Fannie Farmer

Fannie Farmer that mythical homemaker created by the Boston Cooking school in 1896. She was the inspiration for most of my mother's memorable meals and my introduction to the joys of cooking. I recently ordered a used copy of it for my cookbook collection because my mother won't let go of hers until her fingers are cold and gray. Can't blame her. It holds some of my best memories... I mean recipes. Sometimes those get pretty mixed up for me.

My new-to-me copy is just about as well used as my mother's copy so I wonder who held it and leafed through it's pages over the years looking for just the perfect recipe to impress their in laws or feed their growing family. It's fun to guess what the favorite recipes were for it's original owner by looking at the wear and stains on the pages.

I'm glad to have this old friend back in a place of honor on my bookshelf. In fact I'm thinking of ordering a copy of the original printing from 1896. We are moving so far from modern convenience foods it would be nice to have a cookbook from the time when my great grandmother was feeding her family from the bounty of the farm.