My two favorite things: books and food

I can’t even remember where now, or why I ran across it, but yesterday I ended up looking at a picture of Melissa Gilbert’s new plastic surgery. And so, like I always do whenever I run across a mention of Melissa Gilbert, I thought: headcheese.

I can’t help it. Despite years and years of watching Little House on the Prairie, the one thing that sticks in my mind — the strongest association that I have to Laura Ingalls Wilder — is the food that she ate or made in the books. Headcheese made out of the meat from a bear’s head, the drizzle of maple onto snow … or later, the sugar that brings out the taste of the tea and the salt that brings out the taste of the potato.

I actually don’t remember a lot of details about plot in those books, but the food? Oh yes.

Or Trixie Belden, who always had the most amazing-sounding grub (also, I think Trixie and Jim were the first couple that I ‘shipped.) Moms always had something waiting, as did the other characters. I still want to try game hens baked with sour cream, and I have no idea what the heck that recipe even is. Something Norwegian, I think, because of the character who made it. (And this isn’t the right cover for this book — there’s no game hens slathered with sour cream in this one, just a cooler that a bigfoot rummages through. I do remember the plots for these, but the food sticks just as hard.)

And Ramona? My strongest memory from all of these books is after her mom and dad had a fight, her mom makes pancakes (and waits for the griddle to get hot enough that the drops of water will dance) and Beezus making a carrot salad, “as if a carrot salad would smooth things over.” I don’t even know if Ramona the Pest is the right book … but I remember Ramona watching Beezus, making sure that Beezus didn’t grate her fingers into that carrot salad.

So I’m curious — is there one consistent thing that you remember about the things you read, even if you don’t remember anything else about the books? The clothes they wear, scents, where you got the book or where you were when you read it?

And what are you all having for lunch and dinner?