Of Sunday Mass and Family Meals

Barquillos - not exactly Communion wafers

(Photo by arquera)

Her sandal-clad feet swung back and forth, the only hint of a four-year-old's impatience. She tried to sit quietly and not fidget, as she'd promised her Yaya, but the bench was hard and the little breeze whistling through the church's open doors tickled her ears with the sounds of people outside enjoying the Sunday sunshine. She twisted around to see what she might be missing but a soft tap on her arm and an admonishing glance set her straight again. Then something so unexpected, so very wonderful, happened - Yaya leaned over and placed a heavy coin in her little palm. Grinning with delight, she quickly hopped off the seat, not seeing the surprised look on her nanny's face as she scampered down the aisle, past the usher who stood at the end of the pew holding out the collection basket. She dashed through the open portal and into the bright sunlight, clutching her windfall as she made a beeline for the tienda . . .

. . . where I bought a bag of barquillos - crispy, rolled wafers that I'd stick on my fingers and pretend were long, glamorous nails. That was the last time my nanny ever entrusted her church offering to me.

Our parish, St. Augustine Church, in Ottawa, Canada

It is one of my earliest food memories but not the only one that is connected to Sunday Mass. In fact, the Sabbath provided the setting for childhood experiences that helped form my fascination with food and its meanings. Every Sunday, through fair weather or foul (and once we moved to Canada, there were many foul winter days), our family attended Mass. My parents approached this obligation with faithful formality - Papa always wore a business suit with a handkerchief tucked neatly into the breast pocket, while Mama dressed as elegantly as if she were attending a ladies' luncheon. My sisters and I were also expected to be presentable, even if it meant wearing thick tights under our dresses on those frigid days. I can now admit without a frisson of Catholic guilt and fear of a lightning bolt striking me down that I would've preferred to stay at home and watch cartoons. 

But Papa and Mama made it worth our while - after church services, they would take us out for lunch! The prospect of eating out was incredibly exciting because it was so different from the norm: eating at home was an ordinary routine but eating at a restaurant on a Sunday was an extraordinary ritual. My sisters and I never knew where we would go until we got there and that element of surprise heightened the anticipation. 

(Photo credit: iknowjoe/Flickr)

Sometimes, we ate at a dim sum palace, where I'd watch enraptured as the servers revealed the contents of the rolling carts with a flourish and Papa ordered dishes until the lazy susan, ladened with baskets of steamed dumplings and plates of noodles, could barely spin. In summer months, we would have hamburgers at Harvey's, where we'd perch on the outdoor picnic benches in our Sunday best; years later, I learned that burgers were my mother's secret addiction.

Taking a family of six out to eat once a week was no easier on the wallet back then than it is today and yet my parents somehow managed. But why did they do it? Indeed, food-sharing is a universal form of group bonding and family meals specifically have a significant, positive impact on younger members with regard to future nutrition habits, risk behaviors and social development [see the University of Minnesota's Project Eat]. So wasn't it enough to bond as a family over dinner every night, as we consumed the same familiar dishes in the comfort of our own home? As it turns out, our after-Mass lunches went beyond strengthening family ties - paradoxically, it marked their gradual loosening. 

Like sugar to sweeten the medicine, these excursions were my parents' way of teaching me and my sisters life lessons that might otherwise go undigested if served with unpalatable lectures. Dining out was a means of expanding our scope beyond the spheres of home and school as we learned to interact with people other than family, friends and teachers. In practical terms, it taught us good manners and how to comport ourselves in public. 

At home, we ate as a unit and shared the same food on the table but at places like Harvey's, we could assert our individual preferences - it was the only time I was allowed to turn down vegetables. A variety of restaurants exposed us to a variety of foods and flavors apart from the more familiar Filipino; some became instant favorites, like Vietnamese noodle soups, while an equal number were rejected by immature tastebuds (a taste for kimchi, for example, took years to develop). By taking us out of the confines of the routine meal at home, Papa and Mama used fork and spoon, and the occasional chopsticks, to nudge us onto a path toward a greater awareness of the world at large and our own individuality.

Sadly, those first forays in independence worked all too well as the excitement of childhood gave way to the self-absorption of adolescence. There came a time when my sisters and I preferred other Sunday activities over Mass and the company of our friends over family. My parents surprisingly didn't insist that we continue attending service, perhaps acknowledging our fledgling independence but I now wonder if they felt hurt or saddened by our choice as our family ritual waned, then disappeared altogether as we moved into our own adult lives.

Hindsight is, of course, 20/20 and it brings regret into blinding focus. With our family now scattered, reviving our Sunday tradition is not possible. Yet, as much as I miss that old ritual, I realize that its lessons - that individualism and commensality are not mutually exclusive, that your world can expand with one small bite of a new food and that family will always keep you centered in it - have been achieved and are appreciated. Today, my husband and I have our own food ritual which began without conscious attempt several years ago. Its day, setting, food and purpose are completely different from those long-ago Sunday meals but the sense of fun and anticipation remains. 

I hope you'll come back and read about our Pizza Night Thursdays . . . 

In the meantime, please feel free to share your own memories of family food traditions!


**Updated 3/15/2012: In the original post published on 1/27/09, I used a photograph which I credited to the source but did not actually have permission from the photographer to use. The new photo that replaces it above is used under a Creative Commons license.

Steamed Chicken Dumplings

As a child, the only time we had these was when Papa took us to Sunday dim sum. My husband and I don't go as often as we'd like so this is an easy way to get a quick dumpling fix. It's a slight variation of a recipe for jiaozi (pork and cabbage dumplings) from Tangstein's Blog: Healthy Chinese Home Cooking, which also features an excellent video tutorial on how to form the dumplings. 

Yields approximately 2 dozen

Ingredients

1 pkg wonton or dumpling wrappers

1/2 cup finely chopped cabbage

2 spring onions, chopped

10 oz ground chicken

1/2 tsp ground ginger or ginger paste

1 Tbsp rice vinegar 

1 Tbsp low-sodium soy sauce

water

To make

1. Add all ingredients in a small bowl and mix well by hand;

2. Holding one wrapper in your palm, scoop 1 teaspoon of filling and place in the center of the wrapper;

3. Moisten edges of the wrapper with water and fold over, sealing the edges by pinching them together. If preferred, use a fork to press the edges together; repeat with remaining wrappers and filling.

4. Place in a steamer basket lined with greased wax paper (otherwise, dumplings may adhere to the paper) and steam for approximately 20 minutes. 

5. When done, serve immediately with a dipping sauce.

For dipping sauce: combine soy sauce, rice vinegar, minced garlic, minced ginger and finely chopped green onions to taste.