Spaghetti again???
I have a pretty diverse pallet when it comes to foods. There are certain things I won’t touch, given my disdain for their textures, tastes, or otherwise bad memories associated with them. My keep-away food items generally consist of raw onions and tomatoes, mushrooms, squash, and spaghetti until recently. I know, I know…..what could I possibly have against spaghetti? It’s pasta, topped with a tomato sauce and seasoned ground beef.
I know I can attribute this to my mother making this a dietary staple in our household. I want to say it was weekly, but I remember having it multiple times a week. I vividly remember saying to her, “spaghetti again?”. She always replied, “Your father loves my spaghetti.” I understood my father liked spaghetti but did he prefer to have it multiple times a week?
One of the things that got under my skin with her spaghetti dish was her ploy to pass off mushrooms within the sauce. First, she bought the sliced mushrooms and added them to the sauce. I had to strategically pull out the mushrooms from the sauce to eat the meal. She and I had some good battles on this one. She was adamant she would not take them out or cook my meal special! Finally, she acquiesced and quit adding the mushrooms. She had found a new way by purchasing the sauce with mushroom bits. When I called her out on this, she would immediately deflect and say she did not knowingly buy the sauce with the mushrooms.
Many years later, I have children who love all things pasta, with spaghetti at the top of the list. Let’s face it, pasta is pretty easy to cook, and cooking up a meat sauce isn’t too much inconvenience. I understand now why my mother hung her hat on this dish! She was a working mom, and sometimes easy is the best way. Now that I think about it, I kind of like spaghetti. I like it even more because I make it, and there is no chance mushrooms will ever enter into the equation.