Chicken dressing and Memories
Today, for the first time , I understood my Mawmaw's chicken and dressing. Now I know this sounds strange, as you wonder what there is to understand about chicken dressing, except maybe to understand why some people even like it. Chicken dressing was always center of the important family dinners, we just never did without it. As far back as I remember family dinners, I remember Mawmaw's chicken dressing. My Mawmaw always made it--I don't think I ever remember anyone else doing it. And I always loved it. Loved it.We lost my Mawmaw to cancer about 5 years ago, and I still miss her terribly. She called me "sissy " and I miss hearing her say that, along with "I love you, too "and "I'll see you tomorrow". It's such a hard thing to know that you will never "see someone tomorrow" again.
Since she's been gone, I've sort of taken over the chicken dressing making part of dinners. That's what I was doing this morning--
I sat down at the table to pick apart the whole chicken that I had--I usually cheat and just use chicken breasts, but this time I decided to be "authentic" and do it like Mawmaw. I wondered how on earth I was going to get enough meat off that scrawny looking chicken for a whole pan of dressing. I started in anyways, pulling here, scraping there and doing my best to get every last morsel of meat off the bone.
It was then that my mind went back to those much loved pans of dressing from my childhood and I could hardly see to pick chicken for the tears...
I could just see my Mawmaw on her limited income sitting down to dedicate her time to picking every last scrap of meat off the bone-always coming up with enough chicken for her pan. Those pieces of chicken that as a child I would peer at doubtfully, wondering at their worthiness to appear in the dressing were explained to me as I dug through MY chicken. Those darker pieces of meat with the little bit of fat adds the best flavor to the dressing. The redder pieces were the ones closest to the bone--not undercooked as I previously thought, that's just the color there. The pieces of gristle that I so detest, I'm sure Mawmaw did too, and tried her best to get them out, but sometimes you miss some. Those cool little round shaped pieces of chicken were from a pocket on the thigh and those long thick white ones were from the breast. Even though I never actually did see her make it, I can just picture those wrinkled, sweet old hands working with that chicken with the thought of everyone enjoying the food later.
I learned alot this morning I guess--about how to pick a chicken and what is where on one, how much love (and sometimes tears) goes into a pan of dressing and how much I really do miss my Mawmaw.
posted by Just Me @ 5:01 AM
6 Comments:
Awwwww, great memory!
Beautiful post, Jaylene.
Indulge us some more sometime, OK?
Very touching.
Absolutely fine post!!! Ain't it amazing how much the older generation has given to us and many times we don't understand until WE have to do it. I remember things my dad did and I never realized the sacrifice until it fell my lot to do some of the same things for my kids. They make for beautiful memories.
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Let me do this over... and see if I can be clearer. This is a reply to a question on my blog: How was the coffee at Rooster's in Arab?
I enjoyed the coffee. I'm not a connoisseur of expensive coffees but to me I enjoyed it like I would have a Starbuck's coffee.
What really surprised me was that they have economically priced sandwiches. I'm all about not spending anymore than I have to.
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