My parents were refugees from communist central Europe. Like many immigrants, they brought no possessions, only children and a strong work ethic. My father worked long and hard to support his family, and my mother was a meticulous housewife who stretched a tight budget till it squeaked to cover food, clothing and other necessities.
Her specialty was low-budget cooking using basic and boring ingredients, the cheapest cuts of meat, garden herbs and produce to create phenomenal meals. We kids never had to be told to eat our vegetables, and leftovers didn’t last long. Mom made sauces, soups and stews, filling and nutritious, all based on homemade stock. Every bone, piece of gristle and scrap of poultry skin went into the stock pot with celery, carrots, onion and paprika, then simmered for hours until the bones softened to release their flavor and nutrients. After cooking this for a day or so, Mom strained the stock to remove the solids and cooled it until it jelled, so the fat solidified on top and could be removed.
What remained was a rich, flavorful, high-protein concentrate — a far cry from the watery, oversalted stocks and broths sold in stores.
“Saturday Soup” became a tradition, created on the fly between grocery shopping, errand running and shuttling kids to sports events and friends’ houses. Mom would toss the latest batch of stock in a pot, along with whatever remained in the fridge and pantry — rice, noodles or potatoes, bits of pepper and onions, a few mushrooms, a couple of sausages or leftover meat, along with spices and maybe a scoop of sour cream if it seemed fitting. She rounded this out with what was in the garden — tomatoes, green beans, some baby squash, a few sprigs of thyme or sage leaves. The soup simmered on the back burner until we could get together long enough to eat it, served with crusty homemade bread and butter.
