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What “family favorite” dishes made by your momma did you secretly feed to the dog or choked down?
There were a few things I grew up having to eat that really were difficult to swallow, but I didn’t want to hurt my mom’s feelings or get in trouble with my dad so I just choked and coped.
Pork brains with scrambled eggs. What was mom thinking?
Macaroni and stewed tomatoes. The tomatoes always tasted metallic - kind of like the can.
Fried chicken’s feet made me run. I made sure to be somewhere else when I saw those were set out next to the stove.

We were way too frank with unvarnished opinions to ever let an unliked dish be coddled.

Liver and onions
Cole slaw

My dad was fond of both so we got them frequently at the dinner table regardless of how much we disliked them. He was boss.

Curiously liver seems to have gone completely out of favor in the American diet. But I know it was pretty big back in the 60s and 70s as a frugal meat staple.

I know this because last school year I needed some liver for a biology lab and none of the usual grocery stores had fresh liver in the meat section. I had to go to an actual butcher shop. One or two of them did have frozen liver in the frozen foods section but I just needed some fresh cut liver and that doesn't seem to be something you see in meat sections anymore.

Ken wrote: ↑Thu Jul 31, 2025 12:09 am Liver and onions
Cole slaw

Fresh liver and onions is excellent. Chicken livers with onions and/or mushrooms is good, too.

Cole slaw.... depends. It's like macaroni salad: either it's a good recipe, or just bland.

R7ehr wrote: ↑Thu Jul 31, 2025 12:01 am We were way too frank with unvarnished opinions to ever let an unliked dish be coddled.

Going to bed hungry was always an option.
Sitting at the table alone staring at the unbearable plate (for hours it seemed) was a worse option.

This is where children could learn to stand for their personal convictions.

creamed beef
creamed peas
liver+onions (i later learned to like)

Our empathetic father would sometimes say children’s taste buds are new+sensitive, they get worn down after so much use, so tolerate more foods. could be.

Anyway.
The combination of walking distances to school AND missing a meal now+then, helped keep weight down.
Having every food and every meal taste good adds lots of calories! (fast food and processed food are main culprits)

Bright red and beautiful looking sliced tomatoes fresh from the garden. No matter how pretty they looked, I just could not stomach them. Outside of a small slice of tomato on a Subway sub, I still cannot eat tomatoes. Once we were invited to lunch with the church host family. She had these beautiful red tomatoes with a generous dollop of egg salad on top of them. I foolishly thought surely the delicious looking egg salad would diminish the flavor of that tomato. The salad didn't and it took everything to actually eat the tomato.

Another was my mother's homemade cornmeal mush. Just like tomatoes, it looked good, sliced thick, fried with crispy edges and smothered in gravy or topped with over light eggs. Just couldn't eat it.

Canned peas.

Tomato Aspic. When I took over cooking for the family, that never reappeared.

Did not secretly dislike anything- I was outspoken about it but had to eat it and not complain.
Some stand outs are lentil soup, kidney stew and baked custard. That was one dessert I HAD to eat.