Wednesday, February 12, 2020

Vintage Kitchen: A Connection to the Past by Elizabeth Penney



LUCY BURDETTE: We love nothing better than a new series here at Jungle Red--especially one whose author loves food and cooking! So today I'm delighted to welcome Elizabeth Penney with her book, Hems and Homicide...

ELIZABETH PENNEY: Thank you to the Jungle Red Writers for including me as a guest! This blog is among my favorites—and so are the host authors—so it’s an extra special honor to be featured here.
Many writers have elements that frequently show up in their work, whether it’s a location or an occupation or a personal interest. One of mine is history, more on the social and domestic end than world events. Historic homes often feature in my books, as do unsolved mysteries from the past. Blame it on my childhood reading, heavy on the early twentieth century classics, or living in New England towns with long histories and beautiful architecture. While of course every period had its problems and drawbacks, I can’t help but wistfully admire certain aspects of life in former eras. (Who besides me, while watching Mrs. Maisel, envies the women’s impeccable grooming and gorgeous outfits? I am such a slacker in my daily writing attire of yoga pants and t-shirt, hair up in a clip)
While pondering cozy mystery ideas, aprons came to mind and hence the Apron Shop Series was born. Although humble, aprons are garments with a rich history and tons of variety. Many are hand-stitched, made for every occasion and personalized by the wearer. After a couple of decades of disfavor, aprons seem to be having a renaissance, which encouraged me to write about them. I’ve even seen frilly versions in big box stores, about as mainstream as you can get.
In my series, vintage aprons take center stage. Iris not only sells them in her store, Ruffles and Bows, she finds that these well-worn antiques connect the present day to women in the past. This is true for us, as well. Since publication, many people have shared special apron stories with me. For example, wearing one while helping their grandmother make cookies or stitching a first apron in home economics class. The simple apron holds a cherished place in our cultural history.
And so do vintage kitchen tools and cookbooks, at least for me. After writing all day, I enjoy nothing more than cooking dinner or baking bread. There’s something restful about the process of chopping, sautéing, and putting together ingredients to make something delicious. Or proofing fragrant yeast before adding it to fluffy flour, then kneading the dough vigorously and watching it rise. I find that using vintage tools and cookbooks adds meaning to my efforts, joining me to a long heritage of women who toiled in the kitchen, preparing nourishment for loved ones.
One of my favorite possessions is a forty-year old KitchenAid mixer owned by my mother. She had that thing humming almost every day as she whipped up bread and cookies and cakes. Although she was a nurse before marriage, afterwards, like so many of her generation, she became a housewife. Perhaps due to her nursing background, she took nutrition seriously, and as one of Rodale’s first devotees, fed us whole grains and vitamins. We also had a huge garden bursting with organic vegetables. In addition, she sewed and knit beautiful garments, including aprons. While I cook, I don one of her creations—and wrap another around the child helping me.
But even more than kitchen tools gently worn by the hands of others, old cookbooks hold special meaning for me. The red Betty Crocker in the photo belonged to the grandmother-in-law I never met, although I’ve heard many stories about the sumptuous meals she made during my husband’s childhood. Another cherished cookbook, a 1951 edition of Fanny Farmer, belonged to a dear neighbor, Patricia Irwin Cooper. When I met Pat, she was already in her eighties, but we shared a wonderful friendship sparked by mutual interest in art, history, and gardening.
As you can see in the photo, Pat’s cookbook was more than something to reference for a recipe. She used this soft, faded book to save likes and dislikes, improvements to recipes, notes for future reference, and even letters from friends. When I leaf through and see her handwriting, it is as if she is speaking to me. “Never leave cloves in jar,” she wrote. “They will make peaches and plums too dark.” And, “important to brown the flour,” she wrote beside a gravy recipe, along with “no salt.” Perhaps most touching is this note next to a red cabbage and apples recipe, “Homer likes best.” Homer was her dear husband of sixty years.
Readers, now I ask you. Do you have a special kitchen item or apron that evokes memories for you?

