What Are Your Family’s Signature Dinners?

Being southern, my mom made a southern spaghetti sauce with hamburger,onions, and bell peppers. It had a secret ingredient of Worcestershire sauce. Every Sunday we also had a pot roast that cooked while we were in church. My favorite meal that i always requested was oven fried chicken with mash potatoes. My favorite dessert was a baby food cake that she made with plum baby food. It was like a spice cake that was so good for breakfast with a glass of milk. I remember cutting off slices of it to eat after school as well.

Chicken Marsala. It’s easy, creamy, savory and oh so Italian-American of us. There was something so fancy about dusting chicken in flour to me as a kid, and sprinkling crispy sage over the top of wild mushrooms for a garnish. I used to offer to do the dishes so I could mop up the earthy, buttery juices with a slice of bread before putting them in the dishwasher.

My dad was in charge of breakfast on school days. Sometimes at my request, he would make “special eggs” which were a sunny side up egg on top of a slice of fried bologna with a slice of American cheese in between. Now I know this is not the healthiest thing to eat! but they were special because they were reserved for mornings that felt particularly grand, for no particular reason.
Lunch was our biggest meal, and that was made by mom every day. The hits in her rotation were tuna empanadas (made with pizza dough), ground beef with spinach (amazing with a warm flour tortilla), and sweet and sour chicken (special occasions only).
It makes me smile to think of them making these dishes, but it also makes my heart hurt because living really far from them these last few years has been excruciating :(

I was just thinking this very thing, with regard to how our family foods keep us connected after our loved ones pass on. I think of my Grandma so much when I cook, as I spent allot of time with her in the kitchen. I recently made her delicious “Pastiche” for my family and my daughter was in heaven, asking for it again. It’s one of those dishes that you can’t google a recipe for, a meal specific to an thrifty Italian household, using up the Sunday roast leftovers. Thanks for sharing the book info.
I love those meatballs with polenta, in the photo.
Is that a recipe from the book also?
Thanks!

My mom’s shepherd’s pie is a classic I’ve grown to crave and was always our special Halloween night dinner (full warm meal before we trick or treat!) Browned ground beef with soy sauce for color and season, lots of pepper and onions and peppers. Layered with (gasp) canned creamed corn, and ‘niblets’ corn, and mashed potatoes with a fork swirl on top, I’ve made it in the same tradition for my stepkids and on chilly days when I crave it. My then 11 year old stepdaughter was treated for lunch with her grandparents at a neat pie place in town a couple years ago and saw shepherd’s pie on the menu, she got excited, ordered it and had to trade with Grandma when she got a taste that traditional sheperds pie is with Lamb and peas… It was so cute, she came home and asked if we could make our version, because she was REALLY looking forward to tasting it and got shocked by the lamb! That will always warm my heart and makes me love it even more.

I love my mom’s yam rice and fried beehoon. Extremely Malaysian and just the way I like them :)

This has been one of my favorite comment sections so far and gets me so excited to have a family of my own one day! My sister is also an avid CoJ reader and when we we’re talking about what we think our answers would be for this, we both immediately said my mom’s “peach chicken” — basically chicken breasts simmered with peach jam, balsamic vinegar, and scallions. Sounds weird but if you’re a sweet and salty lover this is the best. She also makes the best crab cakes in the world, with Ina Gartens caesar salad and she adds roasted cherry tomatoes to it. YUM.

My mom is also always known for bringing her sausage balls (sausage meatballs in a tangy sauce) and her sweet and sour coleslaw (the ramen slaw that people always make different versions of.. hers is the best!) to any family party. These recipes seem so 90s to me but my siblings and I have each brought these dishes to more parties than we can count and they are always a hit.

As for my dad, he was never a big cook but my childhood memories of him cooking always include breakfast for dinner or Sunday morning french toast, and instead of milk he adds a splash of OJ to the egg mixture. Funny enough, now that my parents don’t have kids to feed daily, my dad might cook more than my mom and has learned to make some awesome dishes that he loves to impress us all when we come home for holidays!

I love how nearly every single comment isn’t just about food. It’s about family and how strong our associations with food are. Jenny has really tapped into a powerful subject and I cannot wait to get my hands on her new book!

