ABOUT M.O.M.

Through her travels, Chef Lisa came to realize that the best meals of a country are not found in its restaurants. They’re found in its homes, made with love by mothers cooking for their families. So, in addition to Mother’s regular menu where she serves food from mothers around the world, Chef Lisa highlights a different mother each month and features some of her special dishes.

The special mother is called the Mother of the Month (or M.O.M.™), and her photograph, story and menu take a prominent place at the beginning of Mother’s menu. We choose a mother that allows us to take advantage of the seasonal availability of ingredients, such as a Greek mother in the summer months and a Polish mother in the winter months.

If you’d like to nominate a mother to be the M.O.M.™, CLICK HERE and tell us something about her and her special dishes.

Sharon Shanky Hering

Lunch & Dinner

Reuben Chopped Salad
shredded lettuce, cabbage & carrots, corned beef brisket, house made rye bread croutons, tomatoes, hardboiled eggs, red onions & thousand island dressing

18

Shepherd’s Pie
ground beef, onions, carrots, celery, peas, tomatoes, red wine, mashed potatoes

24

Dessert

Irish Cream Bread Pudding
challah bread, Bailey’s Irish Cream, rum,
served with rum crème anglaise & caramel sauce

*contains alcohol, must be over 21 to enjoy!

10

CURRENT M.O.M. STORY

MA SPANKY

mother of the month (m.o.m.)

Sharon Shanky Hering, also known as “Ma Spanky” (it’s a long story!), was born in Portland in 1948 and still lives in the house
where her dad grew up. Of Irish descent (her great-grandparents came from County Cork), Sharon went to Madison High
School and took a job with the phone company soon after. She started as an operator and worked her way up to manager of
central office operations, retiring in 2007. She has three sons, two of whom are identical twins.

Since her mother hated cooking, Sharon started cooking when she was ten, mainly for survival. She would stay at her
grandparents’ house every weekend and loved the cookies and banana bread her grandfather baked for her religiously.
When she got out on her own, Sharon was happy to experiment with new recipes and dishes, and she took lots of cooking
classes. Her favorite was with Jimella Lucas and Nanci Main (owners of the Ark Restaurant on Long Beach Peninsula).
Sharon loves trying different foods, making it a point to eat regionally when traveling. When home, it’s soups and salads,
Ma Spanky likes to make most (and has even placed in a contest or two!).

Ma Spanky absolutely loves all holidays and decorates her entire house as well as herself in head-to-toe holiday décor.
At Christmas, she clears away anything not bolted down (even pictures come off the walls) and transforms her entire house
into a winter wonderland. There are display cabinets with Santas, one with snowmen, and another with villages, among
others. Be it Halloween, Christmas, or St. Patrick’s Day, Ma Spanky opens her house and serves food appropriate for the
holiday (she laments her green mashed potatoes didn’t go over well on St. Patty’s Day). Because Ma Spanky loves to feed
people, she started a catering business called Edesia’s Savory Bites (named after the Roman goddess of the feast).
She is absolutely delighted to be our mother this month, just thinking about how many people she’s feeding
vicariously through her special menu!

Click here to See Former M.O.M.S

Nominate A M.O.M.

The M.O.M. menu has been an important part of Mother’s since we opened in 2000. This allows our guests to experience both new flavors and dishes from around the world and meals prepared with love by mothers cooking for their families. Our past M.O.M.’s include a wide variety of individuals- mothers, sisters, grandmothers, daughters, friends, and wives- and we’ve even had a few honorary male M.O.M.’s!

If you would like to nominate somebody (or yourself) to be a future M.O.M. at Mother’s, please fill out this form and return it to the host at Mother’s or [email protected]. Once we receive your form, we will contact the nominee (if possible), or you, (if it’s you or if you’d like to be the intermediary) to discuss potential dishes for the M.O.M. menu.

When making menu suggestions, please keep in mind that our M.O.M. menu typically includes an appetizer, salad and/or lunch item, 2-3 entrees (usually a meat, poultry, and/or vegetarian/fish dish) and a dessert. When making suggestions, feel free to make your list as long as you’d like, but don’t suggest dishes that replicate those on our main menu (even if yours is the best meatloaf in the world, meatloaf is on our regular menu, so couldn’t be offered on our M.O.M. menu).

It’s likely we’ll have a bit of back and forth where I may ask you to list ingredients in a dish to gain a clearer idea of how it might taste, but keep in mind that we won’t need any recipes until after we finalize the menu.

Thanks again for your interest in the M.O.M. program. Feel free to contact us with any questions you have!

Mother of The Month