Elizabeth Penney lives in New Hampshire’s frozen north where she pens mysteries and tries to grow things. She’s the author of the Apron Shop Series, with book one, Hems and Homicide, available now, as well as numerous titles for Annie’s Fiction and Guideposts.

About Hems and Homicide:

Iris Buckley has taken the plunge—moving her online apron and vintage linen business to a storefront in quaint hometown Blueberry Cove, Maine. But the storefront she rented with her business partner grandmother comes with something extra—a skeleton from the 1970s. Then their wealthy landlord, who has ties to her grandmother’s past, is found murdered in the shop. Is Ruffles & Bows doomed to fail before it even opens?



56 comments:

  1. Congratulations on your new book, Elizabeth . . . it sounds like a wonderful mystery and I’m looking forward to meeting Iris.

    Like you, I enjoy cooking and making bread . . . I have lots of recipe books [and I’ve worn out a couple of copies of the Joy of Cooking], but the handwritten recipes from my mother and grandmother are my real treasures.

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    1. Thank you Joan! And yes, handwritten recipes are so precious. It's fun to make those old favorites.

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  2. Elizabeth, you have touched upon two things I love, aprons and old recipe books/cards. Oddly enough though, I don't wear an apron, and I don't even own one anymore. However, I think they are a special part of cooking history and the history of women in families. My mother did wear and apron, usually a half apron. And, yes, my first project in sewing in home economics in 7th grade was an apron. I wish I still had it, but it was one of the few items that seem to escaped my mother's habit of saving everything. I have recipes from my mother she wrote out that are now fifty years old, but I didn't get the old recipe books she had. I do have a couple of Shaker cookbooks that I received as wedding presents forty-three years ago, and I still use those. I do have an old tin bowl of my mother's that I use when I peel potatoes, and I have lots of her old dishes that I use from time to time.

    So, your series checks lots of boxes for me, Elizabeth, and I'm putting Hems and Homicide on my TBR list.

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    1. That's so nice to hear about my series, Kathy! Old dishes are also a great keepsake.

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  3. As I was saying in my comment yesterday, I'm not much for actually spending time in the kitchen. But I do love to read about it in mysteries. Your new book sounds like so much fun.

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    1. Thanks, Mark. I also love reading about food in cozies. Calorie-free indulgence.

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  4. The new series sounds delicious, Elizabeth. My mother was a fabulous cook and I cherish some of her annotated cookbooks to this day - but I confess, some of the ingredients are either difficult to come by in the modern world, or difficult to decipher - cans by the number? I never remember my mother in an apron, but all the rest of the women in my family, definitely. Usually the type with ruffled shoulders like the one on your cover.

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    1. Thank you, Kait! I find old cookbooks fascinating, especially the odd recipes and unusual ingredients.

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  5. The one item I claimed from my mom's kitchen when I cleaned out her house was an autumn-leaf pattern ball jug in which she used to make iced tea every evening for dinner. Later, she changed to making iced tea in a Tupperware pitcher, but it didn't hold the same charm--or memories--as that ball jug.

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    1. Old glass jugs are fabulous. What sweet memories!

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  6. I say YES to the apron -- I always wear one when cooking. My favourites are the ones my mum made for me, which have an appliqued A on them. I've worn several out over the years! I also love using The Joy of Cooking my mum gave me way back when I was not yet 18, and I enjoy having her well-worn copy of Tante Marie's French Kitchen cookbook. Oh, and one more thing I love having from my mother -- the ancient silver cake tester. Kitchens and cooking and mothers all go together in my mind and memories... (and Mum is still alive and kicking at 91).

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    1. How wonderful, Amanda, to have aprons made by your mother and her old cookbooks. The cake tester sounds cool too, I've never heard of those.

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  7. Homer likes best. Oh , that is so touching! What treasures you have. And you know, I never really thought about my aprons — But definitely, each of them means something! Thank you for this. And I love the annotations in my cookbooks, too.

