On this July 4th holiday I wanted to write about someone who
was very special to me, my Grandmother, Marion Kelly. She has long passed this life but I have
moments when I still feel her presence.
Like the times when I am asked to make sweet potato pie. The response I give is usually a mixed bag of
emotional reactions. First, I give a
look that is a combination of bewilderment and fear. Then, I’ll give that stare of incredulity followed
by a sagging resignation.
You see, sweet potato pie was one of my grandmother’s specialties. If she knew we were coming over for a visit
she made sure to have an extra pie just for me.
My grandmother was a tough lady but we all knew her love was
limitless. She sacrificed so much for
her children and their kids and I'm confident we descendants can all share a
favorite memory that we would instantly recognize as a Grandma Kelly truth.
Warning: If you think this blog
post will end with a sweet potato pie recipe it won't be. If this bothers you I suggest you stop
reading right now. This is just one
persons memory of a loved one sparked by an American holiday and his feelings about a classic (Southern)
dessert. If I were asked to name one
person as my culinary hero it would be Grandma Kelly.
It was never easy visiting my grandmother. Though we lived in the same city grandma lived
in the Throgs Neck projects in the Bronx.
Travelling to her place stretched the limits of our patience because to
get there from Staten Island required a bus to a ferry, a subway ride only to
(get this), transfer to another train and then another. We would catch one final bus only to walk about a half mile to her apartment building.
I suppose a pie is a just reward for embarking on such an arduous trip. I'm grateful for the memory but as a culinary
professional it is both a blessing and a curse.
My memory of her pie is flooded with the flavor of deliciously sweet potatoes. My senses about the flavor are so distinct I
sometimes wonder if my mind, and by extension, my memories are playing tricks
on me. I'm pretty good at making pies
and I'm fairly certain her pie could have used an upgrade in the crust
department. I'm sure it was store bought
and frozen which I would, no doubt, turn my nose up to today. And even though the potatoes she used were
fresh (not canned), if one were to examine a Grandma Kelly pie today, they
would be skeptical of its special magical quality. After all, she used all of the traditional
ingredients to make her sweet potato filling: milk, sugar, eggs and
spices. Nevertheless, I remain
completely intimidated by the thought of making a sweet potato pie. The reason is simple -- my previous attempt don't measure up.
Despite that, my love for cooking is derived in large part by the
foods that came from my grandmother’s kitchen.
Her food was filled with the joys and the hardships of her life. I feel my food is a reflection of my life (an
idea I'd like to develop in future blog entries). She was the daughter of a former slave who
became a sharecropper from Virginia. She
was very young when she started working in tobacco fields where she picked up
her lifelong smoking habit. I don't want
to overstate any facts but it's indisputable my grandmother had a very hard life. At a young age and with the help of her
friends she escaped her home and traveled to Philadelphia to live with her
sister. She ultimately ended up in NYC
where she worked hard, got married to a military man and raised my mother and her four younger brothers.
The stories she shared with me included a somewhat odd friendship with
Billie Holiday, the Harlem nightlife and an occasion when she stopped to
listen to Malcolm X preaching on an uptown corner. Being raised in an abusive home, having a marriage
that she acknowledged was at times difficult (though she was unwilling to
elaborate) and losing one of her sons to drugs is too common a story from women
of similar circumstances. For me, that
she became the bedrock and glue of our family is her real story. I believe it is a story of one woman’s
strength and her uncompromising love.
I think that's what made her pies so special. What she gave of herself became that magical ingredient
in the food she made. My theory is, if
you really care about the food you're making people will love it.
When I was older and living on my own I would call her when I wanted
to drop by and ask for my favorite pie. I
think it did as much for her to make me a pie as it did for me to receive
one. It was hard to visit her in the
hospital seeing her succumb to all the hardships and hard living shortly before
she passed away. She was never able to
give up her tobacco habit and the toll it took on her life became too much for her to
carry on.
As this July 4th comes to a close I just want to honor her
memory. I miss that pie a lot, but I miss
her more.
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