Auntie Emm's kitchen

"And you know I'm a complete recipe follower, right? I don't love cooking for the most part and wasn't taught much in the kitchen, but I did find that if I followed a recipe things tasted good!" email excerpt, July 05

I just came across a huge cache of recipe booklets the other day, courtesy of the Friends of the Library. I was at the desk when John came up with two plastic grocery bags filled with both old and new pamphlets and asked if I would be interested in going through them. These were on top of a huge collection that had been given to them earlier in the week. That little load seemed to be the tail end of a donation. I had no problem digging through them and pulled a dozen or so aside. After that I took a break and went back to the Friends room and went through that treasure trove they received earlier in the week and in the end went home with a paper grocery bag full of old and interesting recipe books. They're not all in the best of shape but they're a reflection of a cooking sense that is long past. Picture life in the days when most women were expected to be homemakers. That was the era of these cookbooklets. They were, and still are, grand.

I found a piece that was generated by the so and so Democratic Society of dumpty dump County. It was a compliation of that particular voter block's favorite recipes. I liked the style of the writing, the quaintness of the recipes, but more I loved the illustration on the cover, a simple pen and ink of a modern woman struggling with a pie recipe while the ghostly image of grandmother hovered benignly overhead. I saw your face in that image, saw the seriousness of your kitchen approach, saw you in your ernestness, your desire to please. You were the housekeeper when I knew you, or maybe more the keeper of the house. Without you that place would have fallen apart. Due to your training or diligence or hardheadedness you've managed to keep that house going in ways that astound me. Frankly, M, it's a lovely house. A grand place to entertain, which you seem to do a lot. And from what I can tell you do it well.

I wasn't a big recipient of your cooking powers, if only because you were so shy in sharing them. You thought that I was some grand master chef, but I snowed you if only because I knew how to cook and did all of it off the cuff. But you amazed me with your love of recipes. Without them you were lost. With them I was dumbfounded. Together we managed to pull off some pretty great stuff. But you, on your own, knocked off dishes without any help or back up. Before your talks you did it all, without a man in the kitchen to provide assistance or support.

Melissa, that alone made me love you. That abillity to pull it all off all by yourself. You were and still are a powerhouse. Those dishes, those treats, things that you wrote about or shared with friends or made for me told me that you were not the woman of "little brain" but a true force of nature to contend with. No wonder The Detective fought so hard to keep you. To lose you would have meant starvation.

Nevertheless, we shared some good chow. For instance:

Applesauce: I told you about it, how easy it was to make. You poo-pooed it for the longest time then the day you stayed home and skipped the All Staff Meeting you made some. Told me the next day in an email that you had some for me but that there were no takers. How was I to know that you'd be waiting there at the corner of Sylvan and Wheaton with a bowlful of applesauce for me? Had I known that you were there nothing would have stood in my way. Not a legion's worth of cinnamon sticks would have stopped me from tasting that fresh sauce. Nothing.

Raspberry jam: we were still new to writing, still feeling out the parameters of our friendship. The Estranged One was still my wife living at home, I was still your boss at work. I was working Sundays at the Rodeo swap meet, taking the boy, selling junk, making cash. In that one letter you wrote me you told me how you spent a Saturday picking raspberries with a friend and afterwards got to gether to make jam. You didn't so much as say it but when you asked me when The Boy had his golf lessons you were telling me that you had something to give me. I found out later that week that it was more than jam, it was more than a bag of plums, it was a small batch of fondness wrapped in a prickly bit of irkedness after finding out that I had applied to Boise. It was funny to see you that way as I stood outside your van, across the passenger seat from me, sunglasses on, distant and just a bit huffy. I had never seen you that way before. You were mad because I had gotten some plums earlier in the day from some other woman. But more you were angry because you thought I was going away, but you couldn't tell me so. Why was that, my guarded one?

Berries: they came up in our story many times, but the time we sat at the track and talked movies you brought along strawberries to share. I don't think I had anything with me, but I remember those berries, room temp, juicy, a bit before their time. Quite unlike the berries we picked from the bushes not too far from where we were sitting. We did that walk only days before, walking, talking about nothing much, when I pulled a vine ripe, sun warmed black berry from a bush. turned to you and popped it into your mouth. Who needs sex when things like that were like making love standing up?

Brownies: you had a recipe that you were particularly proud of, in fact, you asked me in a letter if I could smell them baking from where I stood. While I was out working the swapmeet you baked a batch for an impromptu bbq you were pulling off for some old Texas based friends that were in town for the afternoon. I can't remember if you ever shared that recipe with me but I know that whenever I think of brownies I think of those hot asphalt coated Sundays and the joy of seeing emails in my box from you.

Clafouti: let's just blame Ina Garten, shall we? Maybe Tacoma Boys? Or we'll just blame that stop we made at that fruit stand outside of Twisp on our road trip back from WALE. Nevertheless we always seemed to have pears on our minds fairly back in those days and a recipe for pear clafouti seemed to be just the right thing to make. It necessitated buying kosher salt and nutmeg and pear brandy, but we were good to go with all of that, too. Once I made one in a cast iron skillet so that necessitated finding one for you, too. You've since gotten more than one. I wonder if you still have that skillet I bought for you? If so, when was the last time you broke it and that hand written clafouti recipe out and made one?

Pork burritos: then there was that whole Crock Pot episode we shared, where we were challenging each other weekly with slow cooked meat recipes. I made some dish or another that slow cooked pork with some soup, onions and beer and passed along the idea to you where, in the end, you made a dish that was oh so much better. I still remember the lunch we shared together at Bataan Park there above the library off Sylvan Way. You were hesitant to have me taste your chow, you were afraid I wouldn't like it, as if you were cooking for me. Maybe you were, but all I know is that it was delicious.

Salmon: then there was that time you had in-laws over and everyone went deep sea fishing and you suddenly had tons of salmon in your ice box. Tons of salmon to grill, and alot of it was coated with mayonaise. We never had a chance to explore that. What was that all about? Where did you learn that? Was it really all that good? Explain, Professora!

Banana creme pie: what brought that on, making me a pie? But you did and then you discovered that my Southern colleague at work made one for me, too. I had to eat two of those things, and I have to tell you now that at that time I had no idea which one was better. But darlin', in hind sight, it had to be yours!

Then there were cheese omelets that you suddenly started making because I had made one for you. And then there was the pear tea that I drank in your kitchen because of the pears and my fascination for green tea. Then there was the pan of turkey lasagna that started it all, the one you gave to my family whe my youngest was born. That was the day I first met The Detective, the day I knew that I had to set you free. The day that I found out that love begins and ends in the kitchen, no matter whether or not your dreams or desires or recipes turn out.

I am sure that you are still Queen of your kitchen and are turning out a passle of princesses that will hopefully follow in your path, even if that path is filled with good intentions and good food found in recipe books. Someday, if we are lucky, maybe we will find ourselves washing dishes together after a long slog in the kitchen. Maybe the food we'll make will be soft, less challenging, more suited to geriatric tastes. Maybe it will be for two, or for a grand group. No matter. If that happens, all to the good. If not, well, just know that I am happy for the food that we already shared. You shared lunch off of your plate, we broke bread in your kitchen, we gleaned and gathered knowledge all over the place and I know, in my heart of hearts that when you sautee in that cast iron skillet or bake a dish in that French casserole I gave you that you think of me and all the dishes we never made. It's there in your letters, as much as it was in your eyes when we parted last.

Food and friends, that's where the best memories are made.

Love, your WHMB