|
Back to Family Memories Index Mama's CookbookThis morning I went looking for a recipe. I knew it was handwritten on an index card somewhere, maybe in my Better Homes and Gardens cookbook. It resides in the kitchen drawer of potholders, easy to find. The card wasn't there. Hmm. Maybe it was in the yellow recipe box I'd gotten free in the mail years ago, along with a dozen full-color recipes for fancy dishes I'd never eat, much less prepare. I had used that handy box to store newspaper and magazine clippings of economical, tasty meals, like meat and pasta or veggie casseroles, easy-to-prepare and "sure to please the whole family." You know the kind. Since my kids are grown, I don't cook from scratch much, and for meals I do cook I know the recipes by heart. But this one recipe I didn't know by heart, hence the search for that elusive card. Finally, there in the bottom of my pantry, way to the back, was the yellow box. And beneath it was something I had forgotten — Mama's Pilot Club Cookbook from 1965. As I turned the pages it was easy to spot Mama's favorite recipes. Those pages had smudges on them, dried smears of cake batter, or pie filling, or vanilla flavoring. Pineapple upside-down cake was a frequent dessert at our house and a popular cake to provide for family reunions or church socials. There were five recipes for this cake - which one did Mama use? I tried to figure this out. Two called for the cake to be baked in a skillet. Nope, never knew Mama to do that. One called for six eggs, all the others used only one. I'm sure she'd never put six eggs in it. One included frosting and I knew Mama never frosted this cake! I finally chose one to think of as Mama's, its ingredients seeming to best fit my taste and visual memory. Maybe one day I'll cook it myself. And there in that book was the recipe I was seeking, not on an index card but in my own handwriting, written out on a sheet of notebook paper. It was paper-clipped to the page of pound cake recipes and one of those recipes had a circle around its name. At the top of the sheet was the title, "Bette's Old Fashioned Dark Fruit Cake" but it wasn't really my recipe. It wasn't even Mama's recipe. It was Mimi's. I had gotten her to tell it to me, painstakingly copying down every detail right down to the damson plum jam and half cup "plus" of rum that went into it. The "plus" was used to moisten the cheesecloth that one cake was wrapped in for storage. This very, very rich cake would keep in a dark cupboard for four weeks, maybe longer, but it never lasted longer than that. It was completely gobbled up on Christmas day! The week before Thanksgiving was always a super busy time in the kitchen at Mimi's house. To prepare this fruit cake, the nuts had to be shelled and chopped. Brazil nuts, pecans and walnuts weren't bought shelled at the grocery store, Da bought a case of them in the shell from somewhere, and it took an assembly line to get them ready for Mimi's use. Once ready, the wash-tub full of nuts was mixed thoroughly and set aside for later. Then came the candied fruit. Of course the large chunks had to be transformed into small chunks. Pineapple, ginger, citron, orange and lemon peel, all coated with sticky sugar soon coated all our fingers. A jar of Maraschino cherries was added and these had to be cut up too, adding delicious cherry juice to our messy fingertips. A box of chopped dates was chopped even finer. Golden raisins and currants were dumped in, the juice from the cherry jar poured on top and the mixing began. Now, we're talking a lot of stuff here! It took a long-handled kitchen ladle to mix this batch of ingredients, and a lot of muscle power. When Mimi was satisfied that the flavors would all blend okay, a clean cloth was laid over the top and the fruit concoction placed in the bottom of the refrigerator to await the next step, on the next day. That next step was preparing the pound cake batter, the glue that held the fruit and nuts together. Now, this was no mix from a box. A doubled recipe, it boasted real butter, lots of eggs, lemon and vanilla and almond flavoring - plus the jar of damson plum jam and the rum. Not rum flavoring, actual rum bought by a male relative from the liquor store. Once this batter was ready, it was added to the fruit-nut mixture and more mixing ensued. A lot of mixing! There was always enough for two 5-pound cakes, plus one small 2-pound cake. One cake would be devoured at Thanksgiving dinner, the other one at Christmas. The little one was always a Christmas gift for some lucky person. As I read through the instructions for that cake today, I could see Mimi's kitchen and hear her voice and Mama's voice. I could feel the heat from the kitchen range and see the clutter of pots and pans we'd used for fruit and nuts. I could hear the water running in the sink, as somebody was always washing up the used utensils. By the time the cakes went into the oven, every dish we'd used was drying in the dish drain. As the cakes began to bake, I could smell their wonderful flavor wafting throughout the house. It was Thanksgiving time, and we were so very thankful. |