I am well aware that food seems to be a constant theme in my writing. Who cares? I like food, and it likes me. Today, my sweet tooth was satisfied with a blast from the past: tapioca.
The Sixties was the decade of family meals at the table followed by dessert. Mother made this particular dessert many times for us at 3601 Hill Avenue, Snyder America. With five kids, she knew how to make us behave. Threaten us with no dessert, and we were angels.
So, when I got that red and white box out of the fridge today, measured the contents, and brought them to a rolling boil, my mouth watered waiting for the twenty minutes to let it set. The only way I like to eat tapioca is warm.
When the timer went off, I went in for the pudding that launched a thousand smiles at our dinner table many years ago. (I say that, but actually I am speaking only for myself as I really do not know if Scotty, Sara, Shane, or Sabrina even liked tapioca). Scoops of the pearly white goo went into a real dessert dish. I do not have many dishes in my house because I do not cook, but I do keep two little glass bowls just for these occasions.
Tapioca on my tongue took me back 45 years.
The Sullivans ate supper at the table. All seven of us. We talked. We ate a lot. We probably turned up our noses sometimes as Mother liked to try new recipes. She was a cookbook's best friend. Have Recipe, Will Try was her motto.
King Ranch Chicken was a specialty as were numerous casseroles. About the only thing Mother never perfected was the birthday cake which is ironic considering she had plenty of opportunities to practice with five stinking kids. Pies--super; birthday cakes--not so much.
And then there was tapioca.
Association is a funny thing. With this dessert, I just sensed we were elevating our tastes. Maybe it's because we ate it in a real crystal dish, not some cereal bowl as we did everything else. When Mom made tapioca, I just felt, well, sophisticated.
Until late 1965 or early 1966. Tapioca was on the dessert menu one evening, and this soon-to-be 10-year-old was pumped.
The dinner plates were cleared from the table as dessert was an event. On this night, it became THE event. Just as I was about to dig in to my tapioca, Mom and Dad decided to break the big news: baby number five was on the way. Oh good gosh........
I looked across the table at baby number four! He was not even a year old! What were they thinking? What were they doing? Never mind, I sort of knew the answer and tried to block that out as fast as I could.
Saddest of all, tapioca became a symbol of something else and not the sweet classy tasty dessert it was always intended to be. All I could think of was more cloth diapers being washed out in the commode.
Just in recent years have I overcome the unfortunate blame I placed on tapioca. It wasn't tapioca's fault that the fertility announcement disrupted my after-dinner dessert date. And, it didn't hurt that baby number five turned out to be a girl. Sara and I wanted Sabrina so we could outnumber the smelly boys, and this beautiful dark-haired addition turned out to be much sweeter than even tapioca.
Mom and Dad stopped having babies after number five. In honor of that, I ate five bowls of tapioca today--enough sophistication to get me through until Thanksgiving.
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