Dear Editor,
The quintessential SWNE diet consists of…?
Thinking fondly of my late grandmother who lived well into her 90s, whose diet consisted almost entirely of wheat thins and tomato sandwiches and whose exercise routine was a daily walk down the street to Todd’s Point Park in Old Greenwich.
What do you eat? When do you eat? and how do you eat it?
Looking forward to your response.
Tuesday, February 28, 2023
The Quintessential SWNE Breakfast, Lunch, Grazing, and Dinner?
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I am looking forward to New Englanders' offerings. Although I hail from Boston, I now live in Austin. My brother, who loves to cook and eat well, still lives in Somerville. We often compare food ideas, and I have sampled and compared the restaurant scene in Boston and Austin.
ReplyDeleteOur regular breakfast alternates between simple breakfast tacos of egg and, sometimes potato and/or cheese with Herdez guacamole salsa or avocado toast on homemade whole wheat toast filled with walnuts or pecans, pumpkin seeds, flax seeds, and a little molasses. It is topped with harissa, lemon, and Maldon salt.
Dinners are all over the map. Last night was a stir fry of baby bok choy, carrot, mushroom, snowpeas, scallions, and mung bean sprouts. Tonight is tacos of charcoal grilled chicken thighs, onions and peppers seasoned with cumin and New Mexico dried peppers, crema, and jalapeños. Often it is a small chop or bit of chicken with a pan sauce and a salad. A new favorite and frequent salad is arugula, beets, and marcona almonds in a white wine vinaigrette over a bit of mozzarella or burrata. Decadent nights are things like steak frites, lamb chops with broiled tomatoes, short ribs over barley, or cacio e pepe. Birthday dinner favorite is cassoulet. We go out rarely, but when we do it is almost always for Mexican. My favorites are enchiladas verde and mole enchiladas, but I won't turn down a puffy taco. We love barbecue, but it is so rich and heavy we rarely get it or make it.
Pie for breakfast?
ReplyDeleteI try to shop as locally as possible and eat what's in season! It's better for the environment and food tastes SO much better when it's fresh, local, and in-season. I also try to eat with more of a degree of formality than is perhaps usual in the States--I sit down with my preschooler and we have breakfast together, I take time to sit and eat lunch away from my computer, and we have dinner together as a family every night.
ReplyDeleteMy families most cherished time was around the dinner table. It seems a lost tradition to so many, but we happily keep ours.
DeleteIt never occurred to us not to eat all meals as a family at the table, just as our parents, grandparents, and great grandparents did. Over our lifetimes the level of formality has changed. There is no older generation to require me to come to meals in a coat and tie, everyday china has become the norm, and conversation drifts into once forbidden topics. We still nonplus our guests with the use of cloth napkins and napkin rings so they can be reused. The menus have not really changed too much for lunches and dinners, although I miss the superior seafood from the Atlantic and its bays.
DeleteIs it that unusual to eat at the table together? @Sarah, are you from a country with more formal meal situations?
Deletei don't pretend to be quintessential. breakfast most days is a cup of yogurt, but I don't always eat breakfast. Lunch varies, though popular options are a salad, often with protein cut up; quesadilla with vegetables, protein (maybe), cheese that i cook myself, sometimes frozen chicken or vegetable gyoza tossed in a few tablespoons of olive or sesame oil and cooked in the air fryer. Maybe an apple, at least the parts I don't feed to the dog. Dinner varies even more, except it generally doesn't involve red meat (spouse doesn't eat it) and often involves broiled vegetables with a little salt & pepper, grilled chicken or fish, either on their own or over a salad.
ReplyDeleteThough it seems boring, this and cutting ice cream (most of the time) and sweets knocked about 20 points off my cholesterol in a year. As a result, I'm much more likely to order what I want at restaurants rather than sweating the health implications. Had some near-magnificent fish and chips and a Belgian strong ale a few weekends ago....
Porridge with cream and golden syrup for breakfast Lovely
ReplyDeleteGolden syrup (in the tin, please!) is one of life's great pleasures.
DeleteI don't know about quintessential, but typically two slices of raisin bread toast with fresh coffee for breakfast, and a bowl of 30-35 dry Kellogg's Frosted Miniwheats for lunch (I count calories to stay trim). Most evenings, a nicer meal, often prepared by the Grand Duchess (a dab hand with Thai, North German, Spanish, African, Middle Eastern, Indian, and Persian dishes). Some kind of fruit usually follows about 10pm (grapes, an apple, banana, pear, oranges, clementines, etc).
ReplyDeleteLate Friday and Saturday evenings, my wife and I usually open a bottle of wine and enjoy that with some fruit, a few slices of quality cheese atop some nicer crackers.
