I grew up on this. You just put some cubed potatoes, carrots, onion, and perhaps a parsnip or celery if you have it and then drop some dollops of hamburger into the water. Boil until the veggies are tender but firm.
My mom made hamburger soup once a week. I never liked it much but didn’t want to hurt her feelings so I never said anything about it. It hadn’t realized until years later that this was a cheap meal to put wholesome hot food on the table . That sort of thing happens all the time when you grow up just the good side of poor.
Mom made ends meet, and kept her family fed. But one day in my pre-teens, I was starting to develop my own identity and I told her (gingerly), “Mom… I don’t really like hamburger soup.”
A quick expression flashed across her face, that I’m sure was a feeling of sadness that the hot meal she had made for me all those years was actually something I didn’t like. It was sort of a disappointed look – almost guilty that she had thought she was doing good,but had actually been doing something I didn’t want.
But, she recovered quickly, and said, “That’s okay, honey. If you don’t like it, you don’t have to eat it.” Now I seem to recall that I said I’d go ahead and finish it, and did. But I felt I’d really let her down and not been grateful.
She only made it a few times after that, and always had something else for me. After she passed in 1989, I realized I’d give anything to have a bowl of her hamburger soup again.
A dozen or two years ago I tried making it myself, but I forgot that she didn’t use any spices at all in it. It was just served with salt and pepper on the table. So, when I put in a few seasonings, it just didn’t taste the same – it should have been bland but with subtle vegetable flavors that would get hidden behind any additions.
Since my step-dad passed about a month ago, I’ve been falling into reverie a lot about all those I’ve loved and lost. And today, I decided to recreate her recipe.
I used that big carrot from the garden in my last post, which made it all the more special. And I’m enjoying this bowl of it right now as I write.
It is the same almost tasteless flavor I recall from more than half a century ago when I last had it. And as I savor it, I think of my mom and my step-dad and the tears mist behind my eyes, threatening to fall on my childlike smile as in my mind I sit once more at the table with my parents and grandparents as we all converse about our days over our hot bowls of hamburger soup.