UKRAINIAN PIONEER MORNINGS

MORNING RITUAL for MARY STADNYK (as a child on a homestead)

1.       There was a bench with a basin and a towel was hanging on a nail:

Wash your face and hands in a basin with warm water that was heated in a big pot.   Everyone used the same towel but you changed the towels often.

They also had a wooden tub bought at Pikoff’s store in Rossburn.

2.       Say prayers on your knees by a table in front of icons.  Cross yourself 3 times and say the Lord’s Prayer and one to the Virgin Mary.  (It was not everyone at the same time.  Each person did this when they got up.)

3.       Breakfast:  always oatmeal porridge or cornmeal or cooked rice with milk and sugar.  You put syrup or honey on bread (never toast) and even the children drank tea.  Hardly any milk was drunk.

(Sometimes sour milk was drunk in the evening with dinner.)

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                                                L-R:  Ivan, Eleanor, Larry, and my brother


When I was growing up, Mom used to make a big pot of oatmeal porridge which we had with milk and cream, of course.  

                                             I always liked the brown crust that was at the bottom..

One day, Mom told me that when there wasn't any milk, they used to eat porridge with butter.  For a long time after that, I wouldn't eat porridge any other way!

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My cousin Marilyn comments: "Yes, I remember Breakfast at grandma's and the prayers.   My father loved porridge every morning, the kind that took forever to cook, and I remember that brown crust!"
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Now, it's all about healthy eating, and this is the yummy oatmeal Bryan makes when we want something special:

SPICED OATMEAL   (low-salt:   2 servings)

2 cups water

½ cup chopped dried apples

1/3 cup raisins

2/3 cup rolled oats

1 tsp pumpkin pie spice

¼ tsp salt

1.  Put all the top ingredients in pot and bring to a boil.  Cover & reduce heat to low.
2. Cook for 5 minutes.
3. in each of 2 separate little microwavable dishes put :  2 tbsp maple syrup
                                                  and 1 tbsp chopped walnuts
4. Heat the syrup and the walnuts.
5. Serve oatmeal.  Each person adds their own syrup/walnuts and milk.