Summers see tomato sandwiches, German/Norwegian cucumber salad (white vinegar, sugar, and thinly sliced white onions to taste), corn on and off the cob, lots of fresh tossed salads, and occasional region specific dishes like my maternal grandfather's pulled pork BBQ sandwiches, red slaw, and hush puppies, a nod to my family's North Carolina roots although I hail from SE Pennsylvania. Sometimes I also grill us salmon, steaks, and/or handmade hamburgers on the Weber, but we seem to be eating less and less red meat the last 20 years of so.
And grazing? Again fruit most often, but sometimes something as awful as Cheezits if they are in the house. I know. And I am so ashamed.
Kind Regards,
Heinz-Ulrich
Someone has to eat them. We appreciate you taking one for the team.
DeleteFranks and beans. But B&M has left Portland for the MidWest so I'll transition to franks and lobster.
ReplyDeleteLol. With canned brown bread, I hope.
Delete“Beer is food, Lewis.”—Detective Inspector Morse, Thames Valley Police
ReplyDeleteSoft boiled eggs & blueberries washed down with Topo Chico.
ReplyDeleteAs an afterthought, sometimes on Saturday or Sunday mornings about 10:30, either my wife will make us a batch of pancakes or round Swedish waffles -- I spread and then roll preserves in them, picking them up with my fingers as learned in Norway. Wife and son eat them the more conventional way with butter and syrup. -- or I fix us eggs (usually soft-boiled for 2-5 to 3 minutes or over easy) and toast with either sausage or thick slice bacon and either orange, or grapefruit juice, depending on what's in the fridge.
ReplyDeleteMy wife, the Grand Duchess, also enjoys half a grapefruit with weekend breakfasts and sometimes a small bowl of pickled herring.
And If we really want to live out there on the bloody edge, I fix us a hearty, Scandinavian/North German breakfast with various rolls, sliced cheeses, meats, various preserves, unsalted butter, hard-boiled eggs, etc.
Whatever sort of breakfast we enjoy on the weekends, there are always copious amounts of tea for my wife, and French press coffee for me. The now teen-aged Young Master has yet to discover the joys or those two beverages although he remains a big fan of hot cocoa and orange juice sans pulp.
Kind Regards,
H-U
I father loved kippers and onions on toast for breakfast. A bit much for me.
ReplyDeleteFeeling obliged to contribute. The garden tended to by my grandfather, my father, and now myself is the source of most vegetables during season. In the off-season, we frequent farm stands. Fish, meat, poultry and cheese are staples and we source them as local as possible.
ReplyDeleteWhen eating out, we dine at establishments that produce meals we could not or would not cook ourselves. In our area, most of these restaurants are located in Greenwich.
That which is unhealthy and would be adverse to our habitual exercise & competitive sport is avoided. We seldom buy alcohol for the home, unless we are hosting. Alcohol served at events is enjoyed modestly. I have not enjoyed pie for breakfast but can be persuaded.
I feel like lobster rolls have to be considered part of the New England diet, though not as frequently as every day. Dunkin coffee. For some reason ice cream was huge, more so than anywhere else, at least when I lived there.
ReplyDeleteIt is huge. You’re right. New Englanders consume more ice cream per capita than any other USA region. Perhaps traceable to local dairies, both of times past and times present. But watch out, Sterwarts is gaining.
DeleteStewarts Upstate New York and So’west Vermont has excellent ice cream. They have very loyal customers. The company has made many dozen employees millionaires with an employee stock investment program. Stewarts has a certain je ne sais quoi lacking in its New England convenience store/gas station equivalent.
DeleteFrozen custard is big here in Maine, made with extra eggs. It's decadent.
Delete
ReplyDeleteAs I have aged my dining habits have changed fairly dramatically. I hate to admit it, but my usual breakfast is Carnation Breakfast Essentials High Protein Chocolate with 1% milk and black coffee. Lunch is a large salad, usually a Greek salad, with no meat. In the evening, cheese and crackers, grapes, and a glass of cabernet. When I am forced to a breakfast meeting and order a typical restaurant breakfast such as an omlette, I am sluggish most of the mornning. When I go to a business dinner and have a small filet, I wake up about 3 am with great regret. While by no means a vegan, since I started the daily routine described above, at my annual physical, my blood chemistry and other numbers have all been in the green.
To Northerners, a Yankee is a New Englander. To New Englanders, a Yankee is a Vermonter. And in Vermont, a Yankee is somebody who eats pie for breakfast. --EB White
ReplyDeleteBeat me to it. Thank you!
DeleteNothing like a full English fry up for breakfast!
