Christmas 2014, is almost gone….and I have time to reflect….Today, I made it simple….sweet potato pie and ginger cookies. I just love the smell of ginger during the holidays. It speaks of Grandma Emma who always carried a sleeve of dutch spice cookies in her purse, hot cinnamon and butterscotch candies somewhere tied in a handkerchief whenever she came to visit during my summers in Central Florida.
I miss her unexpected visits…but, while we welcomed her visits they were not welcoming to everyone…. When I became older I found out it was the usual stereotypical response to the mother-in-law’s arrival to any married couple’s home. But, when I was a kid–I didn’t understand any of that. I’d joyfully yell, “hey, there’s a taxicab out front….” My brother and I would peak our heads around the curtain….”who is it?”All we could see were suitcases, her tiny, Sunday Best black hat, her short, dumpty stature, and a broad grin on her face as she strolled down the sidewalk. We’d usually yell, “it’s Grandma Emma!”when we revealed who the unexpected visitor walking down the long sidewalk was to my other Grandmother…there was usually a moan….or an expletive “What? sh–! I didn’t know she was coming!” from under her breath and just moments before Grandma Emma’s grand entrance remarking, “where’s Ruth?” Grandma Ruth’s reaction was quite different from ours…” I didn’t know you were coming, Miss Emma..did I overlook it in your last letter?” “No. I wanted to surprise you all” she said, coyly with a smile, pushing past Grandma Ruth into the living room.
Actually, she was my Great grandmother but, we always just called her Grandma Emma. As a kid I just knew one thing for sure and that was…Grandma Emma meant cookies, candy, cakes, sugar and spice… and all things good to eat!
Grandma Emma, was a big influence on me as far as baking when I visited and later lived in Florida as a child. She was a master baker. A perfectionist who gave me menial tasks like shelling the nuts by hand rather than buying already shelled (something I’d never do today)…hell, I pay the price for shelled nuts without regret! And I guess, there’s some difference in taste as far as freshness but, I gotta draw the line somewhere…and unshelled nuts…that’s my end point.
Anyway, Grandma Emma….was a short, woman whose mother was Cherokee and her father was a run away slave. She often laughed about how he boiled rocks….I said, “boiled rocks?” “Yes, he’d build a fire out back and boil rocks,” she responded, “my father was mentally ill at the end of his life.” I now know that’s what we call dementia.
As I baked these cookies I thought about Grandma Emma. She would have loved these ginger spiced cookies. I rolled them in sugar which made them glisten. They don’t have the “bite” like a ginger snap but, a rather slight ginger taste (not too much) like some ginger cookie recipes. Inside they are a tender cookie with a crispy exterior.
Christmas 2014, may be at an end but, a memory lasts a lifetime….the ginger cookies? Well, I’m taking them to Orlando tomorrow for Grandma Ruth, who’s now 93 years old….I plan on telling her that I made these as a dedication to Grandma Emma…her likely response? “Yeah, Miss Emma was something else!” And she’ll likely shake her head caught up in her own memory of Grandma Emma–(vastly different from my own).
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