Y'all hungry?

     One thing Crackers love is food. Talk about, fix it, eat it, brag on your granny's cooking, brag on your mama's cooking, brag on your own cooking. Start thinking about what you're making for supper right after you've eaten breakfast. Admittedly, I grew up in a "mixed" neighborhood--one Cracker family mixed in with a bunch of Yankees.
      I never realized how differently we ate in my family until I spent the night at my best friend's house and did not eat my supper first. At home, we'd have some kind of meat--usually fried--two or three types of vegetables, white bread and cornbread or biscuits, and tea. (I don't need to say sweet or ice, because that's the only way we had it.) It was always served from bowls and a platter set on the table, and Mommy did give us some say over which vegetables we ate--at least two of the three.

    Imagine my surprise, when her mother called us down to "dinner," and the plates were already filled and sitting at our places. On my plate was a stick with little chunks of breaded meat, a giant stalk of broccoli, and a roll. I looked at my glass, hoping for some help to swallow down whatever this food was, and it was filled with milk. Not just milk, but powdered milk. My mommy had taught me that I was to eat whatever was put in front of me when at someone's house, and here I was stuck with this. I politely asked what the meat was, and I was told it was "City Chicken." What relief! It was just little chunks of breaded chicken. I wrestled a piece off with my fork. I did notice no one else was picking it up with their hands, like I would eat fried chicken. I popped that chunk in my mouth and gagged. And covered up the gag as best as I could. What was this stuff? No chicken I had ever eaten tasted like this! I had to take a swig of that tepid, nasty, water-milk to keep from choking to death. Mrs. Jones then asked, "Donna Jo, have you never had City Chicken? It's breaded veal." Well, I didn't know what a veal was, and now I didn't want to know and I certainly didn't want to eat it again. (Actually, I have NEVER eaten another piece of veal.) "I'm fine. Thank you. It's delicious." (At this point, I was none too happy with Mommy's rules of polite behavior!)
     At least the roll was there to help. It was actually a novelty too--a white, soft dinner roll. If there had been a basket of them on the table, I certainly would have eaten more than my allotted one. Still, there was that gigantic stalk of broccoli staring me in the face. What a decision! To eat another chunk of the meat or to start on the broccoli. I knew what broccoli was, but Mommy never made it. She made "normal" vegetables like  field peas, crowder peas, English peas, well, any kind of pea. She made pole beans, green beans, Lima beans, butter beans, baked beans. She made greens of all types, but never a green tree of any type. I gritted my teeth, took my fork and knife, and sliced me a piece of the broccoli. It was just as nasty-tasting as I expected, and, worse than that, it was raw! I was used to nice soft vegetables, cooked with bacon grease. This was bland and hard. At least I didn't gag, but I did have to swig that milk-water to get it down.
     Unlike Mommy, Mrs. Jones did not insist that I clear my entire plate. Whew. I managed to eat all the roll, most of the "City Chicken," and a few bites of broccoli. Enough to be polite, but not enough to make myself sick. And I determined to eat at home before going off for supper at someone's house again. Or at least ask what they were having for supper first.