Last year, after the terrorist attack on Bourbon Street, I needed some comfort. I found it in a very unexpected place — a meal I dreaded growing up. Food of often has tradition and meaning in cultures around the world. New Orleans is no different. Foods that are seasonal, like oysters and crawfish, include a ritual around the consumption. King Cake includes curses and legends.
On New Years Day, every year, my mom insisted that we eat cabbage and black eyed peas. Cabbage for money and black eyed peas for luck or health. I did not enjoy most meals over rice as a child. I’m still not sure exactly why. Maybe frequency was a factor? Boiled cabbage, slimy and salty, is still on my Do Not Like list. She would spoon a little on our plates, just a taste, so we didn’t break the tradition, while we mostly ate other delicious things like fried back strap.
As an adult, I discovered that I actually do like cabbage and black eyed peas, even over rice, just cooked quite differently. I spent a year in China after I graduated from college, and that year was formative. The constant rice was a an odd reminder of home. Almost 20 years later, I still incorporate Chinese flavors into comfort food because that is a part of my comfort tradition.
This is my mildly Chinese cabbage stir fry recipe and a simple pressure cooker black eyed peas recipe, both adopted from the genius minds of others for my personal palate. Happy New Year! I hope your 2026 is everything you want.
Cabbage and Black Eyed Peas
The traditional January 1 meal for New Orleanians updated with flavors from around the world
A few years ago, my aunt did a DNA test. Her results connected her to all her known family, but then also to some new first cousins. She was skeptical. “We know all of our first cousins.”
But finding secret families through DNA results is a cliche at this point, and it turns out my family is not immune. In the 1950s, for the first time ever, women outnumbered men. Probably a result of so many young men dying in World War II, the prosperity of the 1950s created another phenomenon. Men sometimes decided to take advantage of the situation and have a whole second family. It’s hard to find statistics on exactly how common parallel families were, but every time I mention that my uncle had a secret second family, I’m met with understanding and usually a tale of a similar secret second family in their line.
As soon as we saw the alleged cousins, their features so familiar and so similar to ours, it was clear we had new cousins to meet.
The Ancestors
My Polish family immigrated to New York in 1892. Before New York, they spent some time in Brazil. My great great grandmother was pregnant when they made the journey from Brazil to New York. She had my Aunt Cecilia in October of 1892, but she had my Uncle John and Uncle Walter before making it to New York. I was able to piece together these details through Uncle Walter’s immigration papers. He was the only one who pursued citizenship.
My great grandfather in his military uniform from World War I. According to the New York State Archives, he served from December 1917, when he was 21 years old, to December 1918. He did not serve overseas. WWI draft was initially men ages 21-30. It was expanded to 18-45 in September 1918.
My great grandfather was born in New York in 1896. He had two more siblings after him, Frank and Louise. They grew up in Brooklyn. My great grandfather was exactly the right age to serve in World War I, and he did. One of the only photos we have of him as a young man is in his uniform. I wonder what the Polish family of the first generation American thought of his service in that war even though he only served in the United States. When my family fled Europe, Poland didn’t exist. Documentation lists them as “Polish-speaking Russians” because their part of Poland had been annexed to Russia. I don’t know exactly where in Poland my family lived, but this helps narrow down the region.
My grandfather was born in 1927, and he grew up in the same house in Brooklyn as his father did on Louisiana Avenue. Our Polish name was spelled differently in every census from their arrival until 1940, so that Brooklyn address is how I found my family each year.
My grandfather was a little too young to serve in World War II, but his baby brother Johnny, the link to the new cousins, lied about his age, documented on his draft card. He made himself two years older, which was the same age as my grandfather…and still too young.
Uncle Johnny
I heard stories about Uncle Johnny my whole life. Uncle Johnny was a bit of a troubled soul, from my grandfather’s perspective. He wasn’t motivated in the same way, and I don’t know if we had the vocabulary or societal knowledge about mental health to provide the right support. I’m not sure we have that even now.
The story I remember most vividly was at a funeral. After the ritual portion of the funeral, Uncle Johnny decided to go across the street to a bar to get a drink. They watched him walk away and never saw him again. Uncle Johnny walked off the face of the Earth. It happened before I was born, so I never met Uncle Johnny or knew anything but these stories that were passed down.
But I grew up knowing my dad’s cousin Glen, Uncle Johnny’s son. Cousin Glen is a character who is very fun to be around. He’s gentle and calm now, but I understand that is different than his youth. We always looked forward to any random visit from Cousin Glen, and we’re still just as thrilled when we get to see him today. Like my dad, who moved as far from New York as he could be comfortable, Cousin Glen also moved far away. It took several more states before he got comfortable, and he’s a West Coast resident now.
As recently as 2017, when we decided to get together in Key West (before we knew about the new cousins), Glen was still asking where his father could be.
