Sandra Lee, A Love Letter

When I was a young wife and mom with two littles under the age of three I was still trying to figure out how to be a homemaker.  I grew up with the images of June Cleaver and Laura Petrie as my standards and my role models. Now, I know some women might look at these icons of 1950s and 1960s suburban Americana and feel less-than or see them serve as nagging reminders that not only did they fail to measure-up, indeed they fell far short of the lofty ideals of what a homemaker and wife should aspire to be. But, not me.

Perhaps it is the romantic in me or my Pollyanna nature, but I saw, and still see, these women as lovely embodiments of all that is possible and yes, desirable, when it comes to fulfilling my role as keeper of my home. None of my household chores felt like mundane enslavement. Certainly, Erik never demanded that I stay home or keep the house and raise our girls in a certain manner. Never did I feel as though I had to have my husband’s laundry cleaned, pressed and ready for him each morning. I never felt compelled to have a drink in hand (even if it was just coffee or a cold Coke) when he walked through the door and make sure the house was clean and the girls well managed. I didn’t feel it was my duty to make my home a place that was easy to walk into or pressured to lay aside my own needs to make sure the needs of my family were met first. No, none of these things were ever obligations, they were privileges. From the bottom of my heart, I can tell you it was, and is, my honor, to love, care for and nourish my family in small sacrificial ways every day. It brings them joy when I take my role seriously and do it well and it brings me so much joy I have plenty to spare.

But having a desire to do something, and being grateful for the joy it can bring you and others, does not necessarily mean one is skilled or well equipped to perform said tasks. Such was the case with me and homemaking when I first got married and became a mother all those years ago. Did I love it? You bet! Was I good at it? Let me put it this way: When Erik and I were first married I decided to make him his favorite oatmeal chocolate chip cookies, from scratch. When he got home, he was so excited and took a big bite of my freshly baked offering. “Well,” he commented, “they don’t suck.” What’s a girl to do?

So there I was: twenty-six, the mother of two young girls, married over six years and still so confused and clueless about what it meant to run a home and, more to the point of our story, get a hot, delicious meal on the table. The hot part I could handle - especially if hot meant burned. Delicious, on the other hand, was a nebulous endeavor. By this point in my domestic career, I’d resorted to relying on Hamburger Helper, Sloppy Joes from a can and frozen pizza to guarantee I could get something edible and enjoyable on the table each evening. Don’t get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with any of these items and indeed they still make regular appearances in my culinary rotation. And, thankfully, Erik loves them all...a lot. But, they really were the only things I had in my bag tricks. Suffice to say I was thankful Hamburger Helper came in such a variety of flavors.

All of that changed one afternoon when I turned on the television as my girls napped upstairs, grabbed my daily afternoon cup of coffee and clicked over to Food Network. I heard a voice so sweet and so kind and dripping in encouragement. The show was Semi-Homemade and the voice belonged to Sandra Lee. Sandra, or Sandy as she said her friends called her, was everything I wasn't: tall, blonde, confident and capable. But with a reassuring smile and a wink, she insisted anyone could cook and everyone could prepare delicious meals. The trick, she advised, was in letting go of the idea that it all had to be made from scratch or that I needed to spend hours in the kitchen and hundreds of dollars at the store to accomplish such a feat. This lovely woman opened epicurean doors when she let me in on this secret:

“Seventy percent store-bought, ready-made plus 30 percent fresh allows you to take 100 percent of the credit”. ~ Sandra Lee

For reals? I didn’t have to slave away for hours in the kitchen making handmade pasta from scratch with my own Sunday sauce that simmered all day followed by a pie for which I’d chilled and rolled out the crust and filled it with my own homemade custard? Sandra Lee was promising me I could cook a box of pasta, open a jar of sauce and fill a store-bought pie shell with instant pudding mix and not only feed my family, but satisfy their bellies in ways that previously seemed elusive? Was this for real? Given my lack of skills and track record in the kitchen, it was worth a shot. What did I have to lose?

The very first thing I ever made from Sandra Lee was Caesar Pasta Salad. This recipe consists of spiral pasta, bottled creamy Caesar dressing, black olives and shredded Parmesan cheese. I remember stirring everything together in the bowl and popping it in the fridge thinking, “It can’t be this easy.”

When I served dinner that night to my husband, complete with a side salad, he smiled and said it was awesome. I loved it. I loved his reaction. I had a win. I had a victory under my belt that gave me the confidence to try more recipes and do different things. The ingredients were simple and I’ll admit the instructions for this pasta salad barely qualify as a recipe. But for me, that night, I was June Cleaver (minus the pearls.) To this day, every Halloween I make this pasta salad with Halloween shaped pasta and we enjoy it with my Crescent Mummy Dogs.

I began to try more recipes and I bought a variety of cookbooks, including some of Sandra Lee’s. (Yes, youngsters, we used to actually use cookbooks, or as my husband calls them “Our Grandmother’s Pinterest.) The more successes I had, the more motivated I was to not only try new recipes but even create some of my own. It was in these early years that I created recipes for my enchiladas, meatloaf and beef stew that I still use.

I get that in today’s era of anti-processed food and near cult-like pressure to use only real ingredients that Sandra Lee can seem antiquated and irrelevant. But to me, she will always be the woman that encouraged me and made me believe I, too, could be just like some other antiquated role models I admired. I could be June and Laura in my own home and I could be a successful homemaker.

I’m still a fan of semi-homemade cooking. I admit I’ve probably reversed the percentages and use 70% homemade and 30% store-bought, but the sentiment is the same. The idea that I can buy a few cheater products such as jarred pasta sauce, cereal, jams and yes, boxed cake mix, and create delicious and nutritious meals for my family hasn’t changed. The most valuable thing Sandra Lee taught me was to choose family over formality. Sitting down at the table with my people and breaking bread, whether it’s frozen pizza or homemade Tuscan soup, is the goal. I don’t have to sacrifice time with my family or my husband’s hard earned dollars on the altar of “real food.” Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy cooking from scratch. However, if the choice is having the time to sit down and share a meal with my family or slave away in the kitchen missing out on memories, Hamburger Helper wins. Every time.