What I wouldn't give to once again have the Wheat Shreds cereal we bought from our local Agway Feed Store in Meyersdale! Oh YUM! Much of the cereal we ate was made by Mom. She used to make and sell Grape-Nuts, and could produce one hundred pounds per day to sell! I remember the large baking sheets of whole wheat batter baked up nice and brown, cut into strips, cooled, put through a coarse grinder and then dried.
My dad fixed up an old cook stove in our wash house on the farm where Mom set up her operation, and he even invented a drum drier to turn by hand over the top of the hot cook stove to dry the ground morsels. Then she bagged and sold the cereal by the pound. One lady, Mom said, always came and bought twenty pounds at one time!
The recipe Mom used came from my Aunt Frieda, Uncle Henry's wife, and in case you're interested in trying it yourself, here's the recipe:
8 pints graham flour (16 cups)
3 teaspoons salt
4 teaspoons soda
2 1/2 pints brown sugar (5 cups)
3 pints buttermilk or sour milk (6 cups)
Mix all together and spread on greased baking sheets and bake at 350 degrees until firm. Cut in strips and put back in oven to dry out before grinding. Cool. Put through a grinder using a coarse blade, then dry and toast the cereal in the oven till dry and light golden brown. Stir frequently. Store in air-tight bags or containers. (Note: you may want to reduce the recipe to only make 1/4 of it.)
Applesauce was eaten with just about every meal. Since most of the hard work was done during the morning and mid-day hours, meals were heaviest then. The noon meal was called dinner, and the evening meal called supper which usually consisted of a soup, side dish, and some bread in winter. Many a summertime supper was a cold banana or strawberry "soup" made with the cut-up fruit, sugar, milk, and broken bits of bread. Mom would usually have some cold sliced canned hamburger and maybe a wedge of cabbage or lettuce and cheese with it. We had our own canned hamburger from our cows processed for us by Yoder's Locker Plant in Grantsville, MD. Round steak and roasts were commonplace; hotdogs were a luxury!
We grew most of our food ourselves, and sold strawberries and sweet corn. Potatoes were dug, cabbages gathered and Northern Spy apples picked from our orchard and the produce stored in the "porch cellar" where it was cold all winter. We could eat fresh things until Spring. We ate lettuce from the garden all summer long, and of course we had fresh milk from the bulk tank in the milk house. We didn't have chickens, however, but bought our eggs from a neighboring Amish farmer.
Sundays we often had company for dinner (our noon meal), and I can still see how Mom and I set the table, and how she fixed a roaster full of round steak that would roast in the oven during church. I learned from Mom to cook for a crowd, how to time food preparation so that each dish would be ready to be brought to the table at the same time. It takes practice and a coordinated effort, and I consider it a skill she did extremely well. I'm glad for all she taught me. My mother is truly a "Proverbs 31" woman: a virtuous woman whose price is far above rubies!
We didnt waste anything, but made good use of leftovers. For example, when we had a few servings of mashed potatoes and corn left that wasn't enough for another meal for our family, Mom would beat 3 eggs, add some chopped onion, the mashed potatoes and corn along with a little bit of flour. Then she'd drop about 1/4 cup of the mixture into a skillet with a few tablespoons of oil over medium heat and turn those leftovers into delicious potato patties, browned on both sides. I can still taste them, and once in a great while I get to make them today.
Yes, if those kitchen walls could talk now, they'd have a lot to say. Except you probably couldn't understand a word: they would say it in the Pennsylvania Dutch dialect of German, because that's what we mostly spoke at home. I wonder if those walls miss us. I miss them.
Copyright © 2012 Elaine Beachy
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