Cheese Dreams
When I was about three years old, my family was living in Virginia Beach on 81st Street and my older sister, whom I always wanted to emulate, started school. She got to climb on that bright yellow bus and be whisked away with lots of other kids to great adventures - or so I imagined - coming home with colorful drawings and the ability to actually read the bedtime stories that were our nightly treat.One morning, I was determined to go, too, and got my foot up on the first step of the bus before Mom saw me and gently held me back, explaining that N was a big girl now and I wasn't yet and only big girls went to school.
Of course, I thought that was beastly unfair (and, knowing my sister, I'm pretty sure she was lording it over me, probably making faces out the bus window!), so I started to cry. I cried a lot during early childhood, with frustration at not being one of the "big kids," because the big kids were teasing me and, probably, just because I was a spoiled little snot.
In any case, this time, the tears were productive - Mom said, "Never mind, you and I will stay home together and for lunch we'll have Cheese Dreams."
She prepared the Cheese Dreams by toasting bread, covering it with strips of bacon left over (oops! planned over) from breakfast, topping the bacon with cheese (she used cheddar, I used Swiss for this photo, some chevre would be great next time!), and running the whole thing under the broiler for a few minutes to melt the cheese. I remember clearly watching the cheese turn shiny, then bubbly, and finally begin to brown under the gas flames of the broiler. Just then, she snatched out the cookie sheet, left the sandwiches briefly to cool, and served us both at the kitchen table, consolation, indeed, for not being a big girl yet.
She prepared the Cheese Dreams by toasting bread, covering it with strips of bacon left over (oops! planned over) from breakfast, topping the bacon with cheese (she used cheddar, I used Swiss for this photo, some chevre would be great next time!), and running the whole thing under the broiler for a few minutes to melt the cheese. I remember clearly watching the cheese turn shiny, then bubbly, and finally begin to brown under the gas flames of the broiler. Just then, she snatched out the cookie sheet, left the sandwiches briefly to cool, and served us both at the kitchen table, consolation, indeed, for not being a big girl yet.
Fifty-seven years later, I have more than reached big girl status, but I still love it when I find a few rashers of bacon left over from breakfast, think of Mom in heaven and say to myself, "Never mind, we'll stay home together and for lunch we'll have Cheese Dreams."
posted by Zoomie at
7:50 AM
3 Comments:
Let me be first. (grin)
I, too, have Cheese Dreams in my culinary repertoire! God, yet another thing we have in common.
Mine came about from when Cranky first prepared us toast with tomatoes and broiled cheese on top.
He didn't know what to call it, but in my fevered brain, I thought he said "Cheese Dreams." It stuck.
(Lunch with you today was DIVINE. Thanks. Real note to come by snail mail; I'm a good etiquette kid.)
CC & Zoomie,
Great memories can be created days, months and decades ago!
MB
Cookiecrumb, your Cheese Dreams sound good, too, and Cranky is fun to have lunch with! (We had a great time, too! Another thing we have in common is snail mailed thank you notes!)
BuzzB, amen to that!
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