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I haven't thought about this in years! When I was a kid (in the '40s), my Mom would fry fish on Friday. The fish were called "jack salmon," which has nothing to do with what they really were! They were frozen whole fish, cleaned, beheaded, gutted, and skinned. I think they were what we call "whiting" now. Mom would roll them in corn meal and fry them in Crisco. And fry them, she did! When they were cooked, you could hammer a nail with them! The side dishes were Kraft Macaroni & Cheese, the powdered cheese kind, and a can of stewed tomatoes. Believe it or not, I loved it!

Actually, I have inherited none of my parent's eating habits -- my dad eats pretty poorly, and my mom, though a good cook, never had any interest in food culture and also eats somewhat unbalanced. Dinner was always really late, lunches were often bought at school, breakfast was totally DIY (my mom was a single parent, so no criticism from me).

However, I do think their bad/irregular eating habits with little to no food or nutrition education really inspired me to go in the opposite direction. I buy as much fresh food as I can, and anything in a box, can, or jar has its ingredients and nutrition information scrutinized. I cook as much from scratch as possible to control quality, and I try to diversify the foods I eat (seasonally, nutritionally, and even color-wise). I actually have no taste for the processed, empty-calories foods that both my parents love (stock cookies and cakes, soda, chips, etc.). And I was traumatized the last time I attempted to eat fast food on a dare.

For all of that, though, my mom did inspire me with the concept of home cooking -- I do remember large pots of sauce on the stove for hours, homemade Italian bread, and big yummy pot roasts from time to time. There were also hundreds of homemade cookies at the holidays, a tradition I still try my best to pursue. Food was more about tradition than specifically for health, which I've found can be a great thing if nutrition and careful ingredient selection is taken into consideration.

Hmm interesting question! My mom and dad are both very different in their eating habits, and I'm not like either of them! My mom hates chocolate and coffee (I love both). She eats weird things for breakfast...like leftover dinner; I will have a granola bar or yogurt for breakfast. She also despises sushi, which I love, and doesn't care for chinese. My parents eat out A LOT. Probably 4-5 nights of the week. I eat out maybe one night, if they invite me ;) They eat lots of eggs, I dislike eggs.

One thing I am thankful for, is that we really didn't have junk food in our house growing up. We'd might have some ice cream in the fridge if we were lucky. Though I absolutely LOVE baking and eating sweets, I do not ever buy that kind of stuff at the store. If I have something sweet it is something I've made.

Some similarities, some differences. Growing up, we always had diet soda and low sugar cereals. I still like both. A serving of cookies was always 2- no more, no less. Check. Mom always cooked dinner, and worked full time. Lots of crock pot meals and things that could be prepared and frozen. Check, check. Oooh, I also inherited dad's capacity to eat A LOT, and fairly quickly. I try to keep these under control, but I slip sometimes.

Here are the differences: Mom was and still is lacking in a sense of adventure and a desire to try new things. I love the classics like pot roast and chicken soup, but I love to tweak them, too. I love spicy things, and grew up thinking I didn't just because mom didn't. Wrong! I also love ethnic foods, and will go out of my way to try meals from other cultures.

Dad is a "feast or famine" eater. He eats very little for lunch, and has the same lunch and breakfast every day- oatmeal for breakfast, and yogurt and sugar snap peas for lunch. He works out at the gym after work and then comes home and eats half of a big bag of potato chips and at least 2 servings of dinner followed by one or two enormous helpings of sherbet. I prefer to spread my intake a little more evenly throughout the day. And I like to eat when I'm hungry... which doesn't always coincide with my lunch break. Today I ate my rice krispies with banana and milk just before noon (wasn't hungry before that), and a bag of hard pretzels with some mustard and a diet pepsi around 3. I wonder when dinner will happen? (A slice of leftover frittata and a salad). (Can you tell I'm single?)

Great question, JEP! Keep 'em coming!

I cook a little bit like my mom, because of course I learned by watching her, but I eat quite differently. I grew up with a dad who wouldn't eat basil or curry, and I love both so much. I never had sushi, Thai, Korean, Indian, etc. until I was old enough to go to restaurants closer to the city with friends (I did often have Chinese food when the family went out; my mom cooked mostly New England/American style, with some Italian style thrown in). My mom will try anything really, but it's not often that I have a meal with her and not my dad these days.

My mother eats according to her own silent biorhythms that I have never fully been able to fathom. Sometimes she'll start off her morning with a giant mug of tea and end it with a small salad, with nothing to serve as padding between those meals. Other days she'll have two eggs on toast with creme fraiche and bacon and then steak for dinner.

My days aren't quite as disparate as that: I eat when I'm hungry (most of the time...) and try to eat all whole grain, low-fat, low-processed foods. But I learned to love all of those things from my mother, who also has always insisted on organic, natural foods, preferably sourced locally and prepared at home. There was also rarely dessert in our house, but that doesn't stop me from continually lusting after it. As always, the nature versus nurture question! :)

My Dad would eat one bite of each food, in order, and actually finish his meal evenly.

Every once in a while I find myself unconsciously doing the same thing!

PS: My Dad was an engineer.

The things that I cook and eat have no resemblance whatsoever to what I grew up with -- the typical 60s and 70s diet of Oreos and other junk, canned veggies, bland meats, hamburger and hot dogs, etc.

However, the family dinner hour is the same. We eat as a family virtually every night of the week, as I did as a kid, with the TV off, the candles lit, and nothing else going on.

Fun question. I am happy to have inherited many of my parents' food habits as they eat fairly balanced, healthy meals. My mom is a great cook, and I mostly learned to cook from her. I probably eat more fruits and veggies, whole grains, and legumes than my parents (I was vegetarian for a while and still don't eat tons of meat). I don't use many mixes, but one I cannot give up is Jiffy cornbread mix - it was an essential food of my childhood - for cornbread muffins and pancakes. I definitely feel like that is a family inheritance!

meat, meat, meat, meat, meat. baked potatoes topped with margarine. iceberg lettuce and cardboard tomatoes drowned in wishbone italian dressing. canned asparagus.

NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO.

Definitely not. I did inherit my Mother's deep love of eating out, but other than that...nada. They are both meat and potato eaters, and I am most definitely not. I've been dabbling in Veganism and Raw Foodism. They have no idea what's going on!