REJECTED!!!

Here is something I submitted to Mishpacha Family First, for the back page Life Takes column. I submitted it after another story about a bubby who slaved away in the kitchen over latkes or kugel. The Bubbies of today are different, but the underlying theme is the same.  It was rejected:

Chremsel on the last day of Pesach, stuffed cabbage on Simchas Torah, kreplach on erev Yom Kippur— surely there are those who wait to make these delicacies, to know they are serving their families traditional foods made in a traditional way. Surely, there are those who serve those goodies knowing their family waits for it, and knowing that they are serving a special Shabbos Yom Tov food. Some of the best writers regale us with stories of their Bubbys whipping up dishes, bringing their tantalizing treats to life on the page in a way that makes your mouth water. They evoke the aromas, tastes and closeness of Shabbos and Yom Tov, making us wistful for the days that come weekly or once a year.

But not every special dish is special in that way. In fact, perhaps the kitchen aspect of our lives should not weigh so heavily on us as we seek its meaning.  Sometimes our cooking is important because of what it means for just a few people.

The people who count most.

My mother in law doesn’t get up really early in the morning to be in the kitchen (though she is always up early), she doesn’t make a lot of old recipes that have been handed down through many generations (though she does make a few of those), and she didn’t have a hard life growing up in Europe. No, my mother in law grew up in the ‘50s in Boro Park, and she has great stories to tell my kids, and she often does. Her days of making gefilte fish from scratch, and chopping up liver are behind her, and not something her grandchildren experienced. Yet, her food, and in particular her soup evokes one thing for my kids: love.

My in laws live in Florida now, and are not in New York all that often. When they come, it’s usually only for a few days. But my mother in law will almost always make her soup for us to put in the freezer. It’s not a fancy soup, or very hard to make, but the kids wait for “Bubby Soup.”  On those crazy Thursday nights, when we are expecting a big crowd for Shabbos, (and for some reason the kids still want supper) they will always ask, “Do we have any Bubby Soup in the freezer?”

Could I make it myself? Absolutely, and then we would have it all the time, but what’s special about the soup goes so far beyond its actual taste.

No Chanukah party is complete without the warming embrace of Bubby’s soup. There are latkes there too, and they are excellent, but if there is one thing everyone would miss, it would be that liquid love. Coming to our house for a bas mitzvah party, or Shabbos, or just a visit, my father in law will walk in and say, “I have soup for you in the car—can we put it in the freezer?” And then, while we are shivering in the winter in New York, and Bubby and Zaidy are walking around Miami in shirtsleeves, we can have our soup and let the spoonful of vegetables and barley warm us inside and out.

.Don’t get me wrong, my mother in law is a good cook who in her time made two weddings in her house, cooked everything from scratch for huge Shabbosim, and Yomim Tovim, and makes a really good fluffy and crispy potato kugel. To people besides her children and grandchildren she isn’t particularly known for this soup. It isn’t traditional in the sense that everyone knows someone who makes it. It isn’t a must-have at a Shabbos or Yom Tov meal. It’s not a recipe that goes back very far at all. It’s just something Bubby made, that everyone loved, so she makes it as often as she can, and lets us stock up on it. She lets the kids know how much she loves them and that she is thinking of them. It’s better than the trips to the pizza store and the presents she always brings. She doesn’t ask us if we want it, or if we need it, because she knows that it is always welcome, always the right size and always appreciated. And it evolved into this naturally, without any sort of mystical component. Just love.  

A few years ago my children asked my husband if she made “Bubby Soup” when he was a kid. He responded, “Yes, but we just called it soup.”