Cooking as Autobiography - Zucchini Bread

 

Cooking as Autobiography .

Zucchini Bread

In years gone by, people kept recipes on 3.5 inch cards in files in boxes. I have a box like that and I also treasure the very old box from my deceased mother-in-law. The cards told us how to prepare specific dishes, with more or less detail. But they do more than that sometimes. They remind us of the circumstances that prompted us to write and save them. That can be reminders of our life experiences or events. When I dig around in my old box, I see recipes from old friends and relatives, from old cookbooks of the past, from forgotten but newly remembered times. And then there are recipes about how to prepare something without having to find the old cookbooks that provided them. Boxes of memories.

Here’s a happy example from when we lived in Green Bay. I was surprised one day when daughter Elizabeth (Libby), then about eight or nine years old, came home with a card in her hand. She had been playing with neighbors Leah and Erica. It was summer and the zucchini was ripe. The girls’ mom, Randee, had a recipe for zucchini bread, which Libby wrote onto a new recipe card and brought home. It is written in Libby’s little-kid writing with associated little-kid misspellings. I didn’t ask for it but was glad to have it. I look at it now and it warms my heart for all the good times those kids had when they were little. It reminds me of Randee’s neighborliness in offering me a way to cook something. Zucchini bread is very good.

I have been making zucchini bread from that recipe on the old card ever since. I made it again yesterday, with a bit of modification. When I eat and share the bread, I share the memories. Recipe cards can be autobiographical. Now my recent recipes are word processed and placed in a 3-ring binder. The old box is obsolete but remembered.

Here is the recipe as given to me on that beautiful summer day, with misspellings corrected. Libby is a smart adult person who now spells words better. She cooks well too. 

Zucchini Bread (2 loaves)

2 cups sugar                                                1 teaspoon salt 

1 cup oil                                                       1teaspoon baking powder

3 eggs                                                            3 teaspoons cinnamon

2 cups chopped zucchini                        3 cups flour

2 teaspoons vanilla                                  2 teaspoons baking soda

Mix sugar, oil and eggs until well blended. Add zucchini, flour, soda, salt, making powder, vanilla and cinnamon. Mix well. Put in 2 medium sized greased and floured loaf pans. Bake at 350 degrees for one hour. Use tooth pick test. 

p.s. My modification is to use less sugar. It’s still good with 1 ½ cups sugar.

 

Year End 2020

 

Year End 2020

2020 is a year to remember. This is my annual report to the world, my version of life in the big year of worldwide pandemic disease, racial disturbances following police shootings, and a presidential election campaign that seemed to last all year. For me it was a year of mostly staying at home.

Life was normal for me during January and February, with my usual activities of volunteering at the library, committee meetings at the senior center, classes with PLATO (old people’s education), church activities, and BEST OF ALL, dates with Pete, my wonderful boyfriend. Pete and I toured the Minhas brewery in Monroe, and we went to movies and restaurants. We took a trip to Oshkosh and Appleton and saw the museums. I entered artwork in the Madison part of the Wisconsin Regional Art Program. Life was filled with activity.

Then I turned the page of my pocket calendar from February to March, and suddenly most of it was gone or changed. The covid-19 pandemic had arrived. It is the disease of the century. Sometimes it has seemed to last a hundred years.

I didn’t know this disease would last the rest of the year. Suddenly instructions appeared from the city, county and state about how to avoid getting it. The politicians didn’t (and still don’t) all agree on how to deal with it. We were told to stay at home, wear masks, wash hands, not touch our faces, use hand sanitizer, and stay at least six feet apart. Essential services stayed open. I see the grocery store as essential along with my ongoing relationship with Pete. Pete and I have continued to see each other, and I have enjoyed meals with my Madison family including Sarah, John, Sherry, Laura and Ian.

Much of life went online and changed in other ways. In Madison churches and schools went virtual. Many stores stayed open. Stores installed glass or plastic or something transparent to separate customers from staff people who might breathe on one another. Restaurants turned to carry-out services. Shared transportation separated people inside buses and airplanes. Many businesses struggled to survive. Some people chose to ignore some or all the cautions. Many people got sick with covid-19. Hospitals were and are stressed. I am glad that the vaccine has arrived and is starting to be distributed.

What did we do? We discovered Zoom. Zoom lets us stay together separately. It enabled me and others to join the online world of church services, meetings, classes, social gatherings and more. This made life different but good. I was and am happy to be on the same screen with people at church and other gatherings. Being together in person is better, so I have been together several times a week with Pete, mostly in our homes playing cards or Scrabble, or watching streaming plays and movies. I have had dinner weekly with John’s family and lunch with Sarah occasionally.

Summer came to Madison with disorder about racial injustice after several killings by police in other cities. In Madison daily and nightly demonstrations centered on State Street and the capitol area. Stores and businesses were damaged and looted. I thought it was frightening. Then artists painted pictures and messages about racial injustice on the boarded-up shop windows. Pete and I went downtown a couple times and looked at them but mostly we stayed away from State Street.

I went to Washington Island a few times although pandemic rules were in effect in Door County as in the rest of the state. I enjoyed Memorial Day weekend, the last week in June and Labor Day weekend at the island campground as I have done in recent summers. I stayed in the woods and enjoyed existing. I love being there even without Pete.

 Autumn came with more staying at home. In September, by computer, I attended the annual state gathering of the Wisconsin Regional Art Program. There we heard talks on Zoom from various artists. The best part of being in this was that I won a state award for my picture of apples in colored pencil. This picture and many others in Madison didn’t get many viewings during the spring exhibit of WRAP because the pandemic caused its location to be closed. My winning picture is at the top of this post.

Countless activities and events did not happen in 2020. Most importantly, Pete and I didn’t get sick with covid-19. I didn’t attend a lot of plays, art fairs, day and multiple day trips, restaurants where we could eat on-site, PLATO classes in person, church worship in person, and times with my brothers and out-of-state daughters. I miss seeing Dori, Mary and Libby and spouses but will have more opportunities after the pandemic is under control.

Church and PLATO activities come into my home via Zoom. I don’t mind staying at home, thanks to the few people I share time with and the online meetings with others. Facebook, for all its bad publicity, has been very good for me to stay in touch with my various family members and others who have been part of my life. Life is still good.

Memorial Day Remembrance

On this Memorial Day we remember Rick Whitt, who served in the US Air Force during the Korean War and hated every minute of it. He served from 1953-1957, three years, eight months and ten days, as he often reminded us. He served in Tripoli, Libya and Roswell, New Mexico (didn't know about UFOs there), and saw no combat because the war was almost over.

The good part was his job in the Armed Forces Radio Service in Tripoli, and that got him started in television and radio broadcasting in Wisconsin. Hardly anyone now remembers his announcing on channel 15 television in Madison for several years. Even fewer remember him at WDOR Radio in Sturgeon Bay. After TV he became a city bus driver, which was possible because in the Air Force he drove heavy equipment. His military service served him better than he gave it credit.

After serving in the Air Force Rick attended the University of Wisconsin-Madison, thanks to money from the GI Bill for veterans. He received a BS in Speech (radio and television) in 1962 and then married me. We had five children who are now splendid adults.

Rick was born and raised on a farm west of Madison in Arena, but he chose not to be a farmer. He wanted a more exciting life. Late in life he became a deacon in the Episcopal Church, where he reached out to shut-ins and occasionally preached short sermons. I wouldn’t call that exciting, but it was good service to God and others. That isn’t counting all the sermons he proclaimed to us as his family, which usually were not about God. He died in 2009 of kidney disease.