The BLT. Are you familiar with the sandwich? The summer standard? The BLT. That’s Bacon, Lettuce, and Tomato. When I was a child, my family was all over the BLT. My parents didn’t serve them often, but when they did, it was something of a big deal. The sentiment from most was “Oh Boy!! BLTs!! Yippee!!”
In the 1960s & 70s, Bacon was a staple in our household. There was always a package in the meat drawer of the fridge, sometimes 2 – the working package that was already opened, and the sealed package ready to be called into action when the current one ran out. There was usually a head of iceberg Lettuce in our frig as well. We didn’t have a lot of salads, but lettuce was available to be used in a side dish. For example, my mom might lay a piece of lettuce on the plate, add a canned pear half, place a dollop of Miracle Whip carefully scooped into the small indention of the pear, and add a sprinkle of grated cheddar cheese on top. Oh, I almost forgot.....topped with a maraschino cherry. Or, she might place the leaf of lettuce on the plate, add a canned peach half, and top it with a scoop of cottage cheese. And, of course, a maraschino cherry. I mean, how delicious is all that? Not very. Seriously. Not very.
Tomatoes arrived on the scene in the summer. Real home-grown tomatoes. There were always church members who would bring my dad tomatoes and other vegetables and fruits that they had grown. We also got tomatoes from my grandparents' garden when we visited. My dad started dabbling in gardening himself to grow his own tomatoes. Look at the ridiculous height of his tomato plants one year. What in the world??
All these ingredients, Bacon, Lettuce, and Tomato came together with Sunbeam White Bread and Miracle Whip spread to make a BLT sandwich. I literally had never tasted mayonnaise until I went to college. My family ONLY used Miracle Whip. BLTs were celebrated as a fresh, simple, summer food treat.
Only here’s the rub. I hated BLTs. There was nothing about the combination of flavors that I liked. In the first place, I did not like the taste of Miracle Whip. Not at all. Being a somewhat onery kid who did not like to agree, I often rejected things that my family considered to be staples. Like Miracle Whip. I sometimes took the attitude of “Nope, not me! I’m not eatin’ it!”, just because they wanted me to.
But, in this case, I really did not like the taste of a BLT sandwich. All of the ingredients together. Being weird, I DID like a sandwich of Bacon+Lettuce; or Bacon+Tomato; or Tomato+Lettuce, sans Miracle Whip. Give me 2 of the ingredients. But, not all 3. I just couldn’t eat the trio. That was me, as a kid. Yeah, I gave my parent headaches all the time.
Do you still eat the same foods that you ate growing up? Do you cook the way that your parents did?
People who are younger than me might have had a different experience than I did as a child. During the 1960s & 70s, processed foods were all the rage. Everything packaged to help the modern woman prepare a meal without spending hours in the kitchen. Hours that she didn’t have to spare, because women had hit the workforce like never before. With busy lives, no one had time to toil in the kitchen as their parents had done. Food had to be quick and easy.
TV dinners in aluminum trays. Canned Fruits and Vegetables. Instant Coffee. Instant Pudding. Instant Mashed Potatoes (I had to draw the line there- absolutely not- I would NOT eat that mush.) Although we had access to some fresh vegetables, we relied heavily on packaged and canned products for our everyday meals. High salt content. Oh, and sugar. Sweet Iced Tea and Kool-Aid all day long. I remember my mom adding sugar to Welch’s Grape Juice. I mean, why?
Now, I think back in horror at the types of food that I ingested as I grew up. Not my parents’ fault—it’s just what people did then. I don’t think we were much different from many families back in the day. Those were the trends. There wasn’t much attention to nutrition, unless vitamins were added to a product by Kellogg’s or Del-Monte or some other food processing company. The movement for fresh nutritious foods would begin later in the 1970s as the Hippie culture expanded, but my family was certainly not caught up in bean sprouts and homemade granola. We ate more traditional foods.
Interestingly, I even look back in horror at some of the foods I served my kids decades later as they were growing up. Lunchables, anyone? SpaghettiOs? Kid Cuisine frozen meals? Little Debbie cakes? Yeesh.
Anyway, back to the BLT.
I guess our tastes in food evolve. And our nutritional needs evolve, as well. These days, I don’t really care for bacon. I’m not in the “everything tastes better with bacon” crowd. I’ll eat it here and there, but I often pass on it. I haven’t bought a head of iceberg lettuce in years. In the frig, we usually keep several containers of spring mix, or spinach, or some other dark-leaf lettuce. And we eat a lot of salads. Our bread of choice is whole wheat, seeded, with flax and other nutrients. Also, there is always a jar of Duke’s Mayonnaise in the frig, for those times when you just have to have it.
The only ingredient of my childhood BLT that I even care for these days is the homegrown tomato. Now, that is something that no one can argue with. I hope you can agree that even the most onery child would have to appreciate the sweet, firm, juicy treat. A tomato fresh out of the garden.
I think it’s time for me to head off to the Farmer’s Market, to see if I can get my hands on some right now.
Hope you have a delicious summer! Enjoy your favorite foods! Bon appetite.