• Home
  • Podcast
  • Blog
  • about the squad
  • PATREON
  • contact
  • Shop
Menu

Book Squad Goals

Street Address
City, State, Zip
Phone Number

Your Custom Text Here

Book Squad Goals

  • Home
  • Podcast
  • Blog
  • about the squad
  • PATREON
  • contact
  • Shop

Crying in H Mart, My Mom, and a Recipe

December 23, 2021 Mary

Pls ignore the Halloween costume. And yes, I was a very ugly child.

I’m getting ready to celebrate another holiday season without my mom, and it feels just as weird this year as it did last year. 

I normally don’t write posts that are so personal, but more and more I’m thinking it’s important to see how other people experience grief, especially during times that are traditionally happy and full of cheer. Earlier in 2021, I read Crying in H Mart by Michelle Zauner (who I got to know first as Japanese Breakfast). The memoir follows Zauner’s experiences with her mother as her she was dying from cancer, and explains a bit of the grief Zauner felt about losing her mom. Having lost my mom less than a year earlier when I read the book, it’s easy to understand how it resonated with me. Like Zauner, I had a weird relationship with my mom. We didn’t see eye to eye on a lot of things, and ultimately she was less than pleased with what I was doing with my life (she absolutely hated the education system). But she was proud of me, too, in her way. I have distinct memories of her not wanting to hug me when prompted, not wanting me to get married or have kids because those things didn’t ultimately bring her the joy she was looking for. In the middle of all those strange, bad memories, there are some truly good times, though, and the thing I remember most from my childhood was Christmas. More specifically, I remember how much my mom loved Christmas when I was a kid.

Every year, no matter where she was living, she’d put up at least two trees. On one tree she displayed all of our sentimental ornaments, like things I’d made in school or souvenirs from trips we’d taken together. We had a cheesy Fort Walton Beach ornament from visiting my aunt in Florida right next to Mickey Mouse from a trip to Walt Disney World. The traditional kindergarten popsicle stick ornaments were also there. I loved this tree, because seeing it every year made me remember lots of good times, even if the year at hand hadn’t been all that uplifting. Even when our relationship was strange, I could easily remember when things felt different with this tree. It always reminded me why we loved each other. 

The second tree was full of Santas, or as I usually describe it, “Santas doing things.” There was a tiny surfing Santa, a teacher Santa, a Santa baking his own cookies. I’m not entirely sure why she had a tree full of Santas, or even where those Santas are now, and I guess I can’t ask her that now. Still, I have really fond memories of the Santa tree simply because it felt so weird. My mom presented very normal to others when I was a kid. She wore clothes that were as fashionable as they could be (it was a dark time for plus sized fashion in the 1990s), hosted parties for her Sunday School class, and felt very invested in how I looked, too (in retrospect, a lot of my aversions to wearing certain clothes were OCD behaviors my parents ignored, but that’s an entirely different story). But she was kind of weird, too, in a good way. She’d randomly burst out into songs about her dogs or whatever was going on. Once, she waxed my eyebrows while singing “Welcome to the Jungle,” which was hilarious to me but other people found it unnerving when I shared the story. There are a million weird, subtle moments that make up who a person is, and only a few people get to experience the full range of those moments. I probably didn’t know my mom as much as I could have. She didn’t always want to share details about her feelings, and she didn’t always want to talk about mine, but I still know we loved each other.

Zauner makes a connection to her mother through food, and specifically the Korean food of her mom’s childhood. In Crying in H Mart, Zauner talks about her mom’s kimchi fridge as a fixture of the house, and she details (beautifully, I should add) the culinary delights of visiting Korea with her mother. Like my mom, Zauner’s mother wasn’t overly affectionate in a physical way, but she remembered small details that would pop up at unexpected times to deliver Zauner the love she needed. 

When her mother was especially sick, Zauner wanted to give her something to live for, essentially, so she decided to get married to her long-term boyfriend. They had a small wedding at her parents’ home and her mother seemed to genuinely enjoy the festivities, even though she felt too ill to fully participate in the reception. Reading this passage, I sobbed. My mom never got to see our wedding, which was similarly small for entirely different reasons. I cried because she couldn’t be there, but I also cried because I knew she probably wouldn’t have enjoyed it. My mom, who always told me to never let a man onto my bank account, to never depend on a man for anything. My mom who casually insinuated my now-husband and I would break up sooner or later. 

