees. Set aside a large (12 or more) muffin tin, very lightly buttered. Note: If you can, use a regular aluminum muffin pan, NOT a dark non-stick pan. The puffs will be much bigger with the regular "silver" colored pan. It's worth investing in one of these pans, as you'll be making these again and again.

In a medium sauce pan, bring water and butter to a low boil over medium-high heat. Reduce heat to medium-low and add flour, stirring well until mixture forms a ball. Remove from heat. Stir in eggs, one at a time, beating with spoon or large fork until dough is smooth. Beat additional 10 seconds to continue to increase volume of the dough.

Using a tablespoon, drop dough into deep muffin tins. This doesn't have to be an exact measurement, but depending on how big you want your shells to be. Divide all the batter between 12 tins.

Bake shells in 400 degrees F oven for 25 to 35 minutes or until puffed and golden brown. Important that the puffs are golden/crisp or they may collapse. Remove from oven and cool completely.

NOTES:

The shells can be prepared the day before. Just lightly cover with foil when completely cooled and let sit at room temperature.

You can also bake these on a well greased baking sheet, with your dollops of puff dough about 3- or 4-inches apart. The puffs will be a little flatter this way.

OK, back to why we eat what we eat and the foods on my Grandpa and Grandma Jacobson’s farm. Still on the cream theme: Grandpa always had a bowl of hot oatmeal covered in their cream each morning after he would finish feeding the animals. I think back on this and have to take exception with all the fear-mongering around fat today. My grandparents lived to their late 80’s and were spry and busy right up until the days they passed away. The thing is, they ate REAL, unadulterated food. Their dairy foods were pasture raised without hormones or antibiotics. That kind of food is making a come back, thankfully!

Now, bacon and bacon grease. It was from their own hogs. Grandpa always had 2 hogs on the farm. He wanted to make sure all the kids (and he had 12) had fresh pork for Christmas. Grandma put bacon grease in everything—mashed potatoes, stews and soups, biscuit dough—the list goes on. You can imagine how wonderful their home smelt. The memories haven’t faded.

I bet you have wonderful memories as well, all related to where your people were raised and their nationality. It’s fun to talk about food, and even more fun to serve it up. Let’s raise a glass to REAL food, lovingly prepared and gratefully eaten!

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