Burger Queens

One of my favorite memories from when I was little involves fast food. When I was in elementary school, my mom still worked for an engineering business.  After working 8-5 all day, my mother often didn’t want to make dinner when she got home.  Usually, she would somehow whip up a delicious meal, but the days my sisters and I couldn’t wait for was when we were allowed to get Burger King for dinner.

My dad often travels a lot for work, so when he does, it usually means that my mom and sisters and I go out to dinner.  Whenever we were little, when my dad was out of town, that meant we were getting Burger King that night.  My taste buds have matured very much since I was little, but I would always order the same thing each time – a plain hamburger with a large fry with sweet and sour sauce on the side. Eventually, I matured to a crispy chicken sandwich and onion rings.

The whole car ride home, my sisters and I would sneak fries out of the brown paper bag.  The eight-minute drive from Burger King to my house seemed like an eternity. My sisters and I could not wait to dig in. In fact, even though we all got a large fry (which we would never do now that we are all figure-obsessed) we would try to be the first one to yell “FIRST PICK ON FRIES.” Whoever yelled this first had the extreme privilege of picking large fry that contained the most fries. To this day, we laugh about how ridiculous that is.

I’m not really sure why we used to get so excited about Burger King. Sure, the food tastes good, and we’d always get some sort of prize in our kids meals, but I think it was just more of the experience of going. We would get all worked up because it was “Burger King Night” and think about it the entire day. One time, a Burger King employee even asked my mom out on a date when were in the drive-through! My sisters and I could not stop squealing and immediately called my dad and told him once we got home.

I think that everyone has some sort of fun memory when it comes to fast food, which is why it makes it such a part of our nation. People can say that Americans eat too much fast food, but when fun memories accompany the fast food, who can blame them?

Ice Cream Stereotypes

When I was in high school, I worked as an ice cream server for three years at an ice cream shop called Bruster’s.  To this day, I have never had better ice cream than I did at Bruster’s.

A typical day of work would include me serving ice cream to dozens and dozens of wide-eyed kids and adults looking to treat themselves. 

At Bruster’s, we would make our own ice cream, which certainly set us a part from the other parlors that were considered “competition.” The truth is, Bruster’s didn’t have any competition.  Up the street, there was a shop that didn’t have their own homemade ice cream.  In fact, their Hershey’s brand cream was typically freezer burned, and had chunks of ice thrown throughout each scoop.  The only benefit to this Hershey’s brand ice cream was that the store was open 24/7, whereas Bruster’s closed at 10pm. So for the late night ice cream craving, one had to settle for a less appetizing scoop.

I didn’t realize how much ice cream meant to people until I started working at Bruster’s.  I, like every other girl I know, LOVE ice cream. Sometimes, I just crave a big brownie sundae with extra hot fudge and extra whipped cream. At Bruster’s, that was one of our specialties.

Anyway, one night I was working and an elderly couple came up to my window. I recall that one ordered butter pecan, and the other ordered white house (a vanilla ice cream with whole maraschino cherries mixed throughout). In the ice cream world, these were flavors for older people. Most kids chose Oreo, cotton candy, or cookie dough. Young people got peanut butter puddles, a milkshake, or some kind of sundae. Middle aged-people ordered something like chocolate raspberry truffle, almond coconut, or coffee chocolate chip.

These ice cream stereotypes truly never failed. Occasionally someone would order something outside of their “zone,” and I would always instinctively, ask “are you sure you don’t want a taste first?” After their taste test, the adventurous order-er would usually change his or her mind.

Anyway, after serving the older couple their ice cream on cake cones (another sign of an elderly customer, I went back to helping the other customers in the huge line outside my window.  About twenty minutes went by when the crowd died down, I got a knock on my window. I opened up, and it was the elderly man and woman.  They went on to tell me that their ice cream cone was the best they had ever tasted, and they swore it was because of me.  I assured them that I had nothing to do with making the ice cream, and was only there to scoop it. Unwillingly taking my response, the older man gave me two one-dollar bills, and told me I deserved it. I repeatedly told him I did not need a tip, but he persisted, and the couple left.

After reflecting on that experience, I know now that it wasn’t about if I made the ice cream or not, it was how I treated the customers.  My boss was a stickler for having a good personality and always being “made up” before coming to work.

I think that giving someone a smile with their ice cream cone can make their experience even more delicious. 

Christmas Eve Dinner

“The Language of Baklava” is a story that hit very close to home with me.  Being 100% Italian, food is one of the biggest and most important parts of any of our family gatherings. 

The biggest memories I have formed with food come once every year.  Each year, it is also a little bit different than the year before.  On Christmas Eve, my family cooks more than I have ever seen any other family cook.  The Seven Fish tradition of Italian families is what I would consider one of the most common holiday meals for people.  Even if a family is not Italian, it seems like several people latch on to this Christmas tradition. 

Each year, about fifteen of my closest family members come over to my house to eat homemade pasta made with a baccala (fish) sauce in addition to six other types of fish.  The other fish include shrimp, smelts, oysters, scallops, crab, lobster, and some years even more.  The preparation for this day includes several trips to Pittsburgh’s “strip district,” where the freshest fish in the city is located.  Every single year for as long as I can remember, my mom, grandma, great aunt, and my sisters and I make the fifteen minute commute into the city.

In the strip district, the fish market there is called Wholey’s. They have almost any kind of fish imaginable, and near the holidays, it is always crowded. 

In addition to going to Wholey’s, it is pretty much a requirement that we make a stop at Pennsylvania Macaroni – one of Pittsburgh’s most famous Italian food stores.  While I could write an entire blog about an experience at Pennyslvania Macaroni, I will save that for another day.  

A few days later is my favorite day of the entire year – Christmas Eve. It is the only day of the year that I willingly get up before 9:00AM to help my family cook the most delicious meal I have ever had.

The room is filled with smells of fish. I understand that some people are not the biggest fans of fish, but I truly think it is impossible to dislike the meal that my we (mostly my mom) make. 

The entire house is filled with smells of garlic-y scampi, fried oysters, homemade spaghetti sauce, and salty baccala, along with dozens of other mouth-watering aromas.

We have certain appetizers and desserts that are also included in our Christmas Eve tradition.  Each year, platters of olives, cheeses, prosciutto, and lupini beans are lined up on the island in our kitchen.  For those who have never had lupini beans, they really taste like nothing.  My family douses them in salt to give them some sort of flavor. Eating them is more of a tradition than actually enjoying their taste. 

This post is truly only grazing my family’s tradition of Christmas Eve. In fact, I guarantee every one of my blogs could be about something different with our tradition.  After all, having 21 Christmas Eves with a big Italian family is bound to create a few memories.