I was raised by a single dad and most of the time we ate Hamburger Helper, haha. My great grandmother is Swedish and has passed down a recipe for Swedish meatballs, so every once in a while he’d make them. Now I make them for my boys but I use the DALS recipe instead! Whenever we eat them I am instantly transported back to the tiny kitchenette in Washington state, sitting there while my dad made dinner. My mom wasn’t around much but early in my childhood she was and used to make these really delicious scalloped potatoes. They were so good and I think of her any time I have them.

My husband is the cook in our family and is all about rituals. I love it. We do have regular family meals (he makes the best Lamb Daube) but he always cooks a special meal for birthdays and celebrations. We live in Australia where it’s pretty normal to have an open door policy with guests; most of the time we have people just drop by and he is always happy to whip up a meal. I have a few dishes that I do throughout the week (poor guy can’t do it all!) and I think our boys will be instilled with the idea that food is what brings people together.

It’s healing too….I love finally sitting down together after a rough day and having my 4 yo ask “how’s your day Mom?” That will never get old.

Hi Joanna! Is there a recipe for the meatballs in the photo you used? They look SO delicious! I tried briefly on Jenny’s site, but wasn’t sure if it went with one of her meatball recipes.

My mother makes the best lasagna this side of the Mississippi, and we always had it for Christmas. Also, her tuna noodle casserole! I make it myself now, and I’ve improved the recipe (I make my own soup base rather than use the campbell’s cream of), but it’s still one of my favorite meals.

My Mother was a great cook. One of our regular meals was fried chicken and mashed potatoes with milk gravy from the chicken drippings. I think of it so often but just realized I have never made it for my Son. My Mother passed away when I was 19 so this just reminded me that I need to make this for him soon.

This is a topic that has come up frequently between my husband and I. We are expecting our first child in January. We already have a couple of “signature dinners” together and we have been talking about whether or not our child will grow up to have fond memories of them. Growing up we always had chicken and noodles with mashed potatoes for Sunday supper. Thinking about it just makes me feel cozy.

I was very fortunate to grow up having a mother who was the best cook in the world. She baked fresh bread everyday and made her own yogurt,jam and grew a garden with the freshest produce.I never ate anything out of a can until I was a teenager. We also had dessert every night even if it was just a bowl of ice cream or chocolate pudding.My friends loved to come to my house for dinner.Now my mom is in her late seventies she does.nt cook like that anymore.When I visit her it is a very simple easy menu so I try to cook all the old favourites but it,s not the same.

being raised Brazilian in the US, my mother would make all sorts of Brazilian classics that I ask for whenever she comes to visit, but especially a bean dish called “tropeiro” which is dried beans with manioc flour, super thinly sliced collard greens and fried sausage. it’s a main dish in itself and although i’ve tried, i can never get the greens to match hers.

my dad on the other hand, worked at an italian restaurant, in the kitchen, as a recent immigrant to the country, and learned to cook there! so his signature dish that i have him make is actually chicken piccata.

now that my boyfriend and i are living together, and both working from home, we’re constantly trying to replicate family recipes for each other and create our own recipes – since we eat at home a lot. he’ll always make his portuguese mom’s white bean and sausage + i’ll make my mom’s chicken strogonoff. and after visiting peru last year, our own favorite signature dish has been vegetarian quinoa chaufa! <3

Food in my family has always had a sort of traditional element to it. My aunt makes the best spaghetti pie ever, and that’s always her most-requested dish. My grandmother bakes two casseroles for Christmas Eve dinner, chicken and seafood, and they’re actually the yummiest things on this planet. Food has always been a way to get family together and it’s probably why I love posts like this so much.

This is random but I wonder where the brown-handled silverware is from in the meatball pictures? Maybe it belonged to the photographer so Jenny wouldn’t know. But if anyone has any leads send ’em my way :)

My daughter is only 14 months but as she gets older I love the idea of celebrating a half birthday with half a cake! I also love the special plate someone mentioned above. My college cafeteria had random sparkly trays mixed in with the regular ones and we always felt it was lucky to get what we referred to as “the disco tray”. I would love to do something like this with my daughter too!

My family is very Midwestern. Both my parents grew up on farms (one in Iowa, one in Minnesota). My Grandparent’s house holds such strong food memories for me. My Grandpa makes his own grape juice that’s always in the fridge, much more tart and less sweet than anything you can buy. It’s perfect. My Grandma makes the best baked goods, particularly breads. Her cinnamon bread round is the best! She would always serve it for breakfast whenever we visited.

As a child my family always did Breakfast for dinner on Sunday nights, and it was always waffles and bacon. The house smelled so good. Also my Mom makes amazing chicken noodle soup completely from scratch, and the best bread. We always had dessert after dinner growing up.