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    1. Thanks, Hank. I love how food traditions connect us to former generations.

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  8. I love this so much, Elizabeth! I'm a lifetime apron user. In fact, as kids we wore them to dinner (in the kitchen) - kind of like big-kid bibs, I guess. My mom was nothing if not practical. Her mother sewed them for us and my mom did, too. I still have one of hers. A few years ago at Christmas I got some fun black fabric - one print had red cherries on it and one red peppers. I sewed aprons for all my dear ones. My adult sons are great cooks - and they always grab an apron first.

    I picked up your book this week and it's on the top of the stack!

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    1. Oh - I also have and use my mom's old, tattered, and annotated Joy of Cooking, as well as her sifter and biscuit cutter. Treasures that keep on giving.

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    2. We also wore aprons as children--called "pinnies" by my British mother. Nice to meet someone else who did that! (my friends thought we were weird). So nice you're keeping up the tradition. And thanks for reading HEMS!

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  9. It's fun to see aprons make a comeback. My first home ec project was also an apron, which we all wore over our wool uniform skirts during the cooking part of our class. And when I taught my grandson to sew, he made matching barbecue aprons for his dad and himself. He was so proud of them!

    Over the years I've acquired a lot of kitchen treasures from older family members, but the one that means the most to me actually came from a guy trying to sell life insurance to newly wed me in 1970. It was a copy of the same cookbook my dad and I had used when I was a kid. He loved to cook, and he was really good at it. My mom had utilitarian cooking skills, except for desserts and fried chicken, but Daddy and I made Swiss steak, stuffed pork chops, and biscuits and plain muffins together.

    That poor cookbook is frayed and fragile, and held together with a rubber band, but I cherish those memories that it holds.

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    1. I love hearing about your grandson making aprons! Precious. Wonderful memories with Dad, too!

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    2. Oh Karen, you’ve reminded me that my first sewing project was also an apron!

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  10. I love aprons. I still have the one I made at school. I also used to bring one back as souvenir from the places I visited.
    I'm sure your book is the kind that I will like.

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    1. I never thought of aprons as souvenirs, that is really cool. (plot ideas!)

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  11. You had me rushing off to find a recipe for red cabbage and apples... sounds so good, perfect for the winter. I have so many old and cherished things in my kitchen. My mother's Joy of Cooking, which I had to make a new cover for when the original disintegrate. My mother in law's candy thermometer. An enormous wooden bowl that my grandmother used for chopping liver, its bottom crisscrossed with chop marks.

    The Apron Shop series sounds like great fun. For my daughter's wedding shower I bought her an adorable apron made from fabric patterned in the 50s. And we just bought our 6-year-old granddaughter an apron (along with her own pad of restaurant order forms).

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    1. I do think a younger generation is appreciating aprons now, like your daughter! And so cute about your granddaughter, mine loves to play restaurant. She loves the fake food we bought at the dollar store.

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    2. Hallie, I made aprons with pockets for myself when I waited tables in a local diner in my senior year of high school. And used every decorative stitch on my sewing machine to embellish them!

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  12. congratulations on your new release! I have some of Mom's hand-written recipes tucked away and I use her 1947 Mirro cookie press for Christmas cookies every year. I worked in restaurant kitchens during college and still wear a commercial kitchen apron when I cook.

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    1. Thank you, Margaret! The cookie press sounds like a wonderful tradition every year.

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  13. Shalom Reds and fans. I should buy an apron. I don’t cook too much, either for myself or others. I eat simple foods that don’t take much of a recipe. Perhaps once a season, I will get the urge to follow a recipe.

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  14. Congrats on the book, Elizabeth!

    For years I had my grandmother's wooden rolling pin, much like the one in your picture. It broke my heart when the handle finally came off. I couldn't repair it well enough to use it again, but I have it as a keepsake.

