Antipasto Squares

I grew up as an only child in an Irish household. Neither of my parents could actually cook. I literally existed on breakfast food (for all three meals) and TV dinners. However, I also spent every single day of my life from birth with the three siblings across the street and their parents, Jim and Lynn. Their home was almost the exact opposite of mine: always chaotic, always a litttle messy, and homemade food galore, for almost every meal, every day.

My mother, Eileen, and Lynn were best friends, as were my Dad and Jim, and I became the fourth sibling. I was always welcome in their home and they were all welcome in ours. Lynn and Jim married when they were 19 and began having children right away. They were the cool parents, the ones who believed in old-fashioned values but weren’t big on discipline, or rules. Jim became a firefighter and Lynn was a housewife who occasionally took the part-time supermarket job.

Lynn loved to cook and actually found making a traditional family dinner every night quite easy. They were the only family in the neighborhood with a pool, and Jim was an electronics geek who got into VCR’s and cable when most people couldn’t afford it, or just had no interest. I spent many a late night sneaking into their TV room with the kids to watch Rated R horror movies that we couldn’t watch during the day.

Lynn and Jim had inherited a summer cabin on the St. Lawrence River, and every summer, the family spent at least six weeks there. I always went with them for at least two weeks and the vibe as always the same: unlimited food and drinks, playing and swimming all day, and sneaking around at night. Every day Lynn would make at least two homemade snacks for everyone, plus a full dinner. While she liked to change it up, I had a favorite snack right from the get-go: antipasto squares.

Imagine rich, delicious, cheesy decadence baked into gooey squares that you can eat after you just spent three hours swimming and dunking each other. We never knew what Lynn was going to make, but I knew that smell from a mile away: the crescent roll dough, 3 different kinds of cheese melting around various deli meats, and roasted red peppers. She’d bring the tray out to the deck piping hot and I remember it was all we could do to not burn our hands and our mouths by grabbing them immediately. I’d tell myself to just have one, to make sure everyone could get a piece, while secretly wanting to eat the whole tray. But usually after just one, it was all I could eat. To say that it was heavy is an understatement, but the deliciousness outweighed everything else.

I know what you’re thinking: Who wants to eat searing hot food on an 85°F-day in July? But if you've ever had one, you’d understand. When we were young, we never worried about weight gain. And about an hour after eating them, we’d all be right back in the water, for at least three more hours.

The “kids” are now all adults with their own kids, and the family still goes up to the cabin every summer. All of us know how to make the antipasto squares, but somehow, Lynn’s always come out the best. I’ve never figured out what she does that’s different from the rest of us, and she always makes it look so easy. Given my family’s history of cooking, I’ve always struggled with anything I make.

With all of the “kids” now being 50+ years old, we can’t (or at least shouldn’t) indulge like we used to. We all have to worry about weight gain, heart attacks, cholesterol, and all that fun stuff. But for one summer week out of the year, we pretend that it’s still sometime between 1976 and 1989, and we party accordingly. For me, the antipasto squares define that week, and bring back fond memories of times spent with my “second” family.