Nana's House

Our Nana, Rosina Victoria Slender (née Hopwood), much to her chagrin, was delivered of nine babies, all of whom thrived and grew into healthy children and young adults. My mother, Joyce, was her youngest.

Even though I lived with her until I was aged nearly 8, I have no recollection of her being a good cook, unlike several of her daughters. I am assured though that she was in her younger days, probably before cooking for a large family became a chore. According to Uncle Albert she won prizes at the Coolamon Show for her cream puffs and scones. She was famed for her treacle tart and her sultana-studded rocks cakes. I have never been certain if the rock cake reputation was because they were really good or really terrible. My memory of her baking them is vague at best. As to their palatability, I recall them as dry and unappetizing, but that is through the taste-memory of a child. On the other hand, Aunty Olive remembers them quite differently and looks forward to them right to the present day when Cousin Marilyn’s husband, Barry, bakes them. Whatever the truth about Nana’s rock cakes she could provide substantial meals at short notice for any number of family, friends and freeloaders who regularly happened to be seated around the dinner table, or as she would have described it, the tea table (in those days our evening meal was ‘tea’).

Olive and Dawn said that she could make food go a long way, for instance her  mashed potato patties filled with savoury mince. While browsing recipe books at Cousin Dawn's house, I have lately discovered a recipe in the Country Women's Association (CWA) Cookery Book that approximates Nana's potato patties. They are curiously named "Puffaloonies" according to the CWA. A recipe for them, along with a photograph of an experimental batch I prepared, appears below.  Nana might have used some lard or butter to  fry them. Feel free to do so if you are seeking an authentic culinary experience. I'm not sure if Nana would have used Gravox either but according to the CWA it is an 'optional' ingredient. In my mind’s eye I can see her shallow frying them on the old Kooka stove in the Blaxcell Street, Granville, kitchen. The oven door featured a blue kookaburra on its cream enamel surface. Nana had a slow combustion stove as well which she must have cooked on at some time. If I think really hard I can just remember a cold winter's night and a boiling kettle on the old stove. In time it was bricked over; a surprise in store for an enthusiastic renovator of the future.

Conveniently located immediately opposite Nana’s house was the little ‘Beehive Store’ owned by the Goodwins. Mr Keneally, known to Nana as Tom, worked there. His son Tom went on to become a well known writer. His grand daughter-in-law is now the Premier of NSW. Although small it was crammed with stock: large wheels of cheese, vats of milk ladled by the gill (about 120mls), tins of biscuits with any desired quantity sold in brown paper bags, ice cream in small waxed cardboard buckets accompanied by little wooden paddles, Kooka bars (think of Tim-Tams) and my absolute favourite, Pineapple Paddle Pops. Just like Pavlov’s dog, every day when the bell at East Granville Infants School rang, I would head straight to the Beehive Store for a Pineapple Paddle Pop. It’s a shame they don’t make them any more.

Fundamentally most children consider cooked vegetables, especially ‘greens’, as toxic. In this regard I was no different to most other children. Incompletely drained and incompletely mashed potatoes served with overcooked peas, swimming in their own tiny puddle of water, made a frequent appearance on our dinner (tea) table. But in 1956 help came; we bought our  first TV, a Pye 17”. Yes I was the first of the television generation. Eating my evening meal alone while watching  M.I.C.K.E.Y. M.O.U.S.E and dreaming of owning a set of genuine mouskateer ears, I, absent mindedly at first, discovered the crack between the lounge cushions and the space behind them; perfect for disposing of unwanted peas and lumpy potatoes. Fifty years and more has passed so I think that I can safely assume that I got away with it.