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    1. Thanks, Liz! That's too bad about your grandmother's rolling pin! It must have been well-used and loved.

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  15. Congratulations on your new release, the setting sounds perfect for a "cozy."
    I have tablecloths that were my mothers and I have all kinds of implements, like a peeler and a melon baller, oh, and a rolling pin that I can remember my mother and my grandmother using. I have a Betty Crocker Cookbook from the mid-'40's that has the best pancake recipe ever. Inside, there is a handwritten recipe for apple cake in my mother's hand.

    But aprons, wow, I have at least a dozen! Dressy silk ones for parties, butcher's aprons from my father's meat business, everyday cotton ones and a frilly pink one my aunt gave me when I got married. Yes, I do wear them all the time, and I love to think about the loved one wore it before me.

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    1. Thanks, Judy! Your collection of aprons sounds fabulous. I wonder if my Betty Crocker has that great pancake recipe. I'll have to check.

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  16. Your new series sounds like it has all the right ingredients, Liz: history, that special sense of multi-generational family ties, and a long-cold murder with connections to the present. Congratulations. I hope it's a big hit for you. And I know just what you mean about handing down tools from prior generations. I have my mother's smooth, hefty, completely delightful rolling pin, which I played with as a child. I also have pot holders my late husband's grandmother made, and his carefully seasoned cast iron skillet. My sister has our family's cast iron, as well as kitchen knives from our grandmother, mother, and aunt. They aren't the kinds of heirlooms that wind up in high-priced antique auctions, but we cherish them all the same.

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    1. Thanks for the kind words, Gigi! And yes, it's not their monetary value that makes them precious, it's the memories!

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  17. Hi Elizabeth, "Homer likes best" - that warms my heart. My mom always wears aprons, especially when working in her antiques shop. My daughter, a great cook, always an apron when cooking. She got into the habit when she was a little girl and received one made of fabric printed with teddy bears. The teddy bear apron still lives at my house - I'll never part with it.

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    1. I wouldn't give up the teddy bear apron either! The smallest things are often the most precious.

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  18. What a delightful combination of loves, avocation and gifts, Elizabeth. I shall go searching for your book now. Though while I'm not an apron connoisseur, I do have many cookery books. I also have a 40+ year old Kitchen Aid mixer, and thinking back remembered it was not my first mixer. Back before marriage and my temporary move to the USA, which became permanent, I began my kitchen tool collection on my 21st birthday. Unlike American girls of my age, I was not in college, but already working, living alone in London. Among the gifts were money with which I bought a small electric stand mixer with a blender attachment. With this tool I made some really challenging dishes including Robert Carrier's duck pate from his Great Dishes of the World, book. Carrier was one of the earliest celebrity chefs and writers. I also received the Constance Spry Cookery Book, the UK equivalent of the USA Joy of Cooking. From this book I learned basics and have cooked more meals from it than any other book. Finally, two Le Creuset cast iron casserole dishes. They are well over 50 years old by now. I expect that my grandsons will cook in them one day. These tools anchor my kitchen. I do wear aprons but none are special. However I have inherited some beautiful table linens, so perhaps the apron store will branch into table linens down the road.

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    1. Celia, thanks so much! My mother is also from England, King's Lynn area in Norfolk. I'd love to have a Le Creuset casserole dish, they're gorgeous. And yes, the apron shop does offer linens--kitchen and bedroom. They're even thinking of adding some kitchenware too.

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    2. Liz, you might check out a British mystery series by Peter Grainger, the DC Smith books, which has now evolved into the King's Lake books. King's Lake is a slightly fictionalized King's Lynn, and the books are wonderful. Unfortunately they are only available on Kindle.

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  19. I have the same Betty Crocker cookbook in your picture; it belonged to my mother and is well-used. It has many of her notes scribbled throughout, only some of which I can read. Her extensive collection of handwritten cards and clipped recipes went to my brother -- it was the only thing he wanted when we cleaned out her house.

