Photo Credit: © Can Stock Photo Inc. / Vapi
In the early 1900s, Pauline, my grandmother, was raised in a small village in Italy where refrigeration was nothing more than an inconsistently delivered block of ice stored at the bottom of a battered, old “icebox.” As a result, most of what was eaten by the family came directly from the land or the market. That meant the daily meal was likely fresh fish, many vegetables and fruits, and a side of pasta. These days it is on the cover of books and titled The Mediterranean Diet; her family simply called it lunch.
When my grandmother came to this country as a pre-teen, financial circumstances hadn’t changed much, and although modern refrigeration had come a long way, having the resources to fill that refrigerator was not always easy. Again, a daily trip to the market was likely, and the various “specials” or sale items were probably what my grandmother bought to stretch the family dollar as far as possible.
Somewhere in her mid-twenties, she became a bride, and while her husband provided a good salary and nice home, her habit of visiting the market never died. Grandma made the daily, 3-mile trek to the towering grocery store with its endless shelves of everything a kitchen would need.