Food your parents made you've never heard of anywhere else

TBH I'm kind of weirded out by the idea of fresh beans smothered in sauce to begin with. Vegies are for eating as is, not smothering in salty creamy stuff :/ Maybe its an aus thing.

yeah I've never had a green bean casserole, but no matter how many times I turn and combine the listed ingredients above in my head I can't come up with a version that might taste good

Green bean casserole is one of those things that's totally delicious and necessary only one time per year. I hardly never eat any super salty processed to death but stuff like this is definitely an exception.

Basically my whole childhood was based on salty packaged processed overcooked foods and I'm well past that era in my life.

I'll also just go on the record here as being pro-canned cream of mushroom soup.

When I was in first grade the teacher asked us all to share our favorite recipes so they could be published in the paper and to my newly single and financially struggling mother's utter horror, I gave the recipe for my then favorite meal: elbow macaroni mixed with canned cream of mushroom soup.

My mother would use up the last bits of turkey, mixed with frozen peas and cream of mushroom soup, topped with Bisquick, as "turkey pot pie".

Ground meat in milk gravy. It was served over chunks of boiled potatoes and you'd sorta mash them together with your fork. Not my favorite.

We had something similar - hamburger gravy (like sausage gravy, only extra-bland) served over biscuits or toasted white bread.

this thread is making me feel rather lucky that my mom made a lot of stir fries and basic meat + steamed vegetables.

Any "stir fries" would fall into a category of foods that my mom still to this day refers to as "funny business" and thus viewed suspiciously at best. And why would you steam vegetables when you can boil the hell out of them for an hour?

My mom made a lot of amazing food, too. She'd make her own pasta + stock + etc for chicken noodle soup, make her own barbecue sauce (from a recipe that called for coffee grounds – she used Pero instead), freestyle a great ginger salad dressing, make a perfect pizza crust, insanely good creole shrimp/black beans + rice, shit I can't even step to. OTOH there are seven people in my family & I can't blame her for taking some occasionally questionable shortcuts from time to time. I don't want to misrepresent her mad cooking & baking skills, tho.

I'm amazed she can make anything at all, given what my Grandma makes. She took care of us for two weeks once while my parents went on vacation. Most memorable dish was stirred-together flavorless tomatoes & stew meat with rice (of the baffling/amazing gloppy/crunchy texture combo). She told my parents, "Your kids sure eat a lot of cereal."

I mean I love making risotto but I don't think I'd want to make it for seven people.

my mom made a wide array of utterly bizarre casseroles. mostly ground beef based but there was also a tuna/canned peas/potato chip number. my favorite was the ground beef w/tater tots and I think cream-of-mushroom soup as a binding agent. worst was our neighbor "mrs. yerina's casserole" a ground beef w/noodles and MAYO monstrosity. I loved my mom's take on chili -- very mild w/lots of green pepper -- served over spaghetti cincinnati-style. and these "corned beef hash sandwiches" on english muffins, from I guess a can. her deserts were dynamite, not uncommon but stuff I don't see much anymore like snickerdoodles and bundt cakes. she considered herself a healthy eater and was always pushing fresh fruit on us but I look back at all that hamburger...and canned vegetables...and mayo...and think "why did it occur to anyone that these foods should be eaten together." it was the 60s, man!

so glad i grew up a NYC jew. we don't eat casseroles.

Dude what about kugel? Kugel is TOTALLY a casserole!

kugel is not made with canned cream of mushroom soup and potato chips.

M. Coleman, the snickerdoodle (a fine food and the only reason I have cream of tartar around) is alive & well. Especially on this site, where she has recipes for snickerdoodle muffins, snickerdoodle tarts, snickerdoodle sortbread, and snickerdoodle 'blondies',

<3 kugel
i am also really glad i grew up withe a jewish bff and tons of jewish family friends because i learned about the wonders of brisket and kugel and lox and whitefish salad and latkes.