I think my mother kept us from cooking and baking so she'd be the star. She's still the star. Her mince pies are to die for, although she only cooks for special occasions, one of them in Christmas, so go me!
She had us do things like cut waxed paper and grease tins, but we never knew ingredients until we got our own cookbooks (don't ask me why hers were verboten--I read them religiously, but until I got the Nancy Drew cookbook (god, I want to buy that) I didn't dare do anything on my own outside Cookery class (which also taught us how to set tables, what angles the coffee cup handle went...god bless the Third World). I came out of this taking cooking and baking Very Seriously, and everything had to be From Scratch. She didn't make bread and sometimes she cheated with pastries (like filo--who has the time?), but otherwise the only cake mixes, etc, we saw were from next door and had maggots in them because they weren't actually used (cake mixes were a Big Deal in Jamaica--more expensive and hard to obtain).
But growing up (and now living) in Jamaica is a different thing. Until I was nine or so, we had live in (technically live-behind--there was a separate bed and bath in back of our teeny two bedroom first house. But for the second we converted the helper's quarters into storage since us kids were old enough not to need constant monitoring.
Even now, my sister comes by the house for orange juice and pork dishes--the helper will call her to tell her when her things are ready. And since I'm kind of a guest when I get home I can benefit from the sort of things my father usually takes advantage of--having breakfast made and served to order (she was very nice about going low gly this last Christmas, but I insisted on making my own steel cut oatmeal). My sister loves her so much she paid some of her wages and has now entered her in a "best helper" contest.
Big-up Carol S! Carol doesn’t care that she works for my parents, that I left their house years ago, or that I’m a grown woman: she still looks after me! Every week she squeezes orange juice into two containers: one for the parents, one for me. If I take too long to pick it up, she calls to ask why. She tells me when she’s going to cook pork because she knows it’s my favourite. If I take too long to pick it up, she calls to ask why. If I haven’t been to the house in a while, she calls to ask why. If I pass by on my way to work and I’m not put together right, she doesn’t ask why: she just fixes me so I look halfway decent. Her latest gift? My friend stained my brand new towel with jouvert paint: after failing to get it out myself, I asked Carol for help. A few days later a spotless, neatly folded towel awaited me at my parents’ house. Carol will always take care of me, no matter where I am: I left the house, but I didn’t leave her heart. And the feeling is mutual.
And then we moved to England and that didn't exist and my mother even bought frozen food and we had Mickey D's on Fridays if my father was out of town. All so very exciting. When we moved to Canada, I was out of the house, but my mother was perversely piqued about having a white (Swedish, IIRC) helper. It was quite the turnabout. That was a benefit of being diplomatic, but the Jamaican helpers are just how the middle class lives. My mother went from "too busy" to "too old" and my father insists on home cooked meals and only does leftovers on weekends (Carol's M-F).
American's think it's bougie, but sadly she gets paid so little it's really not. And she's paid the absolute max my mother's pension will allow, which is more than most (not the pension, but the %age she allocates--government university retirees are hardly rolling in it).
I feel guilty having her do my laundry when I go home and usually travel home with the dirty laundry. But we have a washing machine now--I just don't use it. Because I don't think we use the dryer, and I hate ironing.
This is the first WikiHow (continued...)