ReplyDeleteMy mother was from Fairfield CT. Growing up, we ate a lot of the New England classics at very regular times. Breakfast...pancakes, waffles, eggs, cereal. Lunch...tuna sandwich on white Pepperidge Farms bread. Glass of milk. Dinner..fish or meat with a starch. Pie. Indian pudding. Gingerbread. Now, I have developed allergies to mammal meat and nuts. I usually don't eat until after 10 am, fueled just by cappuccino I make at home. A typical day's meals for me are organic oatmeal with flax, Greek yogurt and a teaspoon of strawberry jam (although I will eat apple pie or bread pudding if we have it!). Lunch, if I have it, is usually soup, either tomato, carrot or butternut squash (made by me) with a slice of toast (bread made by me as well). Dinner varies. Last night we had a crispy potato tart with cheddar, onions and tomatoes with a spinach and arugula salad with homemade French dressing. Done before 6 pm. We do eat out a lot (I am part owner of a restaurant). We just returned from Montreal...a fantastic city for food. I am a huge fan of diners, and will try one wherever I go. And as another here mentioned, Cheezits (Extra Toasty) and fries are a weakness...but only only a rare treat.Burn it all off skiing, swimming, walking, and gardening.
ReplyDeleteMy grandmother was from Fairfield, too. Sounds like your fare was similar to hers. She would have been amused at how many words it takes to answer the question what do you eat. Sign of the times, and I guess a positive one. She would have said roast meat, fried fish, and boiled vegetables.
DeleteI have a pretty regular routine at work during the week, having two 8-ounce Noosa blueberry yogurts for breakfast daily. Lunch is most often a chopped salad of greens, grape tomatoes, croutons, goat cheese, carrots and roasted chicken with balsamic vinaigrette, interspersed with sandwiches from a good Italian shop and a weekly pub lunch with colleagues (salad or a burger).
ReplyDeleteDinners vary. My wife and I order in too often, sushi or Thai or pizza or BBQ, but we also cook a fair bit. I have a nice Bolognese that I make in large batches to serve over angel-hair pasta. Sometimes we broil salmon filets to have with rice (her) or in a sandwich (me). We have a recipe we still make from when we consulted with a nutritionist years ago in London: turkey burgers loaded with zucchini, green onions, cilantro and mint, served with a lemony sumac yogurt sauce. Last night my wife made rigatoni with a cream sauce of spinach, chicken and sundried tomatoes -- very tasty.
And we do enjoy a nice meal out. We live in a neighborhood in NYC with a lot of good restaurants, and we seek out others. Just had an extraordinary meal at the three-Michelin-starred Addison in San Diego.
And of coastal New England interest: Our annual two weeks on Martha's Vineyard find me mostly alternating between lobster rolls and fried clams, with lots of ice cream for desserts.
IMO, the days of Preps/WASPs not being able to cook and prepare food is declining. Some of us now care where are food comes from, who is growing it, what is sprayed on it, etc. This awakening started after my lymphoma journey however I'm not militant about it. I still enjoy Triscuits and Pepperidge Farm bread
ReplyDeleteIn Maine, I eat a lot of seafood. I love supporting the local seafood industry: lobster, scallops, crab, and clams are the big industry so I prepare many meals around seasonal seafood: chowders, bisques etc. In the summer, it's Lobster and clams steamed in beer; lobster rolls, crab rolls etc. In the winter, baked haddock, fish chowder, lobster-corn chowder and the like. Saturday Night Baked beans are a favourite with baked ham, slaw and yeast rolls. Roast turkey on Sunday which will carry one over with turkey soup, curried turkey sandwiches etc.
For breakfasts, I love toast served cold with butter and jam, a local roasted coffee or a good tea, lunches are light, salads or sandwiches and in the winter, a hearty supper of Chicken Pot Pie or a seafood dish. Summers are filled with seafood and farm-fresh vegetables and fruits.
I am not qualified to answer but love the question and the comments.
ReplyDeleteWe love/prefer cooking at home and prepare a lot of cod, haddock, salmon, tuna, trout, anchovies, shellfish, and bivalves, along with dark greens and non-starchy vegetables. Weekends permit red wine and splurging out with friends, or making any number of our PA Dutch/German favorites. --Holly in PA
ReplyDeleteSame breakfast every day: oats and wheat germ as a vehicle for pumpkin seeds, rose hips, bluebs, stewed cranberries, and pumpkin purée. Liquid is sweet apple cider. Chase with cod liver oil--keeps your coat nice and shiny :)
ReplyDeleteIn my experience, the more WASPy the household, the less food is to be found. At the top of the pyramid, you'll find Triscuits and cheddar cheese, Ritz and peanut butter, and gin.
ReplyDeleteHear, hear.
DeleteGrape Nuts pudding is a classic New England dessert or breakfast. Go heavy on the nutmeg.
ReplyDelete