MY Nana

When I was little, I thought there was only one "Nana" in the world...mine! :) (If you feel that way too, I salute you.) Anyway, I don't even know when I began calling her that--I just did. Nobody told me she was Nana...I just knew.

She was my great-grandmother, Mollie; and she was amazing.

As I had said in a different post, I once passed up a trip to Disneyland to spend the weekend with her. I was about five, and somehow the idea of sitting in front of the tv on Saturday morning watching cartooons with my cornflakes seemed like more fun. (I've since been to "The Happiest place on Earth" many times.) Anyway, I always loved sitting at a TV tray...with my cereal and one of those Home Run pies (yeah, major sugar high :) Nana kept these pies in her pantry on the back potch. I never had to sneak them or anything. This was Nana's house... she was more than happy to give them! I think to her these were more like a pastry or something. She would eat them with her coffee...which she usually shared with me. To this day, my cups of coffee are "Nana" cups of coffee (which simply means, they are loaded with sugar). I would watch "Popeye," and "The Great Space Coaster," and then "American Bandstand."

Summers there were particularly fun because of the pool and the swing set in the back yard. (And never under estimate the fun of a simple garden hose... Look out!) She had an old hula hoop in the garrage, which I could never learn to hula with, so I took to spinning it around the back yard (rolling it on the lawn). There was a big patio with a red picnic table. Nana and I would sit there and eat slices of water mellon. Sometimes she would cut up apples or persimmons (depending on the time of year). The persimmons would be for cookies, and the apples would either go into a coffee cake or be used to make a german dumpling called a varenik.

Vareniks were usually in three flavors: apple, straberry and potato (my favorite of which being potato). Obviously, the different kinds depended on the season. But in summer time, we had the straeberry (with the potato and apple). On TV cooking shows, Vareniks, are always called Perogi's (if I didn't spell that right, it's because we don't call them that.) The outside is make of dough, like a pasta, the inside has the filling... they were put into boiling water, drained and then--basted with melted butter. YUMMY!! :)

Nobody could make dough like Nana could...for anything: Coffee cakes, cookies, pie crusts, eeg noodles, Vareniks, Beerocks, homemade bread, and other things I can't think of now. She had one of the old pasta makers with a crank. She would have huge bowls with the yeast, flour and water, that would be kneaded and kneaded some more. She would put flour on her table in the kitchen and dust her rolling pin (although, she usually just used her hands). She would knead that dough smooth. For Vareniks, the dough would go through the pasta maker, and then be cut into squares (sort of like quilt patches) When we had enough squares, we then made sort of an assembly line.
One person had the bowls of filling and a big spoon, another person had cookie sheets for the finished Vareniks, another person was at the stove with the pot of water, and a big serving dish. The sqares of dough would be filled... then all the corners gathered up and pinched (or sealed) and these were lined up to go into the boiling water. They were drained with a slotted spoon and then put into the serving dish. Man did we eat well (and why not, for all that work?)

The potato vareniks, those were more work still. The potato filling had to be washed, peeled, boiled and mashed. Onions were then cut up and fried and added to the mashed potatoes. This make the filling. Any left over Vareniks were fried, which made them taste even better. Anybody hungry yet? For egg noodles, the dough obviously went through the pasta maker, but many more times to make it thinner. Then the long strips of thin dough were hung on wooden racks to dry out. Egg noodles had to be crunchy, see? But whatever Nana made...it was amazing. You could always count on her house smelling good (unless she was making watermelon honey). What is that, you ask? That's another entry. :)
She could crochet everything...pot holders, afghans, scarves. She embroidered dish towels (oh goodness...so many of them!) And somehow she still had time to entertain me :) Wow! She was awesome.