We were dining at my sister-in-law's home a week ago and we sat down to a simple soup meal, with side accoutrements and crusty bread. The minute I saw the pickles in a Fostoria relish dish I was borne away to my childhood!
Although Mother didn’t have Fostoria, my aunts did and always had pickles like that in those dishes on Sunday or holiday tables. The dish evoked a bustle of women – head coverings, capes, aprons, wisps of hair framing their steamy faces as they worked to get the turkey, mashed potatoes, corn, lima beans, peas, noodles, filling, gravy boats on the table at the exactly right temperatures (how in the world did they do that from tiny, inefficient kitchens), and gracing those groaning tables was always a beautiful, quiet dish of pickles – just waiting to complement all that delicious food! I have such wonderful memories of those boisterous, generous family times and they all came channeling through to that simple pickle dish.
Also the dish conjured up rows of canned pickles on dark shelves in the basement – a bare bulb illuminating all the colorful fruits of Mother’s summer labors and those little bumpy pickles to me were as enticing as the bread and butter variety although I loved them too.
Those recollected times were ones of planting the seed, harvesting, and preserving the bounty - all by the skill and deftness of our own hands. These were courtesy of Trader Joe's!
Nevertheless, the taste was spot on. And the memories rested as sweetly on my heart as the pickles on my tongue.
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