The Right Consistency
I learned exactly zero domestic skills from my mother. It wasn’t due to her lack of trying to impart them. With a needle and thread, she crafted quilts, clothing, and toys. With a few things from the pantry, she whipped up deliciousness nightly. She could fold towels and fitted sheets with military precision. Early on, I gave up on the sewing; I hadn’t the patience. My “folded” fitted sheets still look like wrinkled irregular lumps in an otherwise neat stack of linens.
When I was a little older and had realized that it wasn’t just the magical Kitchen Elves who created the wonderful smells wafting into the living room where I sat, usually with my nose in a book, I did start to show some curiosity about how to make things besides pop tarts and cold cereal.
The problem was my mother was taught by her mother, a quintessential Southern cook. When we’d visit my grandparents in Panama City, Mammaw would be bustling around in her frozen-in-the-1950’s-kitchen, making huge quantities of cheese grits, from-scratch biscuits with special “Mammaw butter” enhanced with buttermilk, and mounds of light and fluffy scrambled eggs. Her cobblers were legendary, her fried chicken a lost art in this era of kale and protein smoothies.
I’d hover around the oven like a bee drawn by honey, waiting for those flaky biscuits to emerge. Once or twice, when I got bored of climbing the trees in the yard or trapping blue crabs with my brother, she tried to show me how it was done. Something about flour, milk, and salt, but I don’t remember the rest. I tried to write it down. Wait. How much milk again? “Oh, you know, about this much.” Well, how much is that? A tablespoon? “Just til it looks right.” How do I know when it looks right? “Just add it until it’s the right consistency.” She was getting frustrated, stirring with more vigor than necessary. I gave up, content to just observe from afar.
My mother was the same way. I’d call her and ask for a particular recipe for one of my favorites. That special lasagna sauce? Well, you have to add a little sugar. Right. How much is a little? Which one of the measuring spoons in my drawer do I use for that? Heavy sigh over the phone. You just have to taste it to know.
No written directions! Chaos! Culinary anarchy! Who could cook anything with this insanity? Somehow, you’re just supposed to know how to go rogue with the cookie recipe printed on the Tollhouse packaging. I know it says to add one cup (2 sticks) of butter, but really you should use only one stick and half a cup of shortening. What? Why? My Type-A orderly brain would go into panic mode when given these types of suggestions.
And then there was cole slaw. If you’re from the South, you’ve got to have a go-to cole slaw recipe for family gatherings and summer cookouts. My mother had one. Hers was the only cole slaw I would ever eat for many years. After she died, I lost the taste of cole slaw right along with her. No one else’s could ever equal it; they were always too vinegar-y or too mayonnaise-y.
Some years ago, I was lolly-gagging (as my dad would say) at a yard sale and stumbled upon what looked like a medieval torture device. But I knew it for what it really was: an exact replica of my mother’s cole slaw shredder. Eureka! It was a steel tripod with a hand crank with interchangeable barrels for different grating settings. You’d push a wedge of cabbage or carrot through the top while turning the crank and perfect shreds would come out the barrel right into my great grandmother’s green Homer Laughlin orange blossom bowl. I already had the bowl. My mother had painstakingly scoured antique stores for several of them to be sure each of us had at least one. No kitchen was complete without a “Grandmother Bonnie bowl.” She died before ebay was a thing; she could have done some serious damage with ebay.
Now, now after all these years I could make mom’s cole slaw and recreate that childhood pleasure! On the way home from the yard sale, I stopped at the grocery store for 
cabbage and carrots. Having happily shredded both into the obligatory green bowl, I called one of my sisters for the next step. “I’m making mom’s cole slaw,” I said, perhaps a tad manic in my excitement. “What do I do after I’ve shredded everything?” You have to add dill pickle juice. “Great!” I said, grabbing a jar with one hand and wedging the phone between my shoulder and ear. “I’ve got some right here! How much?”
“Oh, y’know, til it tastes right.” Seriously? I felt like Charlie Brown having fallen for the football gag…again. I finished making it, but it wasn’t exactly how I remembered. I put the grating contraption up on the topmost shelf of my pantry, where it sits in shame gathering dust to this day. I had such great hopes for it.
I will sometimes grudgingly eat cole slaw now, but every bite is a disappointment. I limp along with my version of the lasagna sauce. Every batch of my chocolate chip cookies is always made with half butter, half shortening, although I still do not know why.
I ain’t no Rachel Ray or Martha Stewart by any stretch. But I’ve begun to get the “consistency” thing in other areas. I hear people talk about trying to achieve balance in their lives, between work and family and all the rest. News stories are popping up about “free range” parenting versus the prevalent “helicopter” type. We struggle with purposeful self-improvement and spiritual depth versus binge watching Netflix for an entire weekend.
How do you know when you’ve got it right? What do the media, the magazine quizzes, the current gurus say? For me, it’s a matter of intuition. A little of this, a little of that, not too much of any one thing. It’s not a matter of the exact right bowl or accessory. Taste frequently and when you’ve reached the right consistency, you’ll know. More of those “ahh” moments of joy will pop up–with your spouse, your kids, your work. Formulas and recipes, even for left-brained personalities like mine, usually aren’t the way true masterpieces are made.