Laughing, Crying, and Eating My Way Through Proofing A Cookbook

Hey Y'all! Here's a little something to help get you over the hump...a new Que-Licious post!

Last fall I decided to put together a cookbook featuring my grandma Robinson's scratch recipes my family has enjoyed for years. I know what you're thinking right...another cookbook of comfort foods...that couldn't be farther from the truth. I am sure when a cookbook of this nature is put together there is some collaberation with the person that inspires the book to be written in the first place. Perhaps you gather all the hand written recipes that were tucked away in recipe boxes and between the pages of cookbooks and sit down together at the kitchen table and go over each one carefully as to not forget an important step or that must have ingredient. Well, not this particular cookbook. The Forgotten Kitchen was inspired by the woman who taught me to grow a garden, can and preserve, how not only to cook but cook with love, and most of all, how to become self-sufficient when that is your only option.

As I began writting her recipes and methods down, I began to remember so many Sunday dinner's spent at her house growing up. I remember watching her start a fire in the wood burning stove, the glorious smells drifting out of her kitchen, and the way her highboy buffet would be filled end-to-end with pies and the occassional cake. I am blessed to have so many memories of and with her, and I wish she could remember those days as well.  My grandmother suffers from the devastating effects of Alzheimer's Disease. So you see folks, there will be no talks at the kitchen table, no cooking in the kitchen next to one of the most admired women in my life, and certainly no hand-written recipes. As the book started to come together, I realized it needed to be more than just a book of recipes and methods. It needed to be a book about the memories created out of one woman's love for her family expressed through her food.

So what does putting together our family recipes have to do with a bbq business? EVERYTHING! I have taken those same family favorites and made them my own by adding my bbq twist. For example, my grandma's homemade chicken and dumplin's are my absolute favorite food ever. So given my love of barbecue style food, I made the dish my own and call it Smoked Chicken & Dumplin's. To me, this is the best of both worlds. So these days I find myself reviewing these pages that I have "set to paper" (as she would say) and laughing when I remember a mischievious child's actions on a Sunday afternoon in her house, crying because I miss her so, and eating because...well...I have to test the recipes. My goal is to have the book ready by her birthday this year which is April 1, 2012 so please keep watching the blog and other social sites for updates on when the book will be available.

A percentage of the sales of the cookbook will be made to the Alzheimer's Association (alz.org) in her name, Lucille Mae Robinson. The Forgotten Kitchen is filled with memories of how my grandmother taught me to cook, working with her in the garden, and how her influence helped guide me to this point in my life which is exactly where I need to be...in the kitchen.

Keep Cookin' Y'all!