What family dinners did you grow up with?

[ValkyrieAssassin]

Both my parents were excellent cooks. And I and my sister relished food in a very big way so I expect it was quite satisfying to cook for us. For context i was born in 1973 and Dsis in 1976. I am not from the UK which makes a difference I think because meat was cheap when I was growing up. Not particularly well off- thoroughly middle class as both parents were teachers (DM part time from when I was born).

Our fairly regular family meals

• french onion soup
• pumpkin soup
• chicken noodle soup
• minestrone with homemade meatballs
• spanakopita
• beef wellington (every single birthday)
• chicken schnitzel with apple sauce, mash and peas
• beef filet on mustard crouton with brandy cream sauce
• semolina gnocchi with spicy tomato basil sauce
• pumpkin gnocchi (homemade) with sage cream sauce
• rissoles with mushroom gravy
• sausages and mash
• seafood pancakes
• chicken and veg pancakes
• bacon and sweetcorn chowder
• homemade asparagus soup (my mother was a Delia Smith devotee)

Most of this I would never cook in a regular week. It's mainly pasta, tacos, pasta and easy because I have children with a range of SEN that makes eating generally difficult for them.

I am feeling nostalgic this afternoon and am curious what sorts of dishes you had while growing up, and if you make them now for your own family or not.

Roast chicken (very special treat, for birthdays!)
Roast lamb
Chili con carne
Bangers n mash
Pea, pie and pud
Saveloys, potatoes and peas
Ham steak with new potatoes and veges
Rump steak with mushroom sauce
Shepherds Pie
Fish pie
Macaroni Cheese
Savoury Chops and veges
Corned beef and jigs
Steamed fish with lemon or parsley sauce
Chicken chausseur (from a packet mix)
Chinese rice risotto
Fish and chips from the chippy every saturday

Brought up 70's and 80's in NZ.

Oh saveloys. How much I adored those! Did you have mini ones at kids parties? That and fairy bread. 🌭

Yep - cheerios, they were called! (And when the kids went to the butchers, they'd be given one to eat, there. . .) I found with kids parties it was very important to do a big bowlful of them for the adults, as well, or the kids didn't get a look in!

Good ol' fairy bread - I hated myself, but everyone else seemed to love it!

I've found B&M stock saveloys - I love them for lunch, wrapped in bread and butter, with tomato sauce. . .

I’ll have to check b and m out. I once saw them at the deli counter in Morrisons and became unreasonably excited.they were tasteless! Such a disappointment. My mother was brought up calling the mini ones ‘little boys’ which still gives me this ick!!

Kegeree, tortellini, daal, & cauliflower cheese were my mum's go-to's.

Frozen/tinned food - pizza, crispy pancakes, smash, fray bentos pies
When we were little it was usually going out of date and was stock dad couldn't sell in the village shop.
Until I learnt to cook and we lived in a bigger place it was generally low quality crap.
Mum & dad didn't cook they burnt stuff in the oven
My kids generally eat homemade stuff now and loads of fruit and veg as we grow our own.
One of my brothers is a gourmet chef and the other a baker

I think we all reacted to the horrible food growing up.

Always a Sunday roast, beef or pork. Chicken was still relatively expensive and my DF didn’t like lamb.
Beef stews/casseroles.
Cottage pie (remains of roast beef, minced).

Cauliflower cheese and chips.
occasionally gammon with parsley sauce.
Cheese pudding, made with breadcrumbs, eggs, cheese and milk. I adored this! Usually with chips and salad.
Sausages and mash
Toad in the hole.
Cold meat (leftovers from the roast) with salad and baked potatoes in summer.
An occasional curry with rice - usually made with roast leftovers again.
Green veg with just about everything, often cabbage, plus carrots/peas - tinned peas before frozen were widely available.
Everything made from scratch, inc. chips. Ready made versions just weren’t available.
When my Dm was even more skint than usual, we had ‘dustbin soup’ - whatever veg she had, with added pearl barley, rice, anything else to bulk it out. Always tasty - she was a good cook.

I grew up at the same time as you OP (born 1975) but in the U.K. and our dinners were nowhere near as exciting as yours! Meat must have been a lot cheaper though because we had meat at every meal, including steak once a week, and we were very working class. A typical week might include:

Roast on Sunday - beef, pork or lamb (never chicken)
Leftover meat from the roast with jacket potatoes and beans on Monday
Toad in the hole
Pasties, mash and veg
Homemade chicken pie (this was delicious and nothing like anything I have ever made myself)
Steak, egg and chips
Spaghetti bolognaise was quite exotic!
Fish and chips on Saturday.
Stew and dumplings

When I got older my parents got a little more adventurous and we might have a lasagne, stir fry or chicken fricasee and rice.

Mum's cooking was good, but very basic and stodgy. I still can't make pastry as good as hers. There was pretty much always a cooked pudding as well.

My mums pastry was magnificent, her secret was half butter and half lard for the fat element. Made the pastry really light and short, melt in the mouth and could be rolled very thin.

My mum and dad were both second generation Polish immigrants, so lots of the family food I remember the most is Polish classics but made with easily available ingredients in England in the 80s.

Bigos - sauerkraut and sausage stew. My dad would make huge pots of this for family occasions.
Kotlety mielone - basically meatballs, served without a sauce, with mashed potatoes and cucumber salad
Kotlet schabowy - pork schnitzel, also served with mash and cucumber salad
Polish sausage, grilled and served with boiled potatoes and dill
Tomato soup with rice
Chicken noodle soup

My mum did also cook non-Polish food. We'd often have a nice roast chicken, though she never made gravy. She also made a lovely chicken casserole which was somehow sweet tasting - I guess she must have used parsnips or carrots. I remember lasagne being a particular treat for when we had friends round for lunch.

They used to get fish and chips on a Friday and give me and my brother each a fried egg and some chips.

My Mam wasn't a great cook, so dinners tended to be meat and two veg. dinners The meat would be something like:-

• Pork Chops
• Lamb cutlets (boiled)
• Tripe
• Liver
• Fish fingers
• Sausages and rashers (coddle)
• Mince (shepherds pie)

The veg. was generally mashed potatoes and carrots.

We usually had stew once a week made with lamb pieces (neck of mutton) and mince balls.

We generally had a roast on a Sunday - roast chicken or lamb or bacon. With cabbage or marrowfat peas.

We had colcannon at Hallowe'en - mashed potatoes, kale and onion.

When processed foods became more popular, we had things like steak and kidney pies or spice burgers. Often with baked beans or tinned peas.

We never had duck (wasn't sold in any of the butchers) or steaks (too expensive for a big family).

We never had exotic dishes like pasta, rice or pizzas. These were all things I encountered in my teens, often at a friend's house.

Takeaways were from the chipper - usually fish and chips or sometimes a burger and chips.

Savoury rice was sometimes served at 21st birthday parties (one of the buffet dishes). It was yellow rice (cooked in turmeric?) with chopped up peppers and sultanas. I haven't had it in years .

Soup came from a packet and we also had Oxo or Bovril drinks.

I don't eat many of my childhood meals now.

My favourites meals are seafood curry and chicken and bacon pasta. I love pizzas and pasta dishes.

If it was very hot in summer, we'd have a salad. It would consist of:-

A lettuce leaf
A scallion or two
A slice of plastic cheese
A slice of ham or corned beef
A tomato, sliced
A boiled egg, sliced
Beetroot from a jar
Bread and butter

With the exception of the beetroot and tomato, it was very dry. As we DC got older, we discovered coleslaw, potato salad and mayonnaise which made salads more palatable. Olive oil and balsamic vinegar didn't make an appearance until I was an adult.