The ‘Day’ Begins. In 1600s England, “Mothering Sunday” was celebrated annually on the fourth Sunday of Lent, with a prayer service to honor Virgin Mary, and children brought small gifts and flowers to celebrate their mothers. In honor of the day, servants and trade workers were allowed to travel back to their hometowns to visit with family, and all enjoyed a reprieve from the fasting and penance of Lent, with elaborate meals, setting the stage nicely for today’s dining extravaganzas (more on that below!). Its journey to American icon is paved with irony, beginning as a strictly no-frills affair to protest the killing of all mothers’ sons in war by the author of the Battle Hymn of the Republic herself, Julia Ward Howe. Her 1870 proclamation called for a Mother’s Day celebrating peace and women (and not a bouquet or mimosa in sight), and was observed for a few years on the second Sunday of June. The banner was picked up in 1905 by Anna Jarvis, who founded Mother’s Day in the US to honor her own activist, social worker mother. She, too, envisioned it as a simple tribute, with carnations at a church service to symbolize a mother’s pure love. Irony #2: Anna Jarvis, who never married and never had children, is known as the Mother of Mother’s Day. For years, she gathered supporters and lobbied the powerful for an official declaration of the day, paying off on May 8, 1914, when President Woodrow Wilson signed a Joint Resolution designating the second Sunday in May as Mother's Day. Let the celebrations begin…
Mother Love Spreads. Fast forward to today, when 80 million adults plan to lift a glass, raise a fork and spend almost $3.5 billion on meals to fete mom. From all-you-can-eat buffets groaning with brunch dishes to elegant 3-course prix-fixe dinners, everyone’s eating with family, in style. Savvy restaurateurs lure them in with upscale menus, special kid’s meals, and freebies for mom…appetizer, dessert, glass of champagne, a single rose. As Monkeydish.com reports: “It seems like a holiday where splurging is the way to go. And if Mom is happy, everyone is happy!” Dinner remains the most popular meal (55%), with lunch or brunch, bringing in another third each, and breakfast at 12%, according to the NRA. Moms weighed in with their favorite type of restaurant to visit this Sunday: steak, seafood or barbeque reigned, at 34%, American cuisine closely on its heels at 24% - with ethnic cuisine and buffets rounding out the choices at about 20% each.
Mom vs. Food: Of course, Mom wins all on her big day, at the seat of honor everywhere. OpenTable reports the most Mom-friendly dining cities, defined as “places where it’s terrific to be both a mom and foodie” as Long Beach, CA, Tampa, FL and Boulder, CO, but restaurants in every city will be putting it all on the table for mothers. The $75 buffet at T Cook’s Royal Palms goes big with butter roasted sea scallops, celeriac and parsnip puree, braised baby leeks and lemon foam; braised short ribs with wild mushroom polenta, garlic rapini, thyme and beef jus; but the $98 brunch at NYC’s Picholi raises the bar even higher with a 3-course brunch including duck confit hash with sweet potato, poached farm egg, chipotle hollandaise, spring baby Lamb with artichokes barigoule and goat cheese gnocchi. Too over the top? Stay at home sweet home with this make-it-yourself dinner from NY Times “The Minimalist” food critic Mark Bittman, which he says Dad and kids can pull together in three hours: roasted-beet salad with goat cheese and walnuts, braised chicken with tomatoes, olives and capers, topped off with a sweetly simplified version of tres popular French chef Jean-Georges Vongerichten’s molten chocolate cake…and several glasses of wine for mom!
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