Appalling isn’t it? I can cook from here to Bombay, but do I? No. At least, not for me. I cook daily for my son at his home, but here, the dog eats better than I do… she, at least, reminds me twice a day without fail to fill her bowls with something decent.
I live mainly on coffee unless I have visitors, with the odd foray into the larder every now and then in search of something I can nibble while I work. Which is where the packet of crisps materialised… and the rice pudding.
I was going to write about that.. then I remembered that I already had done so, some time ago.. so, as I am up-to- the- eyeballs busy and none too well either, I thought I might share the memories again… cold rice pudding takes me back a very long way…
When I was a very little girl I remember my grandmother telling me that cold rice pudding was an infallible cure for a broken heart. I cannot remember why my heart was broken at that early age, but it obviously was, because she served me a bowl of the stuff. It made me giggle. So as a cure it was, at that point in time, pretty effective.
It had to be the tinned version, of course. Real rice pudding, baked with cream and butter and freshly grated nutmeg was serious and the thought takes me back a further generation to my great grandparents’ home, with the square, Deco crockery painted with daffodils. As an even littler girl I had to clear my plate enough to see those daffodils… which was one way of getting a child to eat her greens.
Memories of food, the smells and tastes that come back, visual memories of scenes and rooms, tiny details almost forgotten, intricately linked with those moments in time shared with loved ones. Remembering the daffodil plates I can see my great grandfather sitting opposite, his hair white as snow, cheeks traced with tiny spider veins. Behind me is grandma’s treadle sewing machine with the drawers stuffed with treasures and the brass inkstand shaped like one of the setters.
Most of the small room was taken up with the great carved dresser with grandad’s treasures from India. Opposite was the big, black-leaded Yorkist range with the bread oven, where the fire burned always and sometimes we made toast in front of the flames or watched strange landscapes in the embers of the coals. And always there were the three red setters, Bonnie, Rory and Meg and great grandma, seated in her chair in the corner with her beautiful long hair bound around her head in a coronet of plaits.
They taught me to cook. All of them, one after another. A simple, homely thread of loving that even now can take me back to their hearths and homes. I was luckier than many and remember most of my great grandparents. There were photographs of five generations together. The threads of learning went back in time for me in a very vivid way.
So the child that grew learned much first hand that in many families she would have missed. I sat at my great grandmother’s knee as she told me of her own childhood in the 1800′s and of her courtship with her husband to be. And she taught me to pray. Not the written prayers we learned in school, but as she did. Simply and from the heart.
Until her death in her very late nineties, she chatted with her God every night, shared the day’s joys with Him, because, she said, they were His and He should know how glad they made her. She took Him her sorrows and fears and laid them in His lap. She taught me never to ask for anything for myself because He knew best and would give what was needed. But to ask instead for blessings on everyone else.
Her relationship with God was a very personal one. She spoke to Him like a friend and that memory stayed with me. My own journey has been convoluted perhaps, my image of Divinity has shifted somewhat from that childhood vision, but the simplicity of those prayers remained. So did something she told me when I asked her where God lived. She smiled at me very gently and said, ‘In your heart.’
Sue Vincent's Daily Echo 
Beautiful, touching and so very warm. Thank you so much for sharing ❤
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I was lucky to have them ❤
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Thank you for such lovely, warming memories, Sue. So comforting to re-visit. How lucky to have had such long-lived relatives. I too had two sets of grand-parents to visit for special times and durable recollections. x
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I was incredibly lucky, Joy, to have known them. My great grandmother was still here for my own sons to know too 🙂 x
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My childhood was very different to yours, but we share the importance of food in and for the family. My mother wasn’t a very demonstrative woman, but for her, love was in the food she prepared every day, from scratch. No surprise then that food means love to me too. 🙂
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Many of my childhood memories are tied up with kitchens. Back in the day in Yorkshire, the kitchen was still the heart of the home… or the room next to it that was an extension of the tiny scullery where the real work happened.
