My sister Laura came up from Florida to visit this week. In addition to hikes every day in the wooded gorges of Ithaca, we planned a Czech feast of peach dumplings to which we invited our brother Bill and his wife, Nita.
The dumpling recipe feeds a family of eight, which is what we were, growing up in Newark, and then Irvington, New Jersey. Three boys and three girls, two parents. Sitting around the dining-room table, we’d compete with each other to see who could eat the most dumplings in one sitting.
The recipe calls for 2 dozen peaches and 5 pounds of potatoes. The boiled potato dough always lies heavily in your stomach, but the toppings make the whole meal taste like dessert. First you cut up your dumpling, removing the peach pit. Then you generously sprinkle a mixture of cinnamon and sugar, sour cream thinned with milk, and breadcrumbs fried in butter. You top it off with dabs of cottage cheese.
Making the dumplings creates a huge mess in any kitchen. When my brother Don and I made them at my house in San Diego years ago, I found flour here and there for weeks afterwards. The project also takes several hours and directions must be followed precisely to ensure perfect dumplings.
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I do not make peach dumplings. None of my mates thought they were a proper meal. But when a sibling visits and wants to make them in my kitchen, I oblige.
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I’ve missed my sister Laura since she and her husband moved to Florida from Ithaca. Having a sister nearby was a pure gift this late in life. Now our siblings are scattered across the country from north to south, east to west. Traveling is harder and we see less of each other.
As the first one in the family to move 3,000 miles from home at seventeen, I can’t blame the others for scattering. New horizons were all I wanted to see when I was young.
Only now do I appreciate the familiar face, the shared memories of our youth.
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Laura bought 22 peaches at Wegmans, the only store in town we would trust to have good ones. She found the required “white” potatoes also, which are not available everywhere.
We expected Bill and Nita around noon. Laura started work on the dumplings at 9, telling me to go on out to the studio and paint—she had everything covered. We Taetzsch women don’t like a lot of extra hands in the kitchen—we’re soloists.
I left her alone, checking in now and then. Laura put aside two peaches that would not peal easily even after being dipped in hot water.
“I won’t use them,” she said. “There must be something wrong with them.”
Owning my mother’s frugality, I said, “I’ll peal them. Don’t throw them away.”
So I did, even though it took three times as long to scrape away every last bit of the skin. Later Bill got one of those peaches in his dumpling and said it was hard. Evidently those two peaches were not as ripe as the others.
Laura would prefer only perfect dumplings. I would prefer not to waste a jot of food.
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We played a lot of Big Boggle this week, too, since it’s Laura’s favorite word game. She and her husband play it 2 or 3 times a day, so they are experts at it. If I can beat her once out of every 5 or 6 games, I’m satisfied.
Brother Bill is worse than I am at Big Boggle, but he loves the competition, too. So while Nita napped after lunch, we played several rounds. Laura came in first, me second, Bill third. We’re a competitive bunch, and we’ll be competing at games whenever we get together until we’re six feet under.
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For a time I avoided family gatherings. I had no use for childhood connections and shared histories. I wanted to plunge into the unknown and forge a new identity for myself.
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When we were young, we could eat 3 or 4 peach dumplings in one sitting. This time Nita ate one, Laura and I ate one and a half each, and Bill two. We filled a Tupperware container full of leftovers for them to take home afterwards. I have three containers in my freezer. I will introduce my grandkids to them when they come over next week. Maybe one of them will want the recipe and carry on the tradition.
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Laura said to me the day she flew home: “No matter how much you enjoy the company, it's always great to get your house back to yourself.”
But it wasn’t, really.
