My grandmother was a wonderful cook. I know that mostly everyone says this, but I mean it. She was a true, family-style cook. Nothing fancy, just belly-warming, carbohydrate-laden goodies came tumbling from her kitchen virtually any meal of the day. My mother says she often stretched one chicken to feed eight people: my grandpa, six children, and herself. It is from this matriarch, that I learned to peel my very first beet, the slippery orb popping from the dingy, tan skin; that I tasted my very first homemade, sweet-tart, strawberry-rhubarb pie; and learned to love a childhood treat of bologna and american cheese, cut primly into matchsticks. (Come on, I was three and my grandma was originally from South Dakota.) It was when she passed away, that I received what have quickly become invaluable kitchen tools, among her KitchenAid Mixer, a variety of metal baking dishes, and other kitchen odds and ends; I received the grandaddy of all kitchen goods, The Cast-Iron Skillet.
A two-handed lifter, these vessels of down-home cooking are ideal for frittatas, sautes, scrambles, upside-down desserts. Just about anything you fry up on the stove, you can fry up in a cast-iron skillet. My skillets are at least 50 years old (the older the better), and cared for gently and lovingly. Following strict rules from my mother, the skillets are seasoned after each use with a thin layer of cooking oil, keeping the pans shiny, and ensuring their nonstick surface. If all turns out right, and it usually does in these blackened babies, I don’t even have to use soap when washing them out. Just rinse them off, clean with a sponge, and they’re good as new. Some of you might be exclaiming, “What, no soap, but how does it get truly clean?” To you I say, “I am just doing as my grandma would have wanted; if corrosive disease didn’t get her, it surely will not get me.”
When I got married, my uncle gave me a sturdy, cast-iron, dutch oven. It too was from my grandmother. While she made a variety of dishes from this pot, she always made her special Best Ever Donuts in this pot as well. Sprinkled with powdered sugar, and gobbled up while still piping hot, bits of grease gleaming off of the surface and mingling with the sugary topping to create a glaze of sorts, these donuts were truly a thing of beauty. Some might say, “A cast-iron pot, what a strange dowry.” That is the best sort of dowry. Each time I use those pots, dragging them out of the cupboard, practically giving myself carpal tunnel syndrome from the sheer weight of them, I think of my grandma. While she might have scoffed at my pea frittata with fresh mint and Manchego cheese, I am sure she would be thrilled that I was putting her skillets to good use.
