An Ode to Sunday Supper
Washington DC 1972
The smell of Sunday morning sizzling chicken livers -- and I’ve fallen into that time tunnel. The scent is curling up the stairs, down the long hallway, and into my childhood bedroom, tugging me awake -- no, I don’t want to eat the chicken livers, but I love the smell -- and the lure of watching my father create havoc in the kitchen is too hard to resist. So I slip out of bed, and traipse down to the kitchen in my flannel nightgown to find him cooking his favorite breakfast -- while my mother grimaces at the mess -- the oily spatula smears, the egg shell drips, the pile of dirty pots and pans tottering in the sink.
I’m calling my little brother Peter to come down for breakfast, and soon he shuffles down the steps carrying his "Baba" blue blanket with his thumb in his mouth and sleep in his eyes.
We sit down to our breakfast and my dad eagerly spreads open his Sunday Washington Post, riveted, as he has been for months. He disappears behind the newsprint curtain of Watergate Scandal headlines, while voraciously digging into his chicken livers — "SLJ", Sweet Little Jennifer (that was me!), out of sight. The smell of chicken liver and sweet onions imprints on me permanently, mixed with a tinge of grief, and the counterpoint of history unfolding.
I get to work with a bamboo-handled grapefruit spoon, digging into a precious grapefruit half, chosen from a mid-winter box of citrus shipped from Florida. The luxury of citrus on a cold winter morning in DC.
It’s the early 70’s, and outside our house, hippies and Hare Krishna roam the streets of our neighborhood. Barefoot from Memorial Day to Labor Day, our feet grow callouses on the hot brick sidewalks. Baskin Robbins is the new thing. Butter Brick Road is your best friend’s favorite flavor after the trip to the local pool. Sticky hot summer in DC. Dirty, bare, calloused feet; long, tangled hair. Hamburger Hamlet for family night out, Coca cola all summer long (my mom's been hooked since college), and whenever I go with my mom to Safeway, I get to pick out one treat for myself. Hostess pop tarts with sweet strawberry filling burning my tongue before school. Or Ho-Hos, so I can peel off the chocolate before unrolling the creamy cake. Unstitching the Ho-Ho architecture is half the joy. Ho Ho's and the Vietnam war, pop tarts and protests, coca cola while you're in a line for gas so long it goes round the block…
It’s Sunday Supper time now. There is no newspaper at dinnertime, no fast food or Libbyland TV dinners for Sunday Supper.
My mom places a large Scandinavian wooden platter in the middle of the dining table. Sometimes it holds a roast beef and Yorkshire pudding (my favorite), but this Sunday it’s a giant tongue, resting there in a fleshy arch as if about to speak. You can almost count the taste buds, glistening under the chandelier.
My dad picks up the carving knife, ready to slice.
On second thought: let’s screech away from the confusing thought of that tongue, and remember a different Sunday.
Let’s take comfort in the Sunday standing rib roast beef. The king of the Sunday Supper. The raison d’être for the Yorkshire Pudding. The supper my mother still makes for me when I visit her. The survivor from my childhood. Roasted to a perfect medium rare, with a line of browned potatoes, salted and geometrically laid out on the platter. Yes, roast beef will always be a source of comfort.
If you need some comfort, find that meal that brings you joy. Cook your favorite Sunday Supper for your friends or family, and give it pride of place on your favorite platter in the middle of the dining table.
The nicely splattered recipes above, from her favorite Gourmet Menu Cookbook, are the ones my mother always uses to cook her classic Roast Beef and Yorkshire Pudding (see below, typed out for ease of reference); however, a word of warning: in order to simplify timing, you really need a second oven you can start from cold, to bake your Yorkshire Pudding — while the Roast is finishing up in your main cooking oven. I don’t have a 2nd oven, and so have been unable to follow this recipe and have adopted the more “English method” which requires a hot pan with drippings from the roast. (Like this recipe from Gordon Ramsey)
Roast Prime Ribs of Beef:
Rub a rib roast of beef with salt and spread it generously with butter or fat. Put it on a rack in a roasting pan, resting on the bone end. If it lacks a thick layer of natural fat, lay a slice of beef suet on top. Sear the beef in a very hot oven (450 F) for about 20 minutes, reduce the heat to moederate (350F), and continue to roast the meat, basting frequently, until it is done. Allow about 16 minutes per pound for rare beef, 20 minutes for medium, and 23 minutes for well done. If the roast is very large, add a few tablespoons of water to the pan to prevent the fat from burning. Remove the meat to a large platter and let it stand for about 10 minutes before carving. Serve with Yorkshire pudding.
Yorkshire Pudding
Sift 1 cup sifted flour with 1/2 teaspoon salt into a bowl. Break in 2 eggs and 1 cup milk. Mix the ingredients together just enough to moisten them. There should be some lumps in the batter. Pour the batter into a well-buttered fluted muffin tins, filling them two thirds full, and put the tins in a cold oven. Turn on the oven to hot (400F) and bake the puddings for 30 to 40 minutes, until they are puffed and lightly browned.
I just happen to have a Standing Rib Roast in the freezer, that we never managed to enjoy over the holidays. With my mother and daughter, Lily, due to visit soon, I am very excited for our Sunday Supper 2024 together!