Now my husband and I have our own food traditions. We make our own pizza from scratch on Saturday nights. I make the dough, and he makes the sauce. We have so much fun working together. He also makes the BEST meatballs, they have become his special signature dish. We have a daughter on the way and we are so excited to create food memories for her.

My mother died several years ago, and I am always trying to recreate her recipes. Honestly, it was more the time I spent with her in the kitchen that mattered more than anything.
Now I have 2 stepdaughters, and it has become a tradition of ours for me to make them a very special birthday cake each year. I love to surprise them. Now my 2 year old son is part of the tradition of course, and he gets his own favorite chocolate cake. I hope and think they all will remember their special cakes that I loved making for them.

On one of my mom’s last lucid phone calls, I wrote down her pear pie recipe, word-for-word. I can make it so it tastes exactly like hers. I feel so thankful for this. And I miss my mom.
Signature actual meals (hey, pie is a meal!) growing up were lasagna and squash, which is my “birthday meal,” and sausage and spinach pie.

I love reading all of these comments with everyone’s happy memories!
The dishes in regular rotation during my childhood were beef & beans, venison bourguignon (my dad was a hunter, so we always had a deer in the deep freeze), and variations on the Scandinavian theme of creamed vegetables (peas, tomatoes, squash, etc…) on toast. My mom called her creamed tomatoes on toast “rum tum titti”, which always made us giggle. My favorite food tradition was every Sunday night we made popcorn & ice cream floats and watched America’s Funniest Home Videos together in our pajamas. It was a wonderful way to end the weekend, relaxing and laughing together.

My husband and I now have our own rotation of favorite meals which shift based on the season (lots of salads & curries), but my specialties are cakes (I bake them for all of my family & friends’ birthdays) and from-scratch pizza. I can’t wait to make new food memories and traditions with my kids!

Anything and everything that has cod, my mum will make the best version in the whole universe. I can’t cook cod properly myself (the time to buy salted cod and leave it on fresh water for 3 days and have the whole house smell is just too much for me) and I never seem to get the perfect taste out of the store-ready frozen fish.
So my sister and I will always ask for cod on birthdays and special lunches or dinners. Cod with cream; cod with eggs and parsley; cod with mashed potatoes… it’s so unbelievably good and comforting. I loved it as a kid and I still love it now. :)

Just loved reading all these comments – thank you.
There are four kids in my family and we all had a favourite dessert that Mum would make on our birthdays or special occasions, and now when we go home to visit. Mine was apple crumble, my other sisters had Lemon Delicious, cheesecake and chocolate self-saucing pudding. So good. I can’t wait to get a copy of this book now!

I made a comment above somewhere to another commenter as we have similar memories. But I also wanted to share my own meal ritual that I have with my daughter. When she was a baby it never occurred to me to try to create a signature meal. She’s school aged now, and my husband and I work full time with commutes. I don’t cook meals fully from scratch in the same way that my grandma made meals when I was growing up (she lived with us). So I felt guilty for a while that I was somehow short changing my kid on nutritious meals, and of food memories. However, these things happen organically. Every time I make TJ’s orange chicken, accompanied by TJ’s chicken pot stickers, steamed rice, and veggies my daughter is the happiest camper around. She would eat this four times a week if I let her. So when she smells the distinct tang of the vinegary orange sauce she will literally sing about it as she comes into the kitchen to tell me how excited and happy she is about dinner. I think there is a food ritual memory in the making.
Thank you Trader Joe’s.

My mother’s wife made us chicken parm at least once a week. She always used Ragu sauce. There are other brands of sauce I prefer now but when I make chicken parm, I have to get the Ragu or it’s not right. As an adult, I’ve discovered that apparently only my mom fed us bananas and cream–cottage cheese, sour cream, sugar and sliced bananas all mixed together. Still one of my favorite comfort foods!

I am a long time reader, but I have never commented! This article just stirred something inside of me and made me so sentimental! I’m from the Deep South, and rich food was very much a part of my upbringing. Every year, my mom makes cornbread dressing at Thanksgiving, and there is nothing like it. It always takes me back to my childhood. She would also make tomato gravy with biscuits for breakfast. She still makes this for her friends every year for Christmas, and she ends up having to share the recipe with everyone!
Thank you, Joanna, for bringing so many different ladies together on your blog! It makes my heart so happy!