Post #26

Sorry, no thought for today. Maybe tomorrow. Anyway, the following stuff is already too long so I have to cut back on something.


About once a week Grandma and I allow ourselves the luxury of an order of French fries at one of the local fast food dispensers. Today it was at Burger King, whose fries are some of the best. As we sat there eating and discussing all kinds of really important stuff, I commented on the fact that the catsup BK uses for its products just doesn’t taste as good as I remembered eating when I was a boy. That observation made me think of my Aunt Gwen, who was just a few years older than I was. If given her choice of what to have for her lunch, a catsup sandwich would win, hands down. Relating that bit of family history got Grandma and me into a discussion of what we ate as kids growing up. Personally, I recall eating some pretty weird things that might qualify as food. For instance, there was the time, when, as a four-year old, I got into the icebox (I’ll explain “ice box” later) and drank a couple of large glassfuls of the watermelon juice that Mom had prepared for an upcoming picnic. It tasted wonderful going down but not so great coming up. (That reminds me of the guy who drank 8 bottles of Coca Cola and burped seven up, but that’s another story). Ever since that day of overindulgence, I have not liked watermelon! However, I will eat a piece now and then just so Grandma doesn’t have to eat alone.
When I was about seven, now a little older and much wiser, I watched as LauraBelle—our chief cook, bottle washer and friend—added a pinch of brown sugar to some cocoa she was making for my brother and me. That drink tasted great, so I decided, if a pinch of brown sugar was good, just think how much better it would be with more than a pinch. Later that day, I pulled the box of brown sugar and the can of powdered cocoa from the cupboard, and took a bottle of milk from the icebox. Then I got a tall glass and mixed my own version of LauraBelle’s drink. Let me tell you that a teaspoon of cocoa and 3 mounded tablespoons of brown sugar stirred into a glass of milk is not a mixture that you want to give to anyone you care about. To my sweet tooth it tasted pretty good, but the resulting sugar-rush was something I don’t ever want to experience again. I’m still not overly fond of food made with brown sugar.
While Aunt Gwen was crazy about catsup, I was hooked on good old French’s yellow mustard. I still am. When I was about ten years old and living in Compton, California, I always walked to school, as did most all of the kids I knew. My walk just happened to take me past Compton Market. Each day on my way home from school I would stop in at the market and say hello to Mr. Klein, the friendly butcher. I had worked very hard to establish a respectful relationship with him and eventually we became good friends. Mr. Klein knew of my passion for mustard; he also knew that my favorite food to put it on was a slice of “Scotch Ham,” a kind of ham loaf similar to today’s Spam. For all I know, it may have even been the forerunner of Spam. Anyway, each day, if Mr. Klein wasn't too busy, we would have a little chat about school and stuff and then he’d give me a slice of Scotch Ham and send me on my way. I’d hurry home, get out a couple of slices of white bread, spread each slice heavily with mustard, and clamp the whole thing around that luscious slice of meat. I loved Mr. Klein!
Well, there are, perhaps more exotic examples of my eating habits, such as ladling good old rich brown gravy over a piece of chocolate cake (this one passed down to me by my mother) or putting pepper on homemade ice cream to eliminate the freezing pain one gets behind the eyes when eating that yummy dessert, but we’ll save those for another time.

Oh! About ice boxes; to those of you who have never known a time when there was no TV or anything as fancy as a refrigerator, you might not know what an ice box is—or perhaps have never even heard of one. Well, in the “good old days”—those days long since past that you hear old curmudgeons always talking about—many people didn’t even have electricity in their homes, and those that did couldn’t afford a refrigerator even if refrigerators had been commercially available, which they weren’t. So, in order to keep perishable foodstuff relatively fresh and edible, most kitchens had insulated boxes, just as houses today have fridges. They ranged in size from small to large—the size being dependent upon a person’s needs and what they could afford. The boxes were usually made of wood (plastic hadn’t come upon the scene yet) and lined with galvanized metal, like tin or steel. The top portion of a typical icebox had a latchible door that opened out to allow a block of ice to be put inside—hence the name icebox (aha!!!). The lower portion of the box had another latchible door that opened to a small compartment where fruits, meats, and vegetables could be stored. I should mention here that there were delivery people (usually men) who came around every day with their wagon—or truck if they could afford one—filled with several 300-pound blocks of ice. From those blocks he would chip off whatever size his customers needed. Whenever the iceman came, we kids would all gather around and grab any pieces that he may have “accidentally” let fall during the chipping process. They were almost as good as Popsicles; and best of all, they were free.
Most boxes held at least a twenty-five bound block of ice, which would be a cube about ten-inches in size and wouldn’t melt for at least a day—unless you accidentally left the door ajar. Some of the larger ice boxes for home use took fifty-pound blocks, which, of course, kept the contents cool (not really cold) for a longer period of time.
Down at the bottom of the box was an opening that contained a shallow pan, which theoretically caught the run-off water as the ice melted. I say theoretically because more often than not the young son, (whose name will not be mentioned) who had been assigned the job of emptying that pan, had been too busy playing and had forgotten all about it.
Now, that’s probably a lot more than you really cared to know about the icebox—and especially about “those good old days,”—but if you’re just dying to hear more, I’m the old curmudgeon that could tell you all kinds of good stuff about working as an iceman in my teen years, or even about my short-lived adult career as a milkman.

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