For me, Crying in H Mart is a love letter to those who don’t have a picture-perfect relationship with their mothers, and for the mothers that don’t feel particularly maternal. I think Zauner’s mother, like my mom, didn’t really know how to show her love, and ultimately we, as daughters, have to be okay with that. The memoir also stood out because it spoke beautifully about my mom’s love language: food. 

Without getting into too many details, my mom had a troubled relationship with food and her body, and that’s what led me to be so interested in the topic of fat studies in grad school. She had gastric bypass surgery and that changed how she ate food, but it didn’t change how she talked about it, or how she cooked. I have fond memories of my mom’s spaghetti and her Brunswick stew. Her dressing is top tier—simple and yet so delicious—and she always made a big deal about how the recipe had been in our family for generations. I recently learned that it’s essentially a doctored-up version of what’s on the back of the Pepperidge Farm bag, but that doesn’t really make it less special to me. I still make it every holiday, even if it’s just for myself.

In the spirit of the holidays, and to honor my mom and her traditions, here’s her famous cornbread dressing recipe. Share it with your family and think of good memories.

Do I look like her? I wonder this a lot.

Mary Frances’ Cornbread Dressing

Ingredients:

1 box Jiffy cornbread (or cornbread of choice)

1 box Jiffy biscuits (or biscuits of choice; I like Alison Roman’s Luckiest Biscuits in America)

1 onion

2 celery stalks

4 c. chicken broth or more (how much you use will vary; can sub in vegetable broth for vegetarians!)

1 stick of unsalted butter

12 oz of seasoned breadcrumbs from Pepperidge Farm

Salt and pepper

2 eggs

Sage

Poultry seasoning

Directions:

-Cook biscuits and cornbread according to package directions (or recipe instructions). Let cool, then crumble into tiny bits. Think sand.

-Dice and saute onion and celery in the stick of butter. Yes, the whole stick of butter. Saute until the onions are translucent and the celery is soft.

-Pour the butter and vegetables into your casserole dish along with the crumbled-up bread. Add in the seasoned bread crumbs. Mix it all up, and let it cool a bit. 

-Add in your seasoning, which you should measure with your heart. I like a lot of seasoning in my dressing, so I usually use between 1-2 tablespoons of sage, a hefty shake of poultry seasoning, and a few dashes of salt and pepper. If you’re using low sodium broth, or salted butter, or whatever, you can adjust the seasonings to your own taste. This probably isn’t helpful since this is a recipe and you’re looking to me for guidance, but seasoning is done with your heart. 

-Mix in your two eggs and your broth. This part is all about texture, and you might need more or less broth depending on your bread consistency and what you want in a dressing. For me, I like it to get a little soupy, with everything sloshing around, that way the dressing won’t be dry when you pull it out of the oven. If you like a drier dressing, add less broth! I typically use about 4 cups of broth, but can use more or less depending on the year, the temperature, the feeling.

-Cook at 350 degrees F for 45-60 minutes. 

Best served with The Grit’s nutritional yeast gravy.

If it’s not clear, I really loved Crying in H Mart. I’d even say that it’s one of my top books of the year, and it definitely helped me with my own grieving process. I’m thankful that Zauner dared to be so vulnerable with her audience and give voice to the people who miss their moms, no matter how complicated the feelings.

Thanks for a great year, readers and listeners. See you in 2022.

In Blog Tags Mary posts, Food, Reviews, Books, Nonfiction
← BSG #62: Misandry: The Episode / Everyone Knows Your Mother's A WitchOthersode #61: For Virgins, By Virgins / The 2000s Made Me Gay →
blogicon.PNG

The Squad likes to talk about more than just books. Check out our blog posts to read our opinions on trashy (awesome) TV shows, movies, video games, and, okay, yeah, sometimes we do write about other books.
Sue us.


