Grandma's Cooking

When I thought I couldn't write recipes, my boss at the time advised, 'Write as you talk.'

Mary Berry

As most of you know I LOVE food! Subsequently, I have a very special place in my heart for cookbooks and recipes. One of the things that makes them so special is that they are immortal, they have the potential to live forever. The tradition of passing them down to the next generation, who in turn love and appreciate them, through that continuation, they live on. One of my favorite things to do is collect antique cookbooks and old magazine and newspaper recipes, in my kitchen on a shelf with my current “in vogue” cookbooks you will find a bruised and battered old file with hundreds and hundreds of recipes I've either torn out of a magazine, (don't tell my dentist but her waiting room table is a great source!), or newspapers or simply printed off articles I've read on the interweb. It doesn’t mean I make them all however, I absolutely enjoy the simple pleasure of reading the ingredients and processes along with the occasionally attached story that accompanies it.s

The file also contains a few recipes my grandmother wrote out for me during our days of cooking together when I was a child and throughout my twenties when I visited home for the holidays in the summer. She made the most amazing Irish inspired dishes, her recipe for soda bread is still the best in the world ever, just reading them transports me back to that tiny little cottage in the wilds of county Kerry, standing next to her watching intently as she never weighed anything, it was a fist of this or a fist of that! I spent many hours trying to replicate them, mostly I was unsuccessful in my attempts however, I’ve enjoyed the process and eventually I nailed the soda bread!

My nephews are budding “Jamie Olivers” and are now old enough to love cooking together when they come to stay, listening to the stories of their great-grandmother over the mixing bowl has become a bit of a tradition, I hope one day they will come to appreciate the sentiment and continue that tradition, I have promised to gift them the precious recipes in the hope it will give them new life and the stories of that simple life will live forever.

My dusty old file is well known amongst my friends, many of whom have sampled the delights there in. At Christmas, one of those lovely friends gifted me a bit of a challenge, she gave me a beautiful, leather bound notebook suggesting i use it to record my precious recipes potentially even use it to share them with a wider audience - not sure about that but I have started copying them in the hope it will become a favorite family cookbook. I'm loving writing them out, I even bought a new fountain pen, there's something beautifully nostalgic about writing them down rather than typing them out on my puter.

And the soda bread;

A fist, (450 grams) of white flour, preferably bleached if you can get it

A few pinches, (one level teaspoon) of salt

A few pinches, (one level teaspoon) of baking soda

A mug, (380ml) of buttermilk

Stoke the range, (heat the oven to 230 degrees, 210 fan)

Sift the dry ingredients. Make a well in the center. Pour all of the milk in at once. Using 1 hand, mix in the flour from the sides of the bowl, adding more milk if necessary. The dough should be softish, not too wet and sticky. When it all comes together, turn it out onto a well floured board. Knead lightly for a second, just enough to tidy it up, flip over. Pat the dough into a round about 12 inches and cut a cross on it to let the fairies out! Let the cuts go over the sides of the bread to make sure of this. Bake in a hot oven for 15 minutes, then turn down the oven to 200 degrees, (180 fan), for 30 minutes, or until cooked. If you are in doubt, tap the bottom of the bread: if it is cooked it will sound hollow. Soda bread only takes 2 or 3 minutes to make and 20 to 30 minutes to bake, give it a go!

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