Potential Relationship: First Cousin
In 2020, my aunt bought DNA tests for Christmas. My grandmother did one and so did she. My grandfather died when I was seven years old, but my aunt’s test would reveal his family. When first cousin matches came up, she thought it was a mistake because she makes it a point to keep up with all of her cousins, even though they are scattered across the country now.
But Cousin Rose, Glen’s half-sister, was looking for us — the family she didn’t know yet.
The Reunion, Florida, 2023
The new cousins live in Florida, so as soon as it was safe enough during the Pandemic, we planned a reunion. The new cousins weren’t the only cousins who live in Florida now, so we also reunited with some of my second cousins on that trip. We drove around the Gulf anticipating our new cousins. Some nerves, but comfort in knowing we’d all be together, excitement at seeing those we hadn’t for awhile, relief at the ending quarantine. Emotions mixing like static, dulling and distracting.
When Rose and Pauline showed up, looking so much like our cousins, the static started clearing. We learned middle names we did not know. They learned about step-parents who seemed like strangers on their Ancestry family trees. We each had pieces to the puzzle needed to see more of the picture.
The campground where we met in Florida was hosting an eagle in a prominent nest with her babies. She embodies the scrappy American spirit of the immigrants seeking better opportunities on stolen land…without which my family doesn’t exist.
Eagle with its nest, Auburndale, Florida, March 2023
After we marveled at our shared physical features, they fell right in with our family like it had always been. And I guess it always had been somewhere even when we didn’t know it yet.
Let’s Do it Again, Long Island, 2025
This summer, we decided to do another reunion, this time on Long Island. My dad grew up on Long Island and two of my aunts, my grandmother, and a slew of my first cousins still live there. One of my aunts generously hosted us at her house where we had planned activities for the whole weekend, including line dancing, an ice cream truck, crafts with my mom (a famous Faceobok crafter), a movie night, and fireworks. We spent time on Long Island during summers when I was growing up, so seeing the lightning bugs and needing a jacket in the evenings (while my family complained about the heat) were very nostalgic for me.
Several of my cousins and my sister decided that we should be ancestors one day too. I’m diligently filing all the family secrets so that I can be the aunt with the stories and backstories everyone needs to know.
My cousin’s baby (my first cousin once removed) with my niece. They turned nine and 10 months old.
One of my favorite activities was a trip to visit the Suffolk County Vanderbilt Mansion, Museum, and Planetarium with a private tour from my step-uncle who is on the board of the museum. This was the summer home of William K. Vanderbilt, the great-grandson of Cornelius the railroad magnate. Cornelius was known for connecting railroads for one continuous journey, a far more convenient way to travel than constantly changing trains and buying tickets in each small town. William spent his days traveling the seas trying to find new species, and many of the specimens he brought back are now on display in the museum.
The mansion, built right on the Northport Bay so that Vanderbilt could park his yacht in the front yard, was nicknamed The Eagle’s Nest. William apparently struggled with his purpose as the descendant of someone with such a prolific biography. None of the species he found were new. His was the third generation of wealth, the generation who tends to lose the wealth.
The Eagle’s Nest now has two giant eagle statues at the entryway from Grand Central Station in New York City, the city that called my ancestors home.
My step-uncle Steve leading us to The Eagle’s Nest on a private tour. Kristin (Michael’s partner), my mom, my cousin Michael, and Sue (Cousin Glen’s wife).
The Luck of Family
There are a few lessons that I’ve learned from the saga of our new family. First, family is the luck of the draw, and we don’t all get a good hand. It seems like I’m among the most lucky, though. Some of us have famous ancestors who created things we still use. Some of us have infamous ancestors whose mistakes we all learn from. Some of us just have ordinary people who traveled three continents to ensure that their descendants could prosper, and it’s up to us to remember them and tell their stories.
A lesson we all have to learn over and over is that this time could be the last. One of my second cousins who we saw on that 2023 trip with the eagle’s nest has passed on. Another story to preserve and cherish. Another ancestor to honor. As we’re reminded every Mardi Gras, it is later than you think. Ash Wednesday gives us another version: remember that you are dust and to dust you shall return.
Finally, expanding family, whether by blood or choice, results in more. More people to know, more stories to share, more memories and hugs, more opportunities to love, more souls to eventually grieve.
I often wonder what the ancestors would think of us and how we tell their stories. I wish I had more to remember, and I would love for them to correct my mistakes and misunderstandings. But I have no doubt they would recognize the things they passed down — our dimpled chins, hooded eyes, and insistence on remembering.
Yes, I admit it. I am half yankee. Honestly, since I grew up north of the lake, some folks might consider me all yankee. My dad is one of those people who came to Louisiana and never left. He’s been in Louisiana longer than he lived in New York, so we let him say he’s a southerner now. He’s always been one naturally, but now he has the credentials too. If you like synchronicity, you’ll be pleased to know that my grandfather grew up on Louisiana Avenue in Brooklyn.