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Yeah, the kitchen was the heart of our home too. I remember it being big enough for a comfortable kitchen table and chairs so we ate where the food was prepared. We did have a formal dining room, but I honestly can’t remember Mum using it. She must have done as she loved having visitors, but I suspect her favourite visitors ate in the kitchen with us. 😀
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Even in my other grandparents home, a rather grand mansion-type place, the kitchen was the place to be 🙂
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Isn’t it nice that house design has finally caught up with reality? My kitchen now is both the spiritual and geographic heart of my house. 🙂
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I’m suffering the architectural irony of living in a tiny, one bedroomed flat, alone with the dog… and havng the biggest, best kitchen/diner I’ve had in decades.
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lmao! All that means is that you should cook more for yourself. Okay, really for Ani, but for yourself too. -hugs-
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I really should…but after cooking good meals every day for my son, the bext I usually manage is beans on toast or a salad 😉
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Well, at least that’s kind of healthy. 😀 I do understand your reluctance though. After 30 odds years of cooking every day, the love of food does tend to wane. I’m just very lucky that the Offspring has become a brilliant cook and is now cooking on alternate weeks. I’ve started enjoying cooking again.
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I enjoy cooking for others… but eating for anything but maintenance should be a shared experience. And, in spite of anything she tries to tell me, the dog doesn’t count on that one 😉
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lmao! Oh, I’m sure Ani has been waging a long campaign on that score.
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She usually wins too 😉
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Mine does too. She has a perfectly good dog flap at the back door, but she’s learned to scratch at the front door to be let in by the butler [me]. Such a self-satisfied trot as she heads into the house. I keep threatening to ignore her but…
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What gets me with Ani is the air of innocence when I have closed a door bwteen us…and she appears beside me anyway 😉
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Hah! She teleports as well does she? -grin-
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Apparently so 😉
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lol – Ani really is my second favourite dog [after Mogi, of course].
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But of course 😉
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This is such a beautiful post, Sue. I never knew my mother’s mother or any of my biological father’s family, even my half sister and brother. You were a fortunate child as my own boys are. They also have a great grandmother.
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My sons had their great-great granny for several years, which was wonderful. They have only the vaguest memories of her, but they do remember. I just wish that, as a child, I had realised how great a gift it was to have them all.
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What beautiful reminiscences 😊
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It doesn’t take much to set themoff sometimes… and I’d like to remember them while I still can 🙂
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🥰
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She got that right. Spirituality and religion is so personal, and ‘in your heart’ is right. 🙂
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I think that perspective works whatever path you follow. 🙂
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I know I missed out on such a lot, not having a wonderful childhood full of memories. I wasn’t taught anything in that way and had to figure things out for myself. Which explains the yawning great holes in my emotional life… I love reading about yours though, Sue…
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Mine was an odd childhood…perfect in many ways, gaping holes in others… but having grandparents around is a beautiful foundation for a child.
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Reblogged this on anita dawes and jaye marie.
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Thanks for reblogging, Jaye x
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Beautiful memories.
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They are indeed 🙂
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⭐️
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Wonderful, warm memories, Sue. I was lucky when growing up to have two sets of grandparents – one town, one country. Your post has triggered lots of my own memories. I should write them down before they slither away again.
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I keep doing that too…something brings them back, but they are too easily lost unless you fix them on paper.
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How wonderful to be able to remember your great grandparents Sue, not many of us have had that privilege and such lovely memories of rice pudding and simple prayers… hugsxx
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It was such a gift. I wish I had fully understood that at the time. xxx
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xxx
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What a war embrace, this memoir. I could cuddle right up and listen all day.
