“Everything you see,” said famous Italian actress Sophia Loren, “I owe to Spaghetti.” Yes vintage fans, it’s no secret that we, just like Sophia, are big fans of our food! To that avail, we invited food bloggers ‘View from the Table‘ to our Market Harborough fair to have a little sleuth through the foods of our childhood. Bringing a culinary walk down memory lane, take it away folks…
“Mother and daughter team Amy and Karen run Hand Me Down vintage clothing and accessories. Their memories, like most people’s, were from their own mothers. Amy after no consideration at all recalled macaroni cheese which made her mum Karen smile and fondly remember her own mum’s shepherd’s pie. Comfort food extraordinaire.”
“Nostalgic food for shoppers Ian and Maria was all about puddings and sweets. We talked parma violets and pink shrimps but Maria went for Bazooka Joe. Do you remember that the wrappers opened up to reveal a tiny comic strip? Maria did and that you could collect tokens and send them away to claim free Bazooka gifts. Maria saved hers and sent away for a camera, her mum wouldn’t buy her a film for it though as she thought it would be a waste. She is definitely not over that blow. Ian’s food of choice was proper chocolate steam pudding that he would make with his mum. Wonder if she was a bit more generous with the camera film?”
“Stenya from Rambling Rabbit sells kitchenalia and homewares. My assistant Amber was very curious about these. She could not get her head around the egg slicer. “But, why?”
“Being from California and spending a lot of time around campfires when she was growing up Stenya’s nostalgic food of choice is s’mores. A s’more, if you don’t know, is a marshmallow toasted over a campfire and sandwiched along with a layer of chocolate between two biscuits, or pieces of Graham Crackers. In her 12 years of living in the UK she’s never been camping so hasn’t had a s’more delight for a long time. “They make me think of my mother and bring back happy memories of being around 15 years old.”
“Shoppers Abby and Sophia, who had amazing hair by the way, styled at the event by
Jess and Amy, had old fashioned choices for ones so young – bread and butter pudding for Abby, pictured on the left and good old banana custard for Sophia.”
“Chloe of Madame Cherry Jewellery who made these little beauties, Amber’s wages for the day, had very fond memories of mint custard at school. I tried to think of a happy school dinner memory but I could only come up with getting seconds of chips once and little yogurt-pot-shaped portions of vanilla ice cream. To be honest though, the thoughts of prunes and custard are still too traumatic for me to dig too deep there.”
“Diane and Dave Langley sold me this absolute cracker of a 50s handbag. Dave’s retro food is without a shadow of a doubt suet pudding made by his mum with Atora shredded suet. Do you remember the packaging? Red, blue and yellow we thought and probably not changed too much over the years. Diane simply said rissoles and I’m still not sure if that was a good or bad thing.”
“Another thing I like very much about Judy’s Affordable Vintage Fairs is that you’ll always find a mighty fine tea and cake stall. Saturday’s was a real delight and was created by the enigmatic Pennie Pengilly (how great is that name?) and her lovely daughter Ellie of
Pear of Peas. Let me show you the cakes first, all homemade by Pennie.”
“It was a very difficult choice but for the record I went for Seville orange and almond cake. Oh, what a good choice it was too. Pennie’s mother was a great cook, they never had shop bought or processed food so her memories are of beautiful meals, “NOT rice pudding – that was vile!” but instead delicate opaque jellies and chocolate blancmange. Pennie’s fix-all dish that works the same magic as Jewish chicken soup is Malaysian coconut and noodle soup laksa.”
“Unsurprisingly Ellie, pictured above, (Pennie “doesn’t do photographs” though I cannot imagine why because she’s gorgeous) recalls her favourite food as her mum’s cooking. I thought it might be some kind of special cake that brought back happy memories but it was savoury all the way; beef wellington was up there but the winner was beef stroganoff and dauphinoise potatoes – a homecoming meal when Ellie comes back home from university.Judy’s Affordable Vintage Fairs serves 30 cities across the UK. There are events coming up in Edinburgh, Manchester and London. If you’re a lover of vintage and the unique; clothes, furniture, kitchenalia, homewares and accessories then you should definitely seek one out.”
And so there we go folks – retro inspiration a-go-go! For more from ‘View from the Table,’ visit their blog
here and if we’ve got you thinking about the tastes and plates of your childhood, feel free to comment below and tell us what you miss!
Retro Regards,
Judy HQ! x
