Meals that you associate with particular people, places or times?
I'd guess we all have one or two or a few and more.
One for me is Sunday dinner at my grandparents' house in TX hill country.
Fried chicken, German green beans, mashed potatoes, sweet corn, biscuits and gravy. Iced tea. Peach cobbler with whipped cream.
One or more of yours? 
= new reply since forum marked as read
Served with oven-roasted potatoes and green beans with slivered almonds. We still have that dinner.
Then there was the birthday when I was quite young and my mother made cornish hens for 12 people. My birthday is in August and we had no air conditioning.
Mashed potatoes are for Christmas Day. 
back when I had less sense and more energy we did a fancy seafood dinner on "eve" then life got hectic and I usually was doing Santa duty at the last minute all night so it changed to pizza. 
these days I think about taking off to Mexico to avoid it all.
big ranch dinner (mid day) was cowboy steak, aka chicken fried, with mashed potatoes cream/milk gravy, some kind of vegetable like sliced tomatoes and cukes. peach or apricot pie. OMG I am hungry.
My grandparents lived on a ranch. We would go there on Sundays and Grandma would make a roast beef and a roast chicken. Never fish (not on a ranch!)
Her side dishes were always simple, but good: dishes like cucumber salad with sour cream, green beans, and oh, her mashed potatoes!
We would have sliced tomatoes--and sprinkle them with sugar!
The homemade bread was so light and fluffy and served, of course, with her homemade butter.
Dessert was always a homemade pie made with some kind of fruit from their garden: rhubarb/strawberry, cherry, peach. Sometimes there was homemade ice cream to go on top.
Then we would watch TV. I can remember watching Lassie and Mr. Ed. Grandpa, particularly, liked Mr. Ed. BTW, I had the best grandpa ever. He was tall, handsome, and you talk about a laid back, relaxed character? To this day he is my definition of "laid back." Nuthin' ever got to Grandpa.
There would be the long drive home, about 40", and we kids would all fall asleep in the car.
I loved those times. The amount of work, knowing what I now know, must have been staggering. And to have food without preservatives and as fresh as that is almost unheard of now.
Cher
There is just nothing like it.
No, not Grandpa - Grampa!
Our family lived in my Grampa's 2 story house, with us on the 2nd floor, back in the 60's. Every time I smelled the garlic sweating in olive oil, I knew Grampa was making a sauce. I would walk downstairs, and hang out watching my Grampa make the sauce. It was my first lesson in the culinary arts. I used to hang with my Grampa like a puppy follows his master. He was a florist by trade, and had the most AWESOME veggie garden. I felt like a midget walking through the giant tomato plants, towering over my head. (Think "The Godfather" movie, when the grandson is in the garden with Brando's character. His garden was like a forest to the kid.)
And, when the bread man came by, he used to allow me to rip off a hunk and dip it in the sauce.
To this day, I can't make a sauce without thinking of him.
(Yes, we had a bread man, and a milk man, and a fish man. And even a rag man (who collected cotton rags). Our street wasn't paved, and no one spoke English as a first language. My first was Italian. It wasn't until we all moved in 1969 that I was 'forced" to learn English, in order to better assimilate.)
Now...where's the bread, so I can dunk?
… same arrangement, our family on the 2nd floor… and me coming down to visit them, which they loved. I'd speak Italian to my grampa's delight. Other than that, everyone thought he was a stern man. My grandma could do no wrong.
My first introduction to her many Italian dishes were there, but I recall the smells and tastes of artichokes, that I've carried the same recipe with me. Simply, trimming and steaming them, but with lots of sliced garlic into the choke, olive oil and bread crumbs over them. They were so good. Then, she'd make me "desert" of a fresh beaten egg with a little vanilla and sugar beaten into it. We had chickens, and nothing was wrong then with eating a fresh beaten egg, especially if grandma made it.
I also remember when their milkman delivered the milk, getting to take off the top and taste the cream from the paper lid. I also recall him delivering ricotta cheese… tasting like, I mean… no other I've recalled since. That's how good it was in upstate NY in those days.
(sigh) 
Big, refashioned warehouse on one of the piers. Great views of the harbor. The blizzard moved in the day we got there. About seven of us - family, friends, extended family. He was rich but didn't have much of a pantry. Ate out a lot, I guess.
What he did have was all sorts of pastas and tomato sauces, crackers, cheeses, pate, tea, coffee, wine. A great music collection. And 1/2 pound of pot. Given the lack of basil or oregano we started using the pot as a seasoning. Every sauce had grass in it. Eventually it was pot blended into the pate. A plate of joints for after dinner smoke with coffee.
The city had completely shut down so we were "snuck in a stow bank" for three and a half days. Never lost electricity or phone. My sister was chosen to call home to let them know we were OK. "Ma, everything's fine but we're snuck in a stow bank" is literally what she said.
(aside) In all seriousness the blizzard wreaked havoc in the harbor, the city and along the whole coast. It was a big blow.