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Sometimes I wish I could cuddle up with great granny again too 🙂
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A very special post. I was also fortunate to have known my great grandmothers, tough pioneer women, who also had a strong faith. They also passed down some wonderful german recipes. Now I am a great grandmother and have a wonderful relationship with my two great-granddaughters. I only hope they will have special memories of our times together. One of them is already a good cook. I hope you have some cold rice pudding and feel better soon. Hugs, Darlene
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I’m too tired to eat tonight… fence building all day… but I can remember what great-granny’s rice pudding tasted like and wish I had to stuff in to make some.
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What a wonderful family memory. I was also lucky to know both grandparents and my great grandmother, although she was a bit of a curmudgeon and didn’t talk much – but she could cook!
How was your rice pudding? Do you know the Milne poem about Mary Jane and the lovely rice pudding?.
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I don’t hink we realise as children what a gift that is. My granddaughters have great-grandparents… and it is wonderful watching them together.
(What is the matter with Mary Jane? Oh yes, I know that one 🙂 )
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Sue, your story brought back memories of my own grandmother and how she always made special food and desserts for all of us. She was a wonderful cook and a baker of bread, cake and pies, and so many other things. Your story is so beautiful about your grandmother. She had a beautiful smile. Thank you so much for sharing.
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My great grandmother taught me all the basics of cooking and baking… bu not alone, they all had a hand in that, and as I teach my sons, the family recipes continue 🙂
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Sue, my grandmother taught me and my twin sister all the basics too. We are so fortunate to have these memories, it means so much. And, I bet you are a great cook. I can imagine that your sons love your cooking. 🙂
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My sons friends, when they were all children, used to knock on my door to ask if I’d been baking 😉
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Reblogged this on Once Upon a Time…. and commented:
Sue, your beautiful story brought back memories of my own grandmother and how she always made special food and desserts for all of us. She was a wonderful cook and a baker of bread, cake and pies, and so many other things. Your story is so beautiful about your grandmother. She had a beautiful smile. Thank you so much for sharing.
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I too remember that my grandmother’s faith was for others, not herself. It’s a concept that’s out of fashion. (K)
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It is not a change for the better, sadly… though it does not apply to all.
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Thank you for sharing such wonderful memories, Sue! You are blessed to have them. Have a beautiful weekend Michael!
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I count myself blessd, Michael 🙂
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Yes, this is true.
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A beautiful, beautiful post full of joy 💜
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Thank you… good memories ❤
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Excellent 💜
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I thoroughly enjoyed your memories of childhood. I would say that you were one very fortunate little girl indeed.
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To have so many generations to learn from… I was indeed, Liz.
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I haven’t made rice pudding in a long time. Since the kids moved out. But it IS a cure for everything. Almost everything, anyway.
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I can actually smell the stuff coking at the moment… I may have to make some 😉
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Beautiful memories Sue. And that pic of you as a youngster is adorable ❤
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Thanks Debby. My grandad made me the coat… a man of many talents ❤
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All the more precious ❤
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Lovely memories. 😀 … I’ve had hot rice pudding, but not cold. Is it the same thing only chilled?
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Yes… but it becomes something quite different for some reason 🙂
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Gosh, you were so adorable with all those curls, Sue! I enjoyed your walk down Memory Lane, lots of love there. 🙂
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The hair has always done its own thing 😉
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So much love shines through I also was lucky enough to know my great gandmother..and rice pudding has been on my mind for a few days now ..truly …slightly updated I will add…but still with the nutmeg and the skin was the best bit for me…A beautiful post , Sue:) xx
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The skin is still the best bit 😉
I really do think that letting small children grow with the older generations around them makes a vast difference.
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A sharing from your heart, Sue and a delight to read. Blessings indeed and your pictures are beautiful. Here’s to simple prayers, cold rice pudding and living from our hearts. ❤ xXx
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Thank you, Jane. I am glad to have the pictures…and the memories ❤ xx
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“In your heart.” Ah, yes! Wonderful memories, Sue. The detail you remember is the frosting on the cake.
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It’s funny how so much melds to gether, but sone things stand out crystal clear.
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I know exactly what you mean!
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🙂
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