Tags

Tag List
  • Emily posts 299
  • Television 292
  • Books 280
  • Mary posts 224
  • Recaps 203
  • Movies 177
  • Kelli posts 120
  • Susan posts 114
  • Bachelor Franchise 99
  • Horror 92
  • Group posts 87
  • Young Adult Lit 81
  • Podcasts 80
  • Literature 71
  • Guest posts 70
  • The Bachelorette 45
  • The Bachelor 43
  • Survivor 41
  • Reviews 40
  • Reality Television 36
  • Interviews 35
  • Riverdale 33
  • 12 Days of Christmas Movies 32
  • Christmas 32
  • Feminism 31
  • Netflix 28
  • Todd Posts 27
  • Video games 27
  • Fantasy 25
  • Science fiction 25
  • Are You The One 23
  • 10 Weeks of Spooktober 21
  • Music 20
  • LGBTQ 19
  • Mental Health 18
  • Queer Girl Book Club 15
  • Bookstores 14
  • Comics 14
  • PodSquad 12
  • Romance 12
  • History 11
  • Comedy 10
  • True crime 10
  • Religion 9
  • Bachelor in Paradise 8
  • Children's books 8
  • His Dark Materials 8
  • Poetry 8
  • Bonnie posts 7
  • Documentaries 7

Archive

  • April 2025
  • March 2025
  • February 2025
  • December 2024
  • November 2024
  • October 2024
  • September 2024
  • August 2024
  • July 2024
  • June 2024
  • May 2024
  • April 2024
  • March 2024
  • February 2024
  • January 2024
  • December 2023
  • November 2023
  • October 2023
  • September 2023
  • August 2023
  • July 2023
  • June 2023
  • May 2023
  • April 2023
  • March 2023
  • February 2023
  • January 2023
  • December 2022
  • November 2022
  • October 2022
  • September 2022
  • August 2022
  • July 2022
  • June 2022
  • May 2022
  • April 2022
  • March 2022
  • February 2022
  • January 2022
  • December 2021
  • November 2021
  • October 2021
  • September 2021
  • August 2021
  • July 2021
  • June 2021
  • May 2021
  • April 2021
  • March 2021
  • February 2021
  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • November 2020
  • October 2020
  • September 2020
  • August 2020
  • July 2020
  • June 2020
  • May 2020
  • April 2020
  • March 2020
  • February 2020
  • January 2020
  • December 2019
  • November 2019
  • October 2019
  • September 2019
  • August 2019
  • July 2019
  • June 2019
  • May 2019
  • April 2019
  • March 2019
  • February 2019
  • January 2019
  • December 2018
  • November 2018
  • October 2018
  • September 2018
  • August 2018
  • July 2018
  • June 2018
  • May 2018
  • April 2018
  • March 2018
  • February 2018
  • January 2018
  • December 2017
  • November 2017
  • October 2017
  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • April 2017
  • March 2017


Follow us on Instagram!

Happy Wedding Day to Mary and Todd! We love you both and can’t wait to watch you tie the knot today! @thefavoritenpc @tadasborne #MaryToddLincoln
On next Monday’s #othersode, we’re taking a deep dive into the history of racism in our country. Read along with us (or listen for free on Spotify!) for our discussion of Stamped from the Beginning by Ibram X. Kendi. Episode drops 6/29! ?
We’re dedicating our next #Othersode to talking about a very important subject. Read along with us for Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America by Ibram X. Kendi. Episode drops 6/29! 📸: @onegirlreading
Happy Juneteenth! Help lift up Black voices and support Black-owned businesses this week by buying books by Black authors from Black-owned bookstores! (These shops all have online ordering!)📚 Want to share some other Black-owned bookstores? Tell us
Hey, Goalies! Murray and the Squad would like to encourage you to buy books by Black authors this week! Pictured are some of Murray’s top picks (courtesy of @avidbookshop!), but we’d love to hear more of your favorite books by Black autho
Happy New Episode Day! Check out our discussion of Mostly Dead Things by Kristen Arnett — plus a special interview with Erica Boyce, author of Lost at Sea! Available wherever you get your podcasts!

made with love by emily, kelli, mary, and susan. <3 thanks to Katelyn Elaine Photography for our group photos.

POWERED BY SQUARESPACE.