What's In A Gift?

When my mum died, she did not leave behind much. Just enough money to cover her funeral costs and buy a momento. Her flat was rented and her furniture old and tired, so all I kept were a few bits and pieces, and that, as they say, was that.

The thing that I really treasure is a somewhat battered, aluminium pie dish. It is rectangular, deep, with a rim that has a slightly wavy edge and a corner that folded over when a youthful me tried to use it to open a tin of paint. There are fine grooves around the edge, filled with the charcoal remains of edible triumphs and inedible disasters. They will not budge even when assaulted by wire wool. It has been that way all the years of my childhood, my teens and adulthood.

My mum was a housewife cook. Basic to good, with an ability to make do and stretch ingredients. In those days the only fast food was fish and chips, doused in malt vinegar and salt, and a rare treat. Burgers were a greasy delight in the distant future and pizzas had never been heard of. Anyway, they were foreign muck, as my dad would have said. The nearest he ever got to 'foreign' was macaroni cheese, cooked from scratch by my mum and baked in that pie dish with a topping of bubbling cheddar. It was served with mashed potatoes, frozen peas, another new-fangled thing, and beef gravy. Don't knock it until you've tried it. I still cook it but skip on the spuds* and gravy. It gives me that feeling of warmth that filled a hungry child and the lesson to eat what was set before me.

Another of her recipes that often fills the pie dish is cottage pie. Simple, easy and filling. It just minced beef, diced carrots and peas in gravy, topped by mashed potatoes. The secret was a pinch of mixed herbs. She used to buy tubs of a mixture of dried thyme, parsely, sage and rosemary and used it liberally in nearly all her dishes. That, and beef stock cubes to make gravy. I always wanted to eat what was put before me, especially when it came out of the pie dish.

We were not in poverty but we were certainly not well off. One memorable week dad's wages had a big bite taken out of them, something to do with taxes, and were were skint.* It was going to be cheese sandwiches for the week. I can clearly see the grey tone to mum's skin and the grim set of dad's mouth. Out came the pie dish and the last of the eggs. Cheese sandwiches into the pie dish, a sprinkle of mixed herbs and egg and milk mixture poured over. When it was baked, it was served up. With mash and gravy, if course. Thanks, mum, for the gift of savoury bread and butter pudding. And a smile.

When the wages came in next week, we had a bit of a celebration. My all time favourite: lemon meringue pie. The only downside was that mum loved pastry, the thicker the better. And she had never heard of blind baking. This is where you cook the pastry before you put the filling in, that way you do not have the dreaded soggy bottom. I think this is where I learned to dislike pastry. She bought the double packet of lemon pie mix and made up the lot. It just filled the pie dish and the mound of meringue lay like lumpy snow on top. Gorgeous. I was given a big portion and scraped every last smidgen off the semi-raw pastry case. Nothing was said about eating it all. I noticed that dad left a wodge of pastry too.

That pie dish saw a few culinary disasters too. There's a cut of lamb called scrag end of neck. Like it sounds, it is the gristly, tendon-filled piece of neck, just below the skull, with irregular shapes of bone hiding in it. Full of flavour, but it does need a good cooking. At this time, mum was working as a nurse and her best buddy was Irish. I am going to blame Kathleen for the Irish Stew. Scrag end, onions, carrots, parsnips, potatoes and nothing else. No herbs, because they were not Irish. No stock cubes because mum suddenly realised they were beef. Never mind that they made gravy to go on pork, chicken and lamb chops, they could not go in Irish Stew. A bit of salt and pepper was allowed. The whole lot was thickened with flour, making a white, gelatinous goo, scraped into the pie dish and shoved in the oven.

I do not think that mum had been in a good mood that day. I was faced with a slab of this stuff that quivered on the plate, daring me to take a bite. I peeled off the top skin, misshapen bits of carrot and a shard of bone coming with it and stabbed it with my fork. I trusted mum, so took a great mouthful of it.

'Urgh!' I spat out the flavourless, over salted mush. Mum made a face, then took a bite of her portion. She too returned it back to her plate. Without a word she collected our plates a scraped the lot into the bin. I heard a sniff. I saw her wipe her eyes. Then she fried up egg and chips.

'Dad's working down in Orpington.' It was the first time that he left us, returning after a couple of weeks. She always took him back, it was not so easy to be the abandoned wife back then. Her gift to me from those occasional bleak times was a pie dish filled with love and dignity. When dad came back, acting as nothing was amiss, we had lemon meringue pie. With thin pastry.

I never thought about it until now but it was not until after dad died suddenly that mum started making steak and kidney pies. By this time, she had cracked the pastry recipe and topped the pie with a melt in the mouth crust and no soggy glop underneath. It was held up by an upturned tea cup and the filling was a tasty beef and kidney stew with plenty of stock cubes and herbs. Definitely not Irish. Apparently dad not like kidneys. She was missing him, and mourning him, but it was also one in the eye for him. After her passing, many years later, I found his shaving brush and mug in the bottom of a cupboard.

I love pies made in that dish, both sweet and savoury. They always seem to have so much more flavour, it is all the love that fills every dent and groove. Mum, and dad, gave me a lot of love and taught me be self-reliant. She gave me recipes to make something from nothing, not only food but also out of life. That pie dish holds my past, my present and one day I hope my sons will find it full for them too.

*spuds - English slang for potatoes.
*skint - broke
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