My grandparents in Brooklyn early 1950s.
I spent a recent weekend with my grandmother in New York. She has been an avid photographer her entire life. Purely amateur with a point and shoot (on film for far longer than most of us and on a digital camera for years), she has amassed literally thousands of photos from her nine decades and several decades before she was born.
She recently moved to a condo from her home of 69 years. It was a call-in-the-troops situation after a full year of trying to carefully sort and pack a home with the stuff of four generations. In the moving fray, the photos were dispersed and misplaced.
“I can’t find my pictures,” she kept repeating to my dad and me. “I think they threw them away.”
We were part of that “they” and I knew for sure they did no such thing! We spent the weekend looking in all of the still unopened boxes and finding most of the photos. We spent 10+ hours on Saturday looking at photos from 1900-2020. She gave us any we wanted, seemingly fearing they will all be thrown out after she’s gone (NO because I will take them). I saw many photos of her I’d never seen and heard stories I’d never heard.
Nana, me, my aunt and three of my cousins looking at photos.
Aunt Janet
She told us about skipping school (John Adams High School in Queens) and playing in Central Park with her friends. One day they met two young guys who followed them around. She seemed ok with that, but another creepy man also started following them. They recruited the first guys, who wound up in the photos cementing her memories, to scare off the creepy guy. The guys had slicked back hair and cigarettes rolled up in their t-shirt sleeves.
Many of her friends she maintained throughout her life. One in particular, my dad’s godmother who we all knew as Aunt Janet, was in those photos from playing hooky in Central Park and many many others throughout the years. Nana and Aunt Janet married friends and bought homes blocks from each other made by the same builder, so they were identical. They each had four children, three girls and one boy. They remained friends even after Aunt Janet moved to Georgia in retirement, and she always showed up, even at her grand-goddaughter’s wedding.
Aunt Janet died a few years ago of pancreatic cancer shortly after we celebrated her 90th birthday. We love to tell stories of Aunt Janet, who was a sculptor and had an art studio before her retirement. Nana misses her lifelong friend dearly. They were more like sisters and Nana always calls her the sister she never had. They had plans for when they were 95.
Carl
Nana has always had a pen pal. Her name was Doreen, and we have a ton of photos of the many trips Doreen made from England to New York and vice versa. Even some photos of the trip Doreen made to Louisiana to celebrate Mardi Gras. Doreen is also the reason I have a pen pal in England.
But before Doreen, Nana had a pen pal named Carl who she wrote to while he was in Okinawa during World War II. He sent her many photos of himself with his letters, and she has saved them for almost 80 years. I wonder what photos she sent him…
Fancy Ladies
My grandmother’s side of the family is the closest “old New York” ancestors that I have, particularly my grandmother’s mother’s side of the family. But she did not have an easy life. She was born in 1896 in Taberg, New York. Her parents divorced when she was very young, and she was shuffled between relatives. Nana told me that she sometimes lived with her grandparents, sometimes with an aunt. She knew Leo, my great-grandfather, as a child, but they didn’t marry until later and were 36 when Nana was born. “My parents were always the oldest of all my friends,” Nana told me.
My great-grandmother was prim and proper, traits perhaps passed down from her old New York family. She was a talented seamstress. She could copy designs she saw window shopping in Manhattan. My grandmother was always exceptionally well-dressed with tailored clothing as a result. She pointed to every photo of her as a young woman and explained how her mother made the clothing — coats of wool and dresses of silk. Her mother required her to call her Mother, also, not mommy or mom. She still has a beautiful dress her mother made hanging in her closet in her new condo.
Leo/a
I get my name from her father; he was Leo. I was the first great-grandchild. Nana was an only child, as was her mother who died when she was only 68 years old (when Nana was 32 and my dad was nine). Her father lived to 96, and he knew seven of his great-grandchildren. He was a sailor in the Navy in World War I, among the first car mechanics, and a patent-holding inventor. Once on a visit to Louisiana, he asked how far Baton Rouge was. He casually explained that he had passed through once on the way to Texas as part of a civilian militia that chased Pancho Villa.
My name is from her father, but my looks are all Nana. I’ve been told my entire life that I look just like my grandmother. It is never more apparent than looking at photos of Nana when she was younger. So it’s weird to hear her tell me stories about her high school graduation photo, and how much she hates it.
“My mother told me my smile was too wide, so I didn’t smile,” she shared. “I always hated that photo.”
I, too, hate photos of myself where I’m not smiling. I also have a wide smile. In fact, the same wide smile. But I’ve only ever been told my smile is beautiful.
I’m planning another weekend with Nana to look through more photos as soon as possible. My half Yankee side needs nourishing too.
Nana’s 1950 graduation photo and my 2002 graduation photo
