The King Of Jelly Beans
When I think about my first memories and longest-lasting memories with food, I think of my grandfather, Opa. Opa can and will eat everything, and always cleans his plate. I cannot think of another person, besides myself, that lights up the way he does when dinner is served. My grandfather is one of my favorite people to share a meal with, and he never fails to make me laugh.
Opa and I shared a food ritual when I was younger. Every Friday, he would pick me up from kindergarten and I would sit in the back of his awful two-door car holding my CDs that he would never allow me to play in the radio. We would then pick up lunch and head to my grandparents’ house to share a pizza and French fries with mozzarella cheese. Every week, we did this and about halfway through our lunch, my mom would return from work and join us for lunch.
One week, all of this changed. My grandfather ordered our usual pizza with cheese fries, together. The fries were on top of the pizza. I was absolutely livid. My mom still reminds me of the image she has cemented in her brain of my four-foot-tall rage yelling at my grandfather for making such an irreparable mistake. This was the end of our after-school lunch ritual.
When my grandmother returned from work, she called the pizza place to complain about the mistake, and they told her my grandfather insisted he wanted the pizza that way, and he told us the same. He saw no issues with the pizza he had ordered, compared to our usual order. This mix-up, along with other actions, such as: giving away large amounts of money, and driving his car through a lake, led to my grandfather’s dementia diagnosis. I don’t really remember Opa before his dementia. In my mind, he has always been a wacky and fun person who does and says whatever he wants.
For the most part, Opa will eat just about anything, but he is very clear about what he does not like: cucumbers, chicken, and scrambled eggs. My grandfather claims the worst meal he has ever had was a Chick-fil-A sandwich, four years ago after my great-uncle's funeral. When my grandparents lived with my mom and me for a couple of years, he fed every serving of scrambled eggs my grandmother had given him to our dog; I swear the dog ate more eggs during that time than Opa did.
My grandfather’s true love language is a hoagie and Arnold Palmer. He would do just about anything for a hoagie and claims that would suffice as the only meal he could have for the rest of his life, with no complaints. We’re very similar in that way. As someone from Pennsylvania, “the land of hoagies,” I struggle living in Hyde Park with only a Jersey Mike’s and Subway to curb my hoagie craving.
Hoagies are used as an ultimatum and reward system for my grandfather. In an attempt to stay active, we promise him a tuna hoagie for completing walks throughout the hallways of the apartment building. An Italian hoagie makes a great reward for tolerating our ridiculous questions about family members’ birthdays and middle names to keep his mind young.
Opa also hates sharing food. Growing up, if we asked him for one of his Munchos chips, he would give us one. You would have to ask for more each time you wanted a chip. He also loves to sneak food off of other’s plates. During the first Passover my boyfriend had with my family, Opa stole matzo right off of my boyfriend’s plate without asking or caring when my grandmother shouted at him from across the table. We all laughed it off, and still joke about it frequently.
For basically every holiday, my mom and I load my grandfather up with all of his favorite snacks and a gift card for hoagies and McDonald’s. Frequents in his holiday snack collection include Munchos, Pringles, Mike and Ike's, Icebreakers (which he calls the little circle mints), cashews and pistachios, and Jelly Beans. My grandfather loves Jelly Beans.
My grandfather’s love of Jelly Beans comes with a lot of responsibility. He always has them on hand, and always gets more as gifts, and he never knows what flavor he is eating. He describes the flavor of his Jelly Beans as their color, meaning a cherry bean tastes like “red” and a pear bean tastes like “green.” Much like potato chips, and pretty much everything else, it is nearly impossible to get Opa to share his Jelly Beans with you.
Opa’s pockets are always filled with a comb for his hair, his wallet, and little circle mints. Opa always has Icebreakers, Mentos, Altoids, or some type of breath mint on hand, and honestly, I don’t think anyone could explain his desire for keeping them on hand at all times. He begs for little circle mints every time my grandmother goes to the grocery store, and she delivers on that request almost every time.
One of my other favorite treats to share with my grandfather is microwave popcorn. This tradition started at his last home in Blue Bell, Pennsylvania. My grandmother could never successfully make microwave popcorn, it was always leaving the microwave burnt and following a cloud of smoke. My grandfather, who has seriously never cooked in his life, ever, took over the duty of preparing our microwave popcorn. Now, when we share a bag of popcorn, I prepare it, but we always joke about how Granny can never make popcorn the right way.
McDonald’s and Burger King are treats saved for two special occasions. When my mom visits during the middle of the day, and for breakfast after a doctor’s appointment. My grandfather goes to a lot of doctors' appointments, and my grandmother spoils him with a fast-food breakfast after about one-third of them.
Opa and I always shared a fun afternoon having tea, or coffee (decaf for Opa), or apple soup—yes, apple soup. Canned, stewed apples in cinnamon are what my grandfather named apple soup, so the name has stuck, and anytime we are met with stewed apples, we celebrate them for the much better name, apple soup.
Because of his dementia, Opa can’t always remember what he had for dinner, so almost every night I call him, and we recount his final meal of the day. Unless it was a hoagie or McDonald’s, figuring out what Opa had for dinner is a guessing game. “Was your dinner hot or cold?” and “did you eat it with a fork or your hands?” are questions I ask him every night to crack the code of what strange concoction my grandmother has chosen to serve him for dinner.
After solving the mystery of what he had for dinner, we reach the second part of the problem and decide what he had for dessert. Opa usually guesses that my grandmother served him ice cream, when that is usually never what was on the menu. His aging ears struggle to hear, so when my grandmother tried to tell him they had Tate's Cookies for dessert, he told my mom and I over the phone that his cookies were “tasty cookies.” I love asking Opa what he has had for dinner and playing our daily guessing game.
Opa is not only my favorite person to share a meal with, he is also my best friend. We plan all of our meals for my return from college, and discuss what we have eaten throughout the day on the phone with each other. There is no better person to share salty, buttery microwave popcorn with, and no better person to try to steal little circle mints from.
Taylor is currently studying for her bachelor's degree in applied food studies and culinary arts at The Culinary Institute of America. She loves spending time outside, hanging out with her friends, cooking and baking, reading, and playing with her dog.