My grandmother gave me a hundred year old book that had been created by a friend of hers. The woman had taken a blank book and decorated pages to be the starting places for courses. And she asked her friends to write favorite recipes in it. (There was some weird shit being eaten in middle Tennessee in the early part of the last century.) I thought that was a cool idea, though. And I decided I would do a variation on the theme so when my child moved out, they could take usable recipe book for the things I prepared for them.
Unfortunately, my second husband decided that what was mine was his and he used it for his own notes for recipes. Nothing was actually usable. It was just a mess. So, I thought I would start over.
Before I got very far along, free blogs had become a thing. And I thought “Why not do that?” It makes it easier to share a recipe if someone asks for it. It’s easier to make modifications if something doesn’t work for me. And it’s easier to read because my handwriting can be a mess. So, my iPad is my cookbook when I get busy in the kitchen.
I still have that old cookbook. Louise put quotes about dining, food in general and the individual ingredients all through the book. There are some food related newspaper clippings. She did water color pictures at the beginning of each section. And she had everyone sign the recipes they added. Some recipes took 2 pages. Some people crammed theirs on a page with 2 others. And the handwriting is sometimes difficult to read. They all knew what “hot” meant. There was never a temperature given or an actual time noted. It would take some thought for me to use a lot of those recipes. It was fun to read, though.
I am the Audience 