Treasure Chest Thursday – Cooking for the Heart, Not Just for Health

May 13, 2010 at 02:08 | Posted in Carnival of Genealogy, memories, Treasure Chest Thursday | 2 Comments

Sometimes one has to consider cooking for the heart – for health purposes — but then again, sometimes it’s all about for the heart emotionally. Today’s treasure chest memory is the old yellow plaid cookbook my mother was given as a child in elementary school. She still had that cookbook when she married and it was a staple in our kitchen. I used to love to read the recipes over and over. Most were accompanied by black and white photos and of course there were plenty of hints and tips for successful baking and cooking. Years later my mother would buy big fancy cookbooks such as Time Life and they would showcase beautiful full-page color photographs. Yet something drew my interest back to the old yellow plaid book. In it my mother would make notations in pencil about changes or adaptations she preferred. And the front and back cover pages boasted a few of her own recipes. One was for her amazing Yum Yum Cake – a flavorful fruitcake that I still love.

Now as a married woman myself, I often clip recipes from magazines or handwrite copies from friends and family. When I find a cookbook at a garage sale, it is hard to resist buying it. I love to sit in Barnes and Noble and spend a rainy afternoon reading through the newest cookbook offerings. I love the glossy photographs of favorite Italian recipes and have indulged myself with extravagant purchases every now and then. A few Christmases ago I made cookbooks for each of our sons printing out old favorite family recipes of the family from Italy. This past year I drove my mother to distraction as I made another cookbook for everyone with her family recipes. But it is the old yellow plaid cookbook that evokes the fondest memories of my childhood at my mother’s side learning to cook as she taught me to read the recipes and follow the directions.