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    1. It's a great cookbook, I love the pictures. I'm planning to make some of the *gruesome* appetizers for a '50s theme cocktail party. Spam ball, anyone? And there's a jello mold with hard boiled egg halves in red aspic. Can you imagine?

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  20. Elizabeth, welcome to Jungle Reds! I visited New Hampshire in February and they still had Christmas trees up with lights! So beautiful and cold! Loved it there. I love snow. I will look for your book at the library. I am adding your novel to my tbr list. I love history in novels.

    Lucy, thank you for introducing me to a new to me author.

    Diana

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    1. Thank you, Diana! It's cold and beautiful here all right! We're ready for spring.

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  21. Thanks for a great topic, Elizabeth -- and congrats on the new book.

    My mother's taste in aprons ran to what she always called a tinkers apron -- something that FULLY covered the front from neckline to thigh, with built in pockets or pouches in the front. I still use one of those that had been hers.

    I don't really own any kitchen items that were handed down in my family. But I do have some recipe cards that came from friends 35 or more years ago that are still used in my regular dinner rotation. Those are precious to me! Some I may have tweaked slightly to make them healthier over the years, but I still use the original card in my friend's handwriting.

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    1. Your mother's tinkers apron sounds so practical! Now nice you have one of hers and those recipes too. A sweet way to remember your friends.

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  22. When I was in seventh grade homemaking class almost the first thing we did was to make an apron. The one I made was a gift for my mother and she wore it for years and years. All the older ladies that I knew had many aprons and most were made from feed sacks Maybe 10 years ago my mother wanted a new apron and couldn't find them for sale anywhere. I'm not sure she looked for patterns but they might have been hard to find also. So happy that aprons are now plentiful, even if I don't always wear one (and later wished I had). One of the first cookbooks I remember in my mother's kitchen was that red Betty Crocker and then we had a couple of later editions too. Because of a house fire I no longer have any of those wonderful kitchen items you talk about - I'm looking forward to reading the books and reminiscing!

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    1. Jodi, how nice that your mother treasured that first apron! Aprons seem to have made quite a comeback. People are even selling the vintage patterns. And yes, I'm someone who frequently wishes she'd worn an apron. I can be quite a slob.

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    2. Hey Judi! I had dish towels made from flour sacks. My aunt saved the fabric and ran them up on her sewing machine for gifts one year.

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  23. I don’t recall anyone wearing aprons in my family. I have 2 or 3 of the full coverage ones gifted to me but I never use them. I do have Mom’s recipe box and an antique Oster blender she bought back in the sixties. It’s very sharp looking-all chrome and glass. I haven’t checked to see if it works. I got it for the memories. I also have an ancient potato masher , a wooden hot chocolate frother, a glass bowl shaped like a leaf, other things that have come down from older generations.
    Congratulations on your new series Liz!

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    1. Thanks, Pat. That old blender sounds wonderful, maybe have someone check the wiring and give it a spin!

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  24. Liz, your book sounds delightful! I love the idea of aprons. My mom always wore an apron, usually a half apron that she made herself from a striped terry dish towel. So practical--an apron and dish towel in one! Unfortunately, I didn't acquire the habit, but I do try, and I have a few aprons. The latest is from Anthropolgie and is gorgeous. What I'd really like is a good cotton chef's apron.

    I only have a few on my mom's kitchen things, including her red ceramic refrigerator dishes with glass lids. Interesting that we are going back to those now! I do have her recipe box, and I love reading her scribbled notes on the cards.

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    1. Thanks, Deborah! I love those glass refrigerator dishes, so practical. Maybe we're all getting sick of plastic. And so nice to have her recipe box, what a treasure.

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  25. Since I live in my childhood home, I have all the family cookbooks, recipe cards, and kitchen tools. I already read and enjoyed your book. Oh, and I wear aprons.

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    1. Thrilled to hear that you enjoyed the book! And how wonderful that you live in your family home, with all those lovely heirlooms.

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