I’ve had gravy & bread as the main course in a meal, and fried taters on the side if we could afford it.
Nothing beat my grandmas homemade bread. She's been gone almost 30 years now, and my cousins and I STILL talk about her bread when we get together. Their kids are probably tired of hearing about it.
She made really good homemade bean soup. And between my uncle, grandfather, grandmother and myself, we knock off an entire loaf of her bread with the soup.
Buttered bread and soup. Who needs a spoon.
When she'd bake bread in the morning, and when my grandfather and uncle would come in from the fields for lunch, she'd have to stop them from eating the fresh bread.
She'd spend the morning making bread. Something like 5-6 loaves. And after lunch 1 loaf would be gone. She'd get so frustrated. ALL that work, and in about 1/2 an hour 1 loaf is gone. She did it all by hand. Five foot nothing and maybe 100lbs, that was TOUGH work for her. Kneading that bread by hand.
I type this with tears welling up. 49 years old and I still miss them. Probably the 2 people I respect the most.
My grandma, when she wasn't cooking or doing housework, she was in her garden. And when time came, she was in the fields with my grandpa. My grandpa was 61 when I was born, my grandma a few years younger. So I never knew them as "young" people. My grandma was a hard worker until she died at 75. My grandfather was a hard worker until he died at 93.
I consider myself a pretty hard worker (so do my coworkers) I think my grandfather would have done a pretty good job keeping up with me in his 80's (at least his 70's)