What Italian-American Families Actually Ate on Meatless Fridays

Friday dinner might mean peppers and eggs, spaghetti with tuna, or a potato omelet. In one family's kitchen, it even meant pancakes with grape jelly. What did Italian-American families actually eat on meatless Fridays? Through family recollections, oral histories, and a historic cookbook, we explore the meals that filled those tables: quick pasta dinners, spinach and beans, fish sticks, homemade pizza, and baccalà. The same religious restriction left room for different budgets, different tastes, and different ways of getting supper ready. Subscribe to Mulberry Street Memo for more Italian-American food history and family traditions: https://www.youtube.com/@MulberryStreetMemo SELECTED SOURCES Fordham University: Joanna Bonaro-McAvoy oral history https://www.library.fordham.edu/crctranscripts/Bonaro.pdf The Food Table: Pasta Cheech and remembered Friday meals https://thefoodtable.com/pasta-cheech-pasta-e-ceci.html Maria Gentile: The Italian Cook Book, 1919 https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/24407 The Literate Chef: Pasta Memories https://theliteratechef.com/2011/04/09/pasta-memories/ La Gazzetta Italiana: St. Anthony's Pizza Makers https://www.lagazzettaitaliana.com/local-news/7926-st-anthony-s-pizza-makers #ItalianAmerican #FoodHistory #MeatlessFridays