Is it gravy or sauce? Technically gravy is any sauce that is made with meat or meat drippings. We grew up in East Harlem and everyone called the Sunday Sauce “gravy.” In fact, we didn’t call it pasta…it was “macaroni.” I don’t know why they called it gravy, but it’s been that way forever. Over the years we gradually learned to call it sauce, but gravy brings back oh so many wonderful memories. My maternal grandparents had Sunday dinner every single Sunday when I was growing up in the 50’s. My grandmother Nanine (Anna) would do some of the cooking, but as my aunts grew older Grandma took it easy and let all her daughters take over. There were 14 children, two died when they were very small and my Aunt Angie died when she was 21. As for the other 11 they all had children, at least two, and we all squeezed into this five room apartment every Sunday in that broken down tenement in East Harlem on 113th Street and First Avenue. The men would eat first, then the women and children. The men would go into the living room, smoke and listen to the radio…Sundays was usually the Yankee games. In an Italian family the man was the breadwinner and he was treated with priority. Every now and then an argument would break out between the brothers, but that was all part of a normal Sunday. On Monday they would talk like nothing happened. I miss those days when all the family would congregate at Grandma and Grandpa’s.
If you would like to learn how to make “Gravy” please check out my YouTube Video on Nanny’s Italian Kitchen and don’t forget to subscribe (you have to have an gmail account)….https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ynUmIwSqK74