For Better or For Worse by Lynn Johnston for October 19, 2014

Well, at least John tasted it first before burying it in ketchup. Mike just presumed it’d be awful.

Just can’t win, can you, Elly? You sure laboured hard to make… whatever casserole that is.

I wanted to confirm a legend before posting it, but it could not be confirmed. So I will just post this. I heard it as Thomas Jefferson interviewing political appointees.

http://www.snopes.com/business/genius/salted.asp

I once had someone over for dinner and served oriental rice pilaf with delicately-flavored spices. He immediatly put ketchup on it before tasting it. next time he comes for dinner, I’ll just make him some spaghetti.

It doesn’t always mean the dish is bad.. I happen to be a very good cook but my husband dumps ketchup on a whole lot of things. Drives me nuts. Mind you, I am talking about the man who once tried barbecuing liver, so…

Lynn’s Notes:My mom could make a casserole out of anything. In turn, I too have no fear of this classic leftover surprise. My friend Kelly once told me that her husband refused to eat leftovers. I asked if she had offered them to him in a casserole. She said, “No, because he’d find out.” “What do you think quiche and stir fry and pizza and soup are made of?” I argued. “Bits of stuff from the refrigerator, cut up and fashioned into something ELSE!” She said she hadn’t thought of that, and we set about making a great pot of soup out of what was left in her fridge. It was a delicious brew, and her husband ate it with relish (and buns). When he was done, he asked her how she’d made it, and she replied, “soup mix,” referring to a mix of stuff from the refrigerator. “Good,” he said, “as long as it’s not made from leftovers.”

My husband won’t touch a casserole with a ten foot pole. I have to cook for two with no left overs in mind. Usually he eats everything up, anyways. It’s a fine line I walk in this house.

I don’t have any these problems with my husband not eating or criticizing my food. HE does ALL the cooking. (He cooks, I clean up)

If my grandfather didn’t like something, he’d pour ketchup on it and eat it anyway.

My mother’s parents lived through the Depression and taught her not to waste food. That skill came in handy when we were very young, and our Dad was just starting his own pharmacy. We ate a lot of casseroles and meatless meals. Since everyone else in our neighborhood was doing the same, it never occurred that this wasn’t the way meals were supposed to be…

My mother always made some really tasteless stews. Nine times out of ten, the stewing beef was pretty tough. I also hated some of the vegetables she put in there, turnips was one I really hated. I forget what else she put in there, but it would take me an hour to eat it. Salt didn’t help and she hid the ketchup. I make stews, but I add seasonings to it and some gravy mix. Hubby loves it.

My ma is like this. She can cook anything she wants and eat it with no problem, but if someone else makes literally anything, even something she always makes with the exact same ingredients and following the exact same steps, she has to blindly mess with it before she’ll even consider touching it. 100% of the time. Never with her own cooking, though. We’ve actually called her on it before, and she said, salt shaker in hand, “Oh, I NEVER do that!”

Of course, she’s hypercritical of everything anyone does, but even so, none of us will cook for her anymore.

And don’t even get me STARTED on my brothers’ obsessions with ranch dressing.

Elly isn’t the only bad cook in the comic strips.She could always ask Blondie for tips.

While visiting a family in Germany, we went to a Spiessbraten restaurant. The select cuts of meat are marinated in vinegar and spices for a week, then grilled over hardwood fire pit in the center of the restaurant. The proprietor was very proud of his craftsmanship.

So when the youngest daughter asked for ketchup, he was understandably shocked and insulted. Her father, however, in a deft display of lightning diplomacy immediately said “fur pomme fritz!” (For french fries.) The daughter started to protest as the owner hurried away for the pomme fritz ketchup, but subsided at a glare from her father.

She wouldn’t eat her spiessbraten (more for the rest of us), but dined on pomme fritz slathered in ketchup.

And maybe the strip is funny because Elly actually isn’t a good cook.Or maybe it’s funny because Elly isn’t actually actual. (In spite of being based on a real person.)This is a comic strip, written for HUMOR, not as an autobiography.

Ketchup – it’s what covered up the green beans & peas when there wasn’t something better, like spaghetti sauce.

Elly missed a perfect come-back:“The Queen doesn’t use ketchup!” (not even on her pomme fritz.)

I like how Elizabeth keeps quiet, and merely observes all the goings-on!

Michael’s face in the last panel is classic. LOL.