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When she was eighty-seven, my mother compiled a book of recipes that were
the favorites of her family. My brothers and I suggested the book
and
assisted with typing, proofing, and printing it. Our interest in
this project was self-serving, because we wanted to insure that
the recipes we’d loved so dearly as children would be preserved
and passed on to the generations after us. Although cooking
and eating these dishes in our own
homes as adults is never as magical as when we were served them
during our childhood, the food still tastes like good home cooking should.
Mother was a skilled cook, and she paid attention to the color,
texture,
presentation, and balance of food groups she served. She grew up
with a
fascination for food. A diary she kept at the age of sixteen describes
the
food served at a community event to celebrate the safe return
of local boys at the end of World War I, and the entry ends
with the words, “yum, yum.” In her early
twenties she studied Home Economics at Iowa State University.
After a few years of teaching, she married my father in 1927
and began a career in homemaking that she truly enjoyed.
The
foreword to her cookbook explains, with a certain wry humor,
what her
destiny in life was to become:
"Probably the first recipe I ever acquired was Mrs. Ratcliff’s
divinity
and it is included in this collection. From the time I took home economics
in high school I enjoyed cooking and was encouraged by my father
particularly. Then my husband married me because I was a home economics
graduate! It has been a lot of fun.” Anna May Cullison, 1991
The 19th Century saying, “the way to a man’s heart is through
his stomach,”
was still acceptable at the time my parents were young adults.
Present-day
women might find this attitude both sexist and demeaning, but my
father
intended the highest compliment to his bride and he always encouraged
her
culinary efforts. He rarely cooked himself, but together they shared
a love
of good food and enjoyed reproducing dishes at home that they’d tasted
in
restaurants or at friends’ homes. Mom had well-developed taste buds
and
could identify the ingredients of complex dishes, and she knew
how to put
the parts together to achieve the result they wanted. Dad was the
taster and
made suggestions about adding a little more this or that.
My father had spent a lot of time sitting at the kitchen table watching food
being prepared. He’d grown up in the house where we lived and
had observed his mother, also a good cook, long before he brought
home his prized “cooking” bride. So he knew about culinary
process, which is
fundamental to a successful outcome in the kitchen.
The summer before I was to be married I decided I’d better get serious
about
learning how to cook. I thought I’d bake a pie, not exactly the best
choice for a beginner.
Both my mother and Grandmother Cullison, who lived with us, made
excellent
pies, and the secret to their flaky, tender piecrust was lard.
This rendered
and clarified pork fat is richer than other shortenings, thus
the crust is
particularly delicate to handle. Rolling out a perfect round
of piecrust takes practice, and Dad was watching closely from
his chair at the kitchen table as I struggled to shape the tender
crust and transfer it to a pie plate. But the crust kept falling
apart before I could get it into the plate. The day was hot
and sunshine streamed onto the enameled table where I was
working, with sweat trickling down my temples. Dad cut short
my misery by explaining to me that the dough had become too
warm to be useable. That ended my plan for becoming an instantaneous good cook.
I did finally learn the secret to making pies almost as good as Mom’s,
but
she still made my favorite rhubarb pie when I came home to visit
in the
summer.
Mom’s Pie Crust
1 ½ cups flour
½ cup lard (butter or other solid shortening may be substituted)
½ teaspoon salt
4 tablespoons ice water
Mix shortening with flour and salt, using a fork, pastry blender, mixer, or
processor, until it forms balls the size of a pea. Add cold water until
dough is moist enough to be rolled thin. Chill in refrigerator for half hour
or so. Handle dough as little as possible when rolling out bottom and top
crusts.
Rhubarb Pie
3 cups rhubarb, cut into bite size chunks
1 egg, beaten
1 ½ cups sugar (or more, according to taste)
1 heaping tablespoon flour (more if rhubarb has a lot of moisture)
¼ teaspoon nutmeg
2 tablespoons butter
Mix first five ingredients. Put filling in 9 inch pie plate lined with
unbaked crust. Dot the filling with butter. Cover with top crust and seal to
bottom crust around the edge of plate. Sprinkle extra sugar on top crust.
Bake at 350 degrees for 1 hour.
I didn’t learn to cook until after I got married, and then my mother
proved
to be a supportive mentor. I would call her in Iowa from my kitchen
in Ohio,
which was fully equipped with all the necessary cooking appliances,
pans,
and dishes, and even a spatula just like she used, but not yet
permeated
with the mélange of aromas that define a place where good home cooking
is
done. She would send me the recipes I had requested of her typed
on 3x5 inch cards, with detailed instructions to encourage my success.
My card for the divinity recipe from Mrs. Ratcliff, who was a neighborhood
matron in Mom’s hometown of Red Oak, IA, is typical of the attention
she
gave me in explaining process, because making candy from scratch
is
difficult. Melted sugar tends to crystallize as it cooks, creating
an
unpleasant gritty texture in the finished product. For my mother
to attempt
making this candy at the age of fifteen says a lot about her innate
cooking
skills. I remember the snowy mounds of divine divinity drying on
wax paper
on our kitchen table and the subtle flavor of vanilla as my teeth
sank into
a perfectly smooth-textured morsel.
Mrs. Ratcliff’s Divinity
2 2/3 cups sugar
2/3 cups water
2/3 cup white Karo
3 egg whites
1 teaspoon vanilla
Cook first three ingredients over medium heat, stirring and lifting
sugar
from bottom of pan. If sugar crystals get on sides of pan above
the syrup
level, wipe them off with cold damp cloth or pastry brush. Cook
to hardball
stage, until a small amount of syrup hardens when put in cold
water. (244
degrees Fahrenheit using a candy thermometer)
Beat egg whites with electric beater until stiff and then add
syrup slowly
in a steady stream. Continue beating until candy thickens to
a dull sheen.
Add vanilla. One half cup chopped walnuts or candied cherries
can be added
at this point. Drop candy by spoonfuls on waxed paper to harden.
Store in
airtight container.
Great progress in the art of cooking has been made since these recipes
were
first conceived and used. New kinds of equipment streamline the
cook’s
chores and ingredients have been tested and refined to insure a
uniform
product. Sleek and shiny designer kitchens look like a cook’s dream
come
true. But the pure love of cooking and sharing food with family
and friends
remains the same satisfying experience it always has been. That’s
the most
important ingredient in any recipe.
Margaret Cullison
has recently retired from public education and moved to southern
Oregon. Now liberated from work, she's happy to be writing again.
She can be reached at tekie@charter.net.
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