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Well, Lent is here again! No meat on Fridays! When I and my 6 brothers were growing up we thoroughly enjoyed our meatless Friday night dinners... our Mom always made English muffin pizza's, Lobster Neuberg, Macaroni and Cheese, Tuna Casserole with the potato chips on top! Everything was so good it hardly felt like a sacrifice. What recipes do you all make for Lent?

Poached salmon with roasted vegetables!!!! My grandmother used to make an egg gumbo on Fridays. One of these days I'm going to try my hand at that.

First husband was catholic, but he would not adhere to Lent. He said he was a working man and needed to eat!!! That was back in the day when there was to be no meat for the whole of Lent.

Lucky you....we got frozen fish sticks and they were awful. Talk about discouraging someone to ever try "fresh" fish...

I grew up going to Catholic school from grade school through college - and I don't ever remember not eating meat during all of Lent - only on Fridays of Lent and Ash Wednesday. But we were supposed to "fast" every day but Sunday - and "fasting" meant that two of your meals were not to equal the 3rd meal. We always "gave up" something for Lent - like candy usually - or eating inbetween meals. And these rules only applied to adults between the ages of (I'm not sure exactly what the age was) but something like 16 to 65. We always thought eating fish was great and not a sacrifice at all.

I grew up attending public school and they observed no meat Fridays anyway all school year as was the Catholic practice before Vatican II.
So we enjoyed macaroni & cheese, fish sticks, grilled cheese with tomato soup, tuna casserole and tuna salad sandwiches in rotation for lunch.
Even after Vatican II they still observed no meat Fridays for a long time. Now the public schools have it very different.

Even my Mom lots of times ended up preparing fish on Fridays and we weren't Catholic at all. She does a great salmon croquette, salmon patties, salmon loaf, tuna casseroles of all kinds, tuna burgers and of course fried fish. She purchased frozen fish fillets and seafood from the fish route truck- halibut, cod, pike, shrimp, clams, lobster, scallops, etc.

DH is Catholic and his mom burned them out on canned tuna and fish sticks, even tomato soup and they never did fillets of fish or any seafood. So I enjoy my fish & seafood by dining out and when DS2 comes and we have tuna together.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Lurah,

Seaborne, giving up meat to eat fish/seafood isn't any sacrifice down here in southern Louisiana either!!!!

You know, after having read what you all have written thus far, I believe we all carry our childhood memories just as we see them, obviously. I grew up with very little, my Mom and Dad had 7 children and many times my Dad was out of work, I remember his paycheck was $35.00 a week for many years, yet, my Mother always had dinner on the table no matter what. And that's where the Tuna Fish Casserole comes in, and the Macaroni and Cheese, always a favorite of mine because I didn't know anything more than my Mom's great cooking, she always put the effort to feed us a fulfilling and tasty meal... she didn't do much for herself, she didn't dress in fancy clothes, she painted the inside and the outside of our house by herself, she got down on her hands and knees and waxed our wooden floors and always had Chrysanthemums in the hallway to greet us when we came home from school on Fridays. It's not about what your Mom and Dad were able to provide for you, it's more about the fact that they WANTED to provide for you everything that was in their realm of giving you the best childhood they were able to do.

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Originally posted by sms29s66:
Seaborne, giving up meat to eat fish/seafood isn't any sacrifice down here in southern Louisiana either!!!!

Louisiana has the best seafood, Crawfish! I had a crawfish boil 2 weeks ago, it was divine!, spicy, with the corn, garlic, artichokes, potatoes, THE BEST!!

Of course, being from the Seattle area meant that we had all kinds of fish and seafood readily available. We ate fresh fish which my mother bought at the Public Market every Friday, going downtown on the bus. Then, my father was also a commercial fisherman during the fishing seasons - either fishing off the MOnterey Coast in CA in the 30's, up in Alaska, and then finally in the Puget Sound area. Originally, the RC Church made Fridays "meatless," in order to boost the sales of fish - this was in Europe first - but it certainly did the same for the fishing industry in the States as well.

I come from a Spanish background but did not grow up as a Catholic.

Even if I did, Spanish Catholics were given a meatless Friday dispensation from the Church in the 12th c. for their role in the Crusades and in the 1500s, this dispensation was carried over into the Spanish territories in the New World.

I remember my Mom telling me this and found it intriguing. But it was a moot point. As Methodists, we did not have hard and fast rules about Lenten season abstinence.

All that aside, we ate fish all year 'round because we had access to lots of fresh shellfish and fish living on Long Island. To this day, I still prefer fish over red meat.

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Originally posted by aychihuahua:


All that aside, we ate fish all year 'round because we had access to lots of fresh shellfish and fish living on Long Island. To this day, I still prefer fish over red meat.

I grew up on Long Island too, Huntington, Greenlawn area, what part of Long Island did you grow up on?

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Originally posted by Spanish Revival:


I grew up on Long Island too, Huntington, Greenlawn area, what part of Long Island did you grow up on?

Practically around the corner from you in Farmingdale.

This is kinda funny: I married a catholic and I became one because I wished us to be a church-going family. I became pregnant around the time of Lent and had an insatiable appetite. Since I thought I was sup to fast, I found I just couldn't!!! I tried to 'keep track' and was weeks 'ahead' in food consumed...ha! Finally, after mass one day, I heard some ladies say "We could still get pregnant and not worry about fasting"; I was soooooooo relieved that I hadn't been committing any sins!!!! Isn't that just too funny?????

CJO - not funny - just sad that the church had such influence . . . but it was the same for all of us - one drop of water after midnight, and we couldn't go to communion - unbelievable!!

Fish sticks!
Ha!
I haven't thought about them for years.
I thought that really was how fish was prepared.

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Originally posted by Seaborne:
CJO - not funny - just sad that the church had such influence . . . but it was the same for all of us - one drop of water after midnight, and we couldn't go to communion - unbelievable!!

Seaborne, of course you are right about it not being not at all funny; it's just that it was almost 50 yrs. ago and my perspective is different....Wayyyyyyy different! Actually my whole LIfe is completely different, but this isn't the proper forum to expound on that

CJO - of course - and I'm thinking about it from the perspective of so many of us - and in no way, a criticism of your comments - so cute, really. We didn't know any different at the time. My perspective, like yours, is from a distance of well over 50 years.

We eat our fish at the Catholic Church Friday fish fry -- a community event and we always come with a table of friends and it's a great evening (after first having lent-inis at our house first before we leave for the church!)

Martha

Hey, Martha...welcome home!!!

Thank you Gracie but we're in Venice -- we just got internet connection!!!! So I'm catching up some! We stay here until tomorow morning when we'll go to Tuscany for 4 days. Tuscan wine country here we come! (As well as Lucca and Florence)

Martha