random thoughts – Day 1,715 – (Tuesday) – deli meat memories

When I was young, Mummu worked in the yarn mill on the 6 am to 2pm shift. She was highly disciplined and was in bed by 8:00 pm or earlier Sunday through Thursday and up by 5:00 am Monday through Friday. She got up, dressed her chosen uniform of a skirt and blouse, ankle socks and white nursing shoes which were polished every Sunday.

Lunch was prepared each evening so it was ready to go in the morning. Her lunch break was at 10:00 am and her lunch was always a sandwich. The deli meat rotation was luncheon loaf, olive loaf, ham, or roast beef on a rotating roster of bread, but usually scala. Of the meats, I liked the olive loaf and roast beef. Not together. That’s weird.  

Olive Loaf.

On Sunday, while getting the ingredients for Thanksgiving stuffing, including the bread cubes it turned out I didn’t need and forgetting to get the instant potatoes I did need, I took a lap around the outside departments of the store. At the cooler across from the deli where my beloved random cheese ends live, there was one package of cheese ends and one of olive loaf, which instantly made me think of Mummu and her work lunches. I bought them both.

Tonight, back at home after my work day, I had a supper of olive loaf with mayo on wheat pane. The bread was different than Mummu’s scala, but it’s what I had. I rarely eat deli meat, and it might be years before I do so again, but tonight’s sandwich and its memories of Mummu were pretty good.

Wednesday night I’ll be making my Finnish grandmother’s Canadian poultry stuffing recipe. It’s all about the food memories this week.