For me, it's lentil soup. My mom actually makes great lentil soup, but she often made it when there was little else in the house to eat; we kids knew when she broke out the lentils, we were just about to that lone-olive-floating-in-a-jar-of-brine-in-the-back-of-the-fridge stage. For a long time I wouldn't eat lentils because I associated them with poverty.
What about you? What's your poverty food?
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Carnation milk; can't abide it, as we didn't have a fridge for the first two-three years of my life, so I have early memories of nasty sugary glop, and red and white tins with two holes punched in the top, and congealed 'milk' on the edge of the rim. Also from my living-with-boyfriend teenage bedsit years, chapatties made from flour and water, with a bit of curry powder in - assuming we had enough credit in the over-priced electricity meter to actually cook them. But at that time I also went without any food at all for a few days, often, (when the dole cheque money ran out) which has mentally scarred me for life and means I get slightly panicky if I don't have a decent amount of *nuclear supplies* in my cupboard. I would not swap my youthful thinness for my middle aged spread for anything!
*yech* to crusty milk.
Some of my siblings will tell you that we regularly went hungry, which is not really true. Not only did we live on our family food storage at times, but we lived next to a big field that had once been a farm, and during various times of the year we would harvest former crops that had gone wild (especially chard) to supplement our meals. I can only think of a few times when we didn't eat because there was nothing left. But it's an awful feeling--and it's very different from voluntary fasting, when you know you have the option to eat again later.
In college, my grocery budget was $5/week. I usually bought a loaf of cheap bread, a gallon of milk, some cheese, and 3 cans of Chunky soup. I would have toast for breakfast, open face cheese sandwiches for lunch, and 1/2 can of chunky soup for dinner, usually with more bread and cheese. Boy, that is a lot of food for $5. I guess you can tell how long ago I was in college. If I hadn't gotten lots of dinner invites from Rob I might have actually starved.
Pancakes. When we had breakfast for dinner, I knew it was close to the end of the groceries. We also had food storage so there would usually be canned peaches to go with the pancakes.
Miss V can be funny about food. She's usually very good about trying new things, but every time I make ham and beans with cornbread, she asks, "Is this poor people food?" and I always respond the same way: "No, it's food for people who want to be rich."
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