rechelle's lifelyrics

A few weeks ago, I said I would post a couple of favorite recipes I enjoyed when I was a girl. I really thought I had hand-written cards from my family for both of them in my binders (see “Better Than A Recipe Box?“), but alas I could find neither. I only found one card that my grandma wrote out for me, and then I remembered she didn’t like her writing, and usually had me write out my own cards if I was wanting a recipe from her. In my eyes, her writing was perfect, and I wish I would have talked her into writing more of them for me to keep because it is now a tangible thing tied to so many memories that I treasure. It has been over 20 years since she passed and I can still picture and hear her, busy preparing food in her kitchen, or helping me in mine.

But as I was searching for the recipes, I became very grateful for the collection I have gathered from so many different sources through the years. Most of the cards, pieces of scratch paper, or printed emails hold memories of people from long ago. Pages torn from magazines or collected from packaging reflect different eras of food culture or philosophies about health and diet as they have morphed. Several old recipes from 30-40 years ago have my hand-written notes citing modifications I made as I was influenced by things I learned. One example I observed was my effort to reduce the amount of butter, oil, or breading in several of the old-time recipes. Another trend I found was the migration to fresh herbs over dried after I learned how to keep an herb garden. I think it’s really interesting that the food we fix is a part of our history. I’ve noticed on several shows we’ve watched that many famous chefs have a back story of the meals they enjoyed in their youth, and the family member who provided their “daily bread” that ended up being a huge influence on their development in their career.

To me, creating in the kitchen is like writing a song or a blog post. It is an expression of love that is meant to be shared. I’m really happy to have this little corner I can share from, and I hope it will inspire you to create and share for the circle of people you have around you. This week has been really busy with the 4th of July holiday, grandkids sleepover, and tandem rides, but I’ll be making both of the recipes I promised as soon as possible. I need to get good pictures so I can finish creating the recipe cards for my “Rechelle’s Recipes For Family Gathering” page. Check back in next week for those recipes!

I would love to hear from you! Please send me an email if you have feedback on my blog or website, and you can always leave a comment on my weekly blog articles.