Family Cookbook, The Next Generation

It's that time again!
(Also, yes I know I still have the xmas tablecloth on the table still, I've been busy.)

December 2020 marks the 20th anniversary of when I, with the help of my family's contributions, compiled our family cookbook. I learned a lot from the experience, including that 3 months is not enough time to do it in, if you expect to do it right. I passed that learning experience on to the you, in the form of a website, then a book: Creating an Heirloom.

As I mention on that website, I did have a draft for a second edtion started not long after I finished the first book. But now families have grown, children have gotten married and have kids of their own now, and it's time to take that draft and turn it into another cookbook, with the help of those new families.

I have my spreadsheet of names and addresses (29, which I think just about doubles the number of people I queried last time), I wrote my cookbook letter, as well as a "newsy" Happy New Year catching-up letter since some of the people receiving a letter haven't heard from us in a long while, and stuffed my envelopes. I even did myself a favor and used printed mailing labels, since my handwriting is so wretched.

Want to join the fun? C'mon, we'll do it together! I'm giving my family (both sides, my side and my husband's side) a whole year to get their recipes to me, so I have 2020 for editing, formatting and printing. (My life gets very complicated around the holidays, so I'm just budgeting a ton of time, your mileage may vary.) Grab a copy of my book if you don't already have one, and we'll get started!

I'm happy to give you moral and limited tech support (I'll answer the questions I can) while you work on your family cookbook, because more than anything, I want you to succeed at preserving your family's history through the foods you eat and share.

We can do this, it'll be fun! Pay no attention to any of my tweeted complaints to the contrary... it'll all be worth it in the end.

My Grandmothers' Collections

I am incredibly fortunate. I have in my possession the recipe collections from both my grandmothers. But while my father's mother's recipe box was stuffed so full the lid would not close, and it was damaging the contents to try to remove anything, my mother's mother's collection is much slimmer. Why?

This is a question that I happen to know the answer to, but I'll get to that. When you run across something like this as you compile your family cookbook, it's worth it to ask why. If something seems odd, it probably is. If you see a notation on a recipe card "from the kitchen of ___" and don't recognize the name, ask; the person may turn out to be your grandmother's bestie, or it might go deeper yet. If you find three different recipes for sugar cookies, all worn, and don't know why three, ask; there's probably a reason for that, too.*

My point is, don't just blindly accept the collection in front of you. Look at it like a historian – because that's what you are now. You are your family's food historian. Take in every date, every place name on every hastily-written recipe from the bank notepad or deposit slip, read the letters (if you're luck enough to find those in the collection), take it all in. Make notes, make scans, make copies and back them up. It's a ton of work, but someday, someone will thank you for it.

On the left, my maternal grandmother's small recipe binder;
on the right, my paternal grandmother's recipe box that won't close.
One represents a lifetime, one represents a collection that was started
in middle-age, when her children were already grown.

As for my mom's mom? When I was very small, they had a house fire. Whatever recipes she had from her mother were lost. The recipe collection I have from her now is no older than the early 1970s. Missing out on that older stuff stings, but knowing why it's gone helps. It's also a reminder to younger cooks to go and meet with your grandparents now, while you can. (By the time I married, only one of my grandparents was alive to see it, and she died later that year.) Or maybe you don't much cook yourself, but you have kids, or nieces and nephews, who are too young to appreciate the resource that their grandparents are – go, ask the questions, get the recipes, collect the stories. Before they're lost forever.

My book with more advice like this is available at Amazon.com. (If you buy a used copy, make sure it's the Updated Edition – the previous edition is out of date with regards to publishing.)
_______________
*In my family there are in fact, three Very Important Sugar Cookie recipes, and all of them are The Best. All of them were from someone's grandmother, and there's someone willing to die on that sweet hill over each of them.

Creating an Heirloom

In 2005, I published Creating an Heirloom: Writing Your Family's Cookbook. Since then, a lot has changed in publishing options. I knew I needed to update the book, it had gone out of print, and the publishing chapter was inadequate. With Thanksgiving (and family cooking) around the corner, I was finally nudged into getting that chapter rewritten and updating the book. I wasn't able to get it done before Thanksgiving because of some formatting issues, but it's done now, and it's also available for the first time in an e-book edition! Plus, if you buy the print book from Amazon, you can get the Kindle edition free!

Available at Amazon.