By Rachel Hergett EBS COLUMNIST
My grandfather, Bozemanite John Williams, did not talk much about his time in the U.S. Army, though his service to our country shaped our family in countless ways. He met the woman who would become his wife, my grandmother Keiko, in a coffee shop on the outskirts of Hiroshima, near where his unit was stationed to aid in post-war cleanup. His young family’s early moves, criss-crossing the country from Texas to Massachusetts, were based on where he was stationed.
My own ideas of what grandpa’s time in service to our country must have been like are decidedly colored by mid-century cinematic depictions, especially “White Christmas.” It’s a sparkly propaganda-centered version of life in wartime and after the bombs have dropped. And maybe this is the type of nostalgia grandpa was leaning into when he requested my grandmother whip up old Army dishes in the kitchen.
One, which remains a mess hall treat among the ranks of active service members, is a hamburger gravy served over toast. It’s generally known as SOS, or “s*** on a shingle.” It’s delicious slop.
Grandpa loved the dish so much he requested that his wife learn to make it. And she did, every Christmas morning for as long as I can remember. In this way, grandpa’s service also shaped my family’s longest-standing Christmas food tradition.
In my childhood, Christmases were a more raucous affair. My mom was one of seven children, and whoever could possibly make the trip home to Montana would congregate around their parents during the holidays, along with a selection of my more than 20 first cousins. I remember the magic of the giant evergreen, dripping in tinsel and surrounded by a moat of presents so wide one couldn’t even touch the tree. While my eyes were filled with the wonders of that tree, my nose was filled each Christmas morning by the smell of the giant pot of SOS that grandma would stir with one hand, while removing tray after tray of biscuits from the oven with the other.
I polled my family about SOS in the weeks leading up to Christmas this year. “Do you still do SOS on Christmas morning?” I asked. And “Have you tweaked the recipe at all?” The results were interesting.
Without my grandparents, each of my mom’s siblings have started to create their own traditions, though most of us still expect there to be some form of SOS on the table on Christmas morning. Family members that don’t make SOS on Christmas morning have young kids or dietary restrictions, making it impractical. But even they remember it fondly.
The official recipe, I suppose, is the “Creamed Ground Beef” from the Armed Forces Recipe Service developed by the U.S. Army Quartermaster School and used by all branches of the military. Like most of the Armed Forces Recipe Service’s offerings, this one is scaled to feed an army. It calls for 18 pounds of ground beef for 100 servings, and water to reconstitute the dried milk from army rations.
The recipe is simple, as one would expect for food made at that scale: Brown the ground beef with onion, Worcestershire sauce, salt and pepper, then add milk and a flour slurry to thicken. Grandma added Kitchen Bouquet to make the gravy more brown, and, if recall is correct, left out the Worcestershire.
According to my family poll, no one follows the recipe from either grandma or the army. The most popular variation switches up the meat, creating a half-hamburger and half-sausage combo that is somewhere between actual SOS and the sausage gravy most people associate with biscuits and gravy.
My mom’s version is usually some form of ground wild game. It is a bit of a cross between hamburger and sausage, she tells me. At their request, pork fat is added by the game processor, and then, when it is cooking, she adds a homemade sausage seasoning.
One uncle, who also served in the military, seems to go rogue, making more of a brown gravy version with beef stock. I scoffed at the idea, and when I told one cousin—another veteran—she texted, “That is not OK.” But I may have to eat my words. A version of SOS in “The Army Cook” from 1942 uses evaporated milk and water, or beef stock.
These days, Christmas mornings seem very quiet. Our pot of SOS feeds a few people—not an army—and we only make one tray of biscuits. Still, sitting down to the table to a plate of SOS makes me feel connected to our family history, to all of my aunts and uncles and cousins scattered around the country, and to those who served our country itself. I can’t imagine Christmas without it.
Rachel Hergett is a foodie and cook from Montana. She is arts editor emeritus at the Bozeman Daily Chronicle and has written for publications such as Food Network Magazine and Montana Quarterly. Rachel is also the host of the Magic Monday Show on KGLT-FM and teaches at Montana State University.
