10.19.2011

The Adventures of Macaronia me Kima.....

Normally, after I make something for the first time, I will post the recipe because 99.9% of the time, whatever it is usually comes out great. This is NOT one of those times.

Let me start by saying that this is definitely, at least, partially my fault.
My dad makes the best meat sauce. I mean THE BEST meat sauce.....which is why I should have bypassed my mother completely and went straight to him when I decided to make it for the first time.
In all fairness, when there is something that I have been making for a long time, I don't follow a recipe. I add and taste as I go. And that is really the way both of my parents cook............except.......my mom always forgets key steps or ingredients.
So Monday night I decide that I will make meat sauce since my youvetsi came out so good (better than my dad's!). I call my mom, just to double check that I have everything that I need and to clear up any recipe confusion that I had. I start browning my 1 lb. of chopped meat, like she said to do, using no olive oil and chopping the meat into little pieces. Add the red onion, add the garlic, add the cherry tomatoes, 5 peppercorns, add the can of crushed tomatoes.................okay.....something is wrong. There is WAY too much sauce. Daddy's never looks this red. So I call my mom again. She says "Oh, well daddy uses like 4 lbs. of chopped meat and 1 can of crushed tomatoes". Seriously??? So I send Billy to the store to get another 3 lbs. of chopped meat. About 20 minutes later, I start separately browning the new chopped meat to add to my sauce. PS, the sauce was okay but definitely not my dad's.
Yesterday, I hear my phone ringing. I reach for the phone but I had missed the call. It was my dad. The phone then starts ringing again. It's my mom. I pick it up and she says "Daddy wants to talk to you.".........he gets on the phone and in his thick Greek accent says " What did your mother tell you to put in the sauce?". So I tell him - The wrong amount of chopped meat, cherry tomatoes, crushed tomatoes, garlic and peppercorns. "No olive oil?" Nope. He shifts the phone and I hear him say to her "You told her no olive oil? What food on this planet do you make with no olive oil? What is wrong with you?'. My mom is now laughing in the background...and he continues to tell me what he puts in his sauce that she, of course, left out. Reminding her like 4 times that for 40 years, she has been watching him make meat sauce. We leave off with him telling me that he will get everything to make the sauce and I will come over so we can make it together so I can see how he makes it myself...2 different kinds.
Our cooking date is this Sunday............I'll let everyone know how it turns out!

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