one of my all-time favorite cookbooks is jamie’s italy.
and my favorite recipe from that book is probably the simplest.
my husband calls it ‘baked pasta’ but that phrase has so many negative grade school cafeteria/high school graduation party connotations for me that i always make sure to…
The recipes I inherited from my grandmothers and their friends never had precise measurements. They always listed stuff by the handful or glassful. The challah recipe I make — from my grandmother’s collection — started out as “8 hands of flour” and so on. It took a while to figure out!
I always assumed the “glass” in “1/2 glass water” meant the little Yahrzeit glasses Jewish people use. These are small glasses filled with a candle that is lit on the anniversary of a loved one’s death. They burn for 24 hours. But they are not the size of an ordinary glass, like a tumbler for milk or juice or iced tea! And in fact today’s yahrzeit glasses are teeny compared to the ones I remember as a kid, so a measurement of “1/2 glass” would be different today than way back then.
Anyway, I think it is fun to interpret recipes like that. Makes you think and consider what you are doing and what part the ingredients play in the dish you are preparing. It also shows that recipes can be flexible. That’s a good thing because you can change things to suit yourself.
Thanks for this blog post Sprinklefingers! This was fun. I enjoyed hearing what you did with the recipe. Sounds delish. I also like the tips you give (like making some sauce way ahead).
Keep blogging. I really love your posts!