Several years ago, I was blessed with the opportunity to stay and care for my elderly (great) grandmother for a little while. During that time, I came to appreciate her even more than I already did. Grandma held a wealth of knowledge that she would happily share, all you had to do was pull up a chair at the kitchen table and sit for a bit.
One of my favorite rooms in that old farmhouse was the kitchen. That warm, inviting kitchen has served more meals than I can probably count, all with Grandma at the stove. In the middle of the room, there was a worn, laminate table with the pattern rubbed off where many elbows had leaned. Not only did it hold six boys growing up, but many grandchildren and great-grandchildren later on.
While the house was much more quiet by the time I was around, she and I would still sit at the table and pour over the recipe boxes that sat on her countertop under the metal cabinets. I would pull out a pile of recipe clippings and little booklets from a different time and age, and bring them over to the table where we could both sit and look through them.
Recipes for molded applesauce rings on a bed of leafy greens or smothered steaks and a homemade angel food cake would tantalize our tastebuds. Grandma would tell me how she remembered her mother making that same angel food cake for every single birthday in the family. Hand-beating the egg whites until stiff, carefully folding the other ingredients in, and then baking and frosting it. At times, you might even be lucky enough to have a pile of juicy, red strawberries right alongside it.
After finding several recipes and listening to the stories that each one carried along with it, we would finally locate the treasured instructions for Grandma’s sweet dough. We would look it over and I would gather the ingredients, all while Grandma sat in her captain’s chair giving instructions.
When the time came to actually make the giant, cinnamon tea-ring, Grandma would nudge her chair just a little towards me in the other half of the kitchen. The smell of cinnamon teasing our nostrils and the thrill of playing with a soft, smooth dough was a joy to behold. Although I had read the recipe, instructions from Grandma were always needed. This was where I learned that when a recipe calls for sifted flour, you always sift the flour before you measure it into the bowl. Normally I would have just measured it out, dumped it in the sifter, and gone about my merry way. But not unless you want your dough or batter to come out too dry!
Once the dough was a good consistency, I’d carefully carry it over to Grandma so she could poke it with a finger and tell me whether to work a little more flour into it, or if it felt just about right. There was more experience and knowledge in one little finger poke from Grandma than a lot of people have in their whole body!
After we’d concluded that the dough was satisfactory, I’d put it in a greased bowl, cover with a clean tea towel and place it in an ever-so-slightly warm oven to let it rise. As soon as the dough grew to be bigger than the bowl that held it, it was time to go to work.
I’d pull it from the bowl and start rolling it out on the floured kitchen counter. On that same counter, Grandma’s collection of about 10 or so cookbooks sat. One of the most treasured ones being the red Betty Crocker cookbook. In front of it were those three recipes boxes we had poured through; one was (great) Grandma’s, one her mother’s, and the other her grandmother’s. Later in the quieter hours of the evening, I’d open one of those boxes and pull out what looked to be a favorite recipe here or there, copy it into my own newly-started recipe binder, and then carefully tuck it back into what had been its cozy home for the past many years.
“Be sure that there’s plenty of flour on the cabinet and that your pans are well greased,” Grandma would remind me as I worked with the rolling pin to thin the mountain of dough. After rolling it out, I’d smother the top side with a wonderful combination of brown sugar, cinnamon and butter — Perfected by Grandma after so many years of tweaking. Once the dough was entirely coated with the sweet mixture, I’d carefully start at the back of the counter and roll the dough up towards me like when making cinnamon rolls. We’d then shape it into a large ring on a baking sheet, slice, twist, bake, and not-so-patiently wait to frost it. When everything was finished, she and I would retire to the living room for the evening.
After a couple of days had passed by, we were out there in the kitchen again — Grandma in her chair with me working as her hands, making rice crispy treats, cookies, breads, tea rings, and other wonderful little things.
It was in that kitchen that I learned that one never stirs dough for a pie crust — you lift it with two forks. At the same time, what I learned from her had nothing to do with cooking. Some things came from simply flipping through her Bible and noticing the little jottings here and there on the edge of a page, a highlighted passage, or a stray bulletin from a Sunday morning service gone by. But one of the best parts of those moments spent together? When a verse would pop out at me and start us on a half-hour discussion.
In the evenings after our baking had finished for the day, I’d sit in a chair by her rocker in the living room. The propane stove would be cranking out the heat in the opposite end of the room and she’d tell me stories from years gone by. Sometimes they’d hold a meaning or lesson, other times they were simply a sweet little childhood memory.
One story in particular found her laying in her bed as a little girl, while the house was pitch black. All was quiet in the home, and then a new sound rang out — a baby’s cry. Grandma’s father came into her room holding a lamp and she learned the happy news: she had a new baby sister!
As I sit back here at home, I can’t help but think of all that I learned from that sweet woman; things that no textbook could teach me or Youtube tutorial explain better. I don’t thing I’ll ever be truly aware of all the little things I picked up from her. No matter how busy life gets or how old I become, I’ll forever be grateful for that time spent down at the farm, in Grandma’s little corner of the world. I love you, Grandma!
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