Cucumbers, Cookbooks, & Old Family Recipes

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Family recipes create special memories and can be wonderful keepsakes when documented for future generations.

Some food memories stick with us from childhood. Even if we don’t have written recipes, we remember seeing foods prepared in certain ways by our friends and family members.

If one step is skipped or an ingredient is changed, we can tell it’s not the “real deal” we remember. The little details can make all the difference.

Patricia from Westford, Massachusetts, knows this to be true. She remembers the particular way her mother would prepare cucumbers to be transformed into delicious pickles:

“My own food memory is simple fresh pickles. My mother always scored the
cucumbers before slicing so they had a lacy edge.”

Patricia has also worked hard to ensure that her family’s favorite recipes are preserved for future generations. She spent hours observing, documenting, and tasting to create a special keepsake for her large blended family. Thanks to her daughter, the gift has kept on giving over the years:

“What I did for my family (I married a widower with 9 kids) was to
compile a family cookbook with their favorite foods. This included
sitting and watching my husband make things like Slovak Christmas soup
and escargots and writing the ingredients and procedures as he went.
That was in 1987. My daughter re-did it in 2003 as a college project and
everyone treasures their copy.”