Special Menus

In her day my mother did lots of entertaining. She enjoyed having company. It was nothing for her to feed 10-20 people at a clip. And when she did, she prepared easy go to food—like trays of lasagna or sausage and peppers or chicken piccata.

At no point did she ever wonder Is anyone vegetarian? Or vegan? Do I need to prepare something gluten or fat free? My mother never thought about lactose intolerance or soluble or insoluble fiber. She used her box of salt liberally.

My mother cooked what she wanted to prepare.

Back in the day people did not worry about the special dietary needs of their guests because way back when people ate what you fed them whether it was on their personal menu or not. They just picked out or picked around the things displeasing them.

And I was overjoyed this past weekend that my daughter’s 5 friends visiting from out of town had no menu issues whatsoever. It was the first time in a long time that I entertained guests that were happy to eat anything I cooked.

No one cared about the wheat or carbs in the pasta or the lactose in the cheese. Everyone ate my non-grain fed antibiotic laden beef charbroiled with residual benzopyrenes. They enjoyed the processed sugar in the Funfetti birthday cake. They did not mind aspartame laced Diet Coke.

It made my job so easy.

Because lasagna made with  gluten free pasta, tofu formulated cheese and low salt organic meatless tomato sauce not only doesn’t taste very good, it isn’t pleasurable to serve. Part of the enjoyment of cooking is creating palatable dishes and then receiving acclaim for your talents.

Which is why I can’t wait for my daughter’s friends to return—they make all my efforts worthwhile when they say I love visiting here---the food is always so good—it makes me not want to leave.

Those are the words that keep me (and my mother) entertaining. All good cooks cook for the applause.