My Grandmother’s Freezers Were Filled With Hundreds of UFOs
I made soup out of those UFOs and would happily feed it to visiting aliens — AKA, my friends.
If you are like me — impatient to know what the heck UFOs have to do with my grandmother’s freezer, I won’t make you read to the very end to find out.
UFOs are Unidentified Frozen Objects — they usually had food in them, though you never knew for sure!
My grandparents with three children (one of them, my mother) survived the Great Depression because of my grandmother’s mammoth garden. She not only fed her own family from the garden, but a neighbor’s six kids AND at least two to three traveling “hoboes,” who got off the passing train every evening.
When my grandparents moved to their new home acreage, my grandmother’s garden doubled in size. There was a huge garden right behind the farm house and then at the back of the first garden, was a second garden of equal size.
My brother and I were “lucky” enough to help her with her garden throughout the spring, summer and fall. In spring, we spent every weekend for a month, planting. Then there came the endless task of weeding. But soon enough the magic started happening. First the radishes and spinach. There is nothing like pulling a perfect radish from the ground, brushing off the dirt and eating it on the spot. Within weeks of planting, the bounty of fresh vegetables started.
My brother and I spend most of the summer on the farm. We helped with everything … learning to drive the farm trucks when we were seven — given the responsibility of looking after the chicken coop, milking the cow and feeding the pigs.
It wasn’t all work. We were given plenty of time to “play,” and read and just BE. Doing nothing, sitting up high in a tree with a kitten, hidden away from the world was the perfect thing to do on a hot summer afternoon.
The first garden was for eating. The vegetables would be picked young and enjoyed fresh. The second garden was allowed to grow “older,” and when ready, the bounty was canned (hundreds of jars of pickles, jams, jellies, canned tomatoes, berries and fruits). Potatoes, carrots, onions, garlic and other “keeper” crops were stored in the underground cellar and would last till well into spring.
In my late teens, my grandmother got her first freezer. She fell in love with it and over the years acquired three humongous freezers which were placed right at the bottom of the basement stairs. Filling the freezers became her new mission!
The challenge was that my grandmother was always in a hurry, always busy from dawn till well into the night. She never bothered to label the plastic bags, saying that it was unnecessary because you could SEE what was in them. When I left home and moved to another city to go to University, I’d make a trip to the farm every few weeks in the summer. I’d help with farm work, seeding, plowing, trucking grain to the elevators … and of course with the gardening and preserving process. I too would be up at the crack of dawn and work well into the night.
When I was leaving, my grandmother would always INSIST — there was NO saying no — on filling my car trunk with both fresh, preserved and frozen bounty.
As soon as I got home, I’d store the bounty in my refrigerator, pantry or FREEZER. Yes, I had my own freezer at the ripe old age of nineteen. It was half the size of my grandmothers.
The BIG challenge in the freezer was my grandmother’s unlabeled bags. I could identify some of what was in the bags, but other bags came to be known as UFOs.
Unidentified Frozen Objects
At first I was baffled about what do do with the UFO’s. I was almost at the point of throwing them out, but held back. While I didn’t grow up in the depression, I learned depression level thriftiness from my grandparents. There was NO way I could throw out valuable food.
Then one day, I was making a pot of chicken soup and went to the freezer for some peas … and BA BING! I grabbed a bag of peas and two UFO’s. I put the peas into the soup and put the UFOs on the counter to thaw and when I discovered corn and green beans I added them to the soup.
Thus was born UFO soup.
I’d make a vat of chicken or beef stock and grab four or five UFO bags and just dump them in. Over the years of making UFO soup I only had one failure — one of the bags was filled with my grandmother’s home made cottage cheese. This is a dry, sour tasting cottage cheese we used in tarts and other savory dishes.
I had NO problem throwing out the cottage cheese soup (it went into the compost heap) because it was truly awful.
My grandmother and I laughed about the cottage cheese UFO soup for years … every time she loaded up my car trunk with more UFOs we were reminded and laughed ourselves silly.
When my grandmother died, my mom and I emptied out three giant freezers of goodies and took them to a few “needy” neighbors. I told them how to make UFO soup and we had a wonderful time sharing stories about my grandmother and her gardens.
I still have a freezer — now a standing one. Everything in it is labeled with what it is, and when it went into the freezer. This unfortunately means no more UFOs.
I miss the vats of UFO soups I used to make.
I miss my grandmother dearly!
UFO Soup Recipe
This is by nature a soup that evolves on your stove. Be willing to experiment. If you find a variation your family just loves, make a note of what you put into the pot, so you can replicate it again. OR just let the UFO soup develop as you experiment with different combinations … becoming an entirely different soup every time you make it.
In a 12 to 16 quart stainless steel stock pot … add
6 to 8 quarts of Chicken or Beef or Vegetarian Stock (my favorite stock concentrate is “Better Than Bullion”).
Small morsels of chicken or chopped up beef roast (not necessary, but nice) I’ve even used cooked ground beef when it was available.
Alphabet pasta noodles — 1 to 2 cups depending on the size of your pot. You can also use orzo, lentils, pearl barley or rice.
1 or 2 cans (28 ounce) diced tomatoes or a big bag of frozen tomatoes
2 to 4 bags of frozen vegetables. I don’t particularly like Brussels sprouts, or broccoli in my veggie soup, but that’s up to YOU. Carrots, peas, green beans, corn, zucchini, cabbage, mushrooms and hash brown potatoes (or diced fresh potatoes) are all good.
Simmer on a warm stove top for three to four hours.
Taste and taste again. Add some parsley or other herbs (basil, oregano, thyme) if you want. If the stock isn’t strong enough, add a bit more stock concentrate. If the taste is not quite there … try adding a 1/2 cup of ketchup or a bit more salt.
Serve with a slab of home made bread and ENJOY.
This story was originally published on the sugar-free-zone.com
Melanie Rockett has been a freelance writer for over 40 years. About 15 years ago she was diagnosed with Diabetes — and began a long journey of discovery. Today she lives a sugar-free life and has lost 120 pounds. Her website Sugar-Free-Zone.com is all about living sugar-free and maintaining a healthy lifestyle.
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