The Chicken Pie & Grandpa ...

I've posted something quite sometime back about me being a spoiled brat and how I was grandma's pet grandson and all that. But you know what, when it came to my grandfather, it was the exact opposite. I was never on grandpa's good books. In fact I'm pretty sure he didn't really like me all that much!

I'm broaching on this subject of my grandfather because, a few days back my mom came back from my aunt's place and she brought along this home made chicken pie made by my cousin. Before I go any further, let me tell you I used to just love these home made chicken pies.

When I say I used to enjoy these pies was because grandpa made the best chicken pies in the whole entire wide universe and none of those in my family could ever make them as tasty as he did, my mom included. Somehow all their attempts at it alway fell way too short.

These pies made by grandpa was special back when I was a young boy. Special because we only got to eat them on special occasions like the Christmas supper right after the midnight mass and the Easter dinner only, no other times. It was the rule back then. That made made the longing for the pie all that much greater. And grandpa was the one who would make the pie, doing everything from start to the end.

I'll always remember the atmosphere in the house during the times when he would start his pie making process. It would be on Christmas eve morning where he'd normally walk to the market which was about 15 minutes away from our house and buy every single ingredient he needed and it would there would be lots of stuff cos we'd have the whole gang over for Christmas supper.

Then he'd get home, start cutting all the chicken, potatoes, carrots, cauliflowers, broccoli's and a lot more things that I can't really remember anymore and start cooking them while at the same time he'd be making the dough for the pie. All us kids would be milling around the table getting in his way and he'd be grumbling at us to not touch this, don't play with that, put that down , etc, etc but we'd all not listen to him ... hehehe ...

Grandpa was a nice patient man who could take a lot without ever blowing his top. Even though he'd be grumbling the whole time he was making the pie, he'd never really ask us to leave (not that we'd listen, mind you ... LOL). And by this time you could already smell the fillings for the chicken pie wafting throughout the house. I don't know about my other cousins but I'd be drooling by this time ... LOL! The pies would actually be ready late in the evening but he'd forbid any of us from even tasting a tiny bit. He'd always say ...

'the pie is only for those who attend the midnight Mass tonight'

Of course we knew he didn't really mean it. We were kids so we didn't really attend the Christmas eve midnight mass. We'd wait sleepily for the adults to get back from church. Some of us, especially the younger ones would even fall asleep but not before asking those of us who manged to stay awake to wake them up for Christmas supper later :)

And when the adults finally came home, we'd wake up our sleeping cousins, and we'd all eagerly head to the table to get our grubby paws on that sumptuous chicken pie! And only then would we all be totally satisfied. We even ignored opening our presents until we finished eating the pie and there normally is never any leftovers. No matter how many of these pies he would bake, none would remain, not one tiny crumb.

After his death, my mom, my aunt, even my cousins tried to replicate that chicken pie recipe to keep our Christmas supper tradition going and though they tried their best, none of them could even come close to his excellent pies. Eventually everyone started their own families and the tradition sort of got lost in time.

Grandpa passed away about 5 or so years after grandma. He was never the same man that he was after grandma passed away. He went into this state of depression though he didn't admit it to us. He was more withdrawn, kept to himself a lot more. Grandpa was a very active man when he was around. He'd always be doing something, be it cleaning the yard, fixing something that was loose or doing anything that he could get his hands on. After grandma's demise, all that stopped.

Eventually he became senile from inactivity. He started doing all kinds of weird things, like hiding food in the clothes cabinet, started accusing everyone of stealing all his food. He even started asking my mom who I was. He kept telling her there's this boy who keeps coming to the house (which was me) and would steal all his food! That was really sad. To see such an active man lose it all was really sad. I was around 16 or 17 years old at the time. I guessed he missed grandma to a point where life was meaningless without her.

The thing is grandma and grandpa used to always argue. The two of them were like that cartoon strip 'Pickles'. Grandpa used to get scolding from grandma if he ever did scold me, hence the part where I said I'm pretty sure I wasn't one of his pet grandsons ... LOL! But I guess, even though they argued a lot, he must have still loved her considerably to be so affected by her death that he couldn't recover from it. He eventually passed on without ever recovering from that depressive state he was in. In away, to me, I felt it was the best thing for him. At least he would get to be with her again.

You know, I never realised I could get so sentimental about my grandpa because of a chicken pie my mom brought home but I have this to say, I do miss having him around at times, especially during Christmas. Grandpa and me may not have got along too well, but he was one great grandfather and I hope someday I could be as great a grandfather to my grandchildren as he was ...