A Project in the Making: My Grandmother's Recipe Book

For years I've had an idea for a very special project brewing in my mind. I posted about it last winter. My project outline is something like this:

1. Get my hands on my grandmother's recipe book.
2. Cook all the recipes in it (and take pictures of the process).
3. Create a proper cookbook out of it using Blurb or Tastebook and give them as gifts to my family members.

In all honesty, I visualized this whole project based on nothing more than a glimpse of the overstuffed, disintegrating recipe book when I was young; memories of some of my grandmother's tasty dishes; and family conversation about the gourmet meals she was known for. I had no real recollection of what the book, this stuff of family legend, actually looked like.

When it was brought up from Tennessee for me this summer by the most reliable of couriers (Thanks Mom!), and I carefully, reverently, leafed through the pages, what I found was far more than a recipe book.

The leather-bound book, as it turns out, belonged first to my great-grandmother and begins with a clipping that she pasted in:

1920. 88 years ago this collection of recipes was begun. Sticking out between the pages of pasted-in clippings and scrawled measurements were thank you notes, shopping lists, and even a drawing done in a sweet child's hand; a note from my aunt to her grandma, my great-grandmother.

I was suddenly in awe of the history I held in my hands, terrified of tearing the brittle, crumbling pages, or of causing this new-found treasure to disintegrate altogether. How could I even flip through the book, much less cook the recipes from it? So I kept it in a padded envelope for a month. Safe. Protected.

Still, I could not resist the charm of its whimsical drawings and the very intriguing recipes I came across. I mean, something called "Knock 'em Dead Pie" is clearly just begging to be made.

So, I won't hold back any longer. This is it. I am embarking on Project Recipe Book. I'll be sharing regular updates here, and likely asking for suggestions as I attempt to decipher recipes and track down ingredients. It will take time, I know. Grandmother had a lot of recipes. Wish me luck.