"Serene Vannoy" > wrote in message
...
> Dimitri wrote:
>>
>
>> My BIL's wife is the same 1/2 Jewish 1/2 Italian (both parents from
>> Boston now both gone)
>>
>> One year there were coming down to the vacation place we usually rented &
>> I was making a big pot of Italian Gravy.
>>
>> She came into the house and started to tear up.
>>
>> I said " What's the matter?
>>
>> She said "It smells like my mothers house and I miss her terribly"
>
> Awww. I know how it is. I cook my mother's food as much for how it makes
> my house smell as anything else.
>
> I'm *really* hoping to have the Mom Food Cookbook done by her birthday in
> August.
>
> Serene

I always though my Mom was a great cook. I never really knew if that was
true or just my perception because she stopped cooking when I was about 11,
due to illness (colitis, then cancer). She never really picked up the mantle
again and I really missed all the wonderful foods she would prepare when I
was young. She did keep a recipe file but it was lost in a fire in their
apartment when I was in my early 20's, and out on my own.

It was a really nice surprise to get an email from my uncle a few weeks ago
with a recipe attached for my Mom's Passover apple cake. It seems she was
visiting him the year she died and one of his friends talked my mom into
cooking with her preparing for the seder. She made the apple cake with my
Mom's supervision and had just now thought to forward the recipe to my
uncle.

I was going to make it for our seder last week but my 16 YO old niece really
wanted to try it so I left it to her.

It was fantastic, just like I remember from my childhood. Plus, it made our
seder something really special. It felt like mom was in the kitchen again.

Just thought I'd share.

Jon