Thelma Turner
Photo Courtesy of my Grandfather, J. Paul Turner
Hello, and welcome to my new blog. Scratch That: Eating the way your Memaw intended. I've decided to dive into the realm of food blogging with slight apprehension. First, I am completely aware that food blogging has taken the world by storm. I do not claim food superiority or that I am some sort of kitchen genius. Instead I hope to grasp one main point here. Living slowly. In a world where technology has taken over our lives, it is important to slow down and enjoy our surroundings. I hope to communicate the joy of living day to day, and taste to taste.
Who's Memaw? My Great-Grandmother Turner. She has had a quiet, but powerful influence on my life. I hardly new her, because I was quite young when she passed, but her legacy has influenced her entire family years later. The stories which are told of her all paint her as a strong, sweet, but firm woman. She bore nine children, buried a few before she herself passed, worked hard to provide and nurture her family, and had so many sayings and colloquialisms that they're famous even to her great-grandchildren. One that I hear often (and I promise it's in jest) is "I'm gunna wring yer neck!" I can only imagine how handy that was with eight kids running around.
My inspiration for this blog was her. I feel that as the world and society depends more and more on technology, social networking and instant gratification, we forget the things my Memaw experienced. I am in no way wanting to romanticize her life, all lives have hardships and nothing is perfect, but what I want to do is bring back the things she would have known and experienced. I want to learn to do things the way it was intended. To earn things with the sweat of my brow, to have gratification from great results, to taste food the way it was intended, and to live a simpler life sans the microwave and pop tarts. Memaw did not have purple ketchup, or frozen t.v dinners. Instead, they raised chickens, food was worked for, and eight mouths had to be fed. She stretched her dollars and her cooking. In a way, she was probably the most creative woman in my life. I respect the work she did and the hardships she overcame.
This blog is intended to honor her. By cooking from scratch, and sharing my experiences in an open forum, I hope to learn to appreciate food in a whole new light. I don't want to cook anything she wouldn't recognize. I want to take the stairs and make coffee without a percolator. It is important to live life slowly. Computer screens will only show you so much, and honestly, the world has so much to offer. It's time to experience it.
Bon Appetit
