When Family Recipes Go to Someone Else: What Do You Do?

She Got the Cookbook. I Got Nothing. But I Found a Solution!Your sister gets Mom's or Grandma's cookbook, the one you wanted, and your best friend is lucky enough to have her mom's recipe box. The handwriting's faded, the cards are stained, and it says, among other things, "add butter the size of an egg, a tea cup of flour, and bake until done." That's it. No further instruction. What do you do when trying to make her cake just as you remember it? Well, if you have side notes like this or something similar, then you'll likely find the answer you've been looking for in this episode of Family Tree Food Stories with Nancy May and Sylvia France

This episode of Family Tree Food Stories gives you the tools to fix the incomplete notes that grandma, mom, or another family relative left you in her recipe book or box. You'll learn how to translate confusing, old-fashioned measurements into something you can actually use to cook with today. How to track down a "lost" family recipe when nobody wrote it down, and a simple five-step method to make sure your own recipes survive for the next generation.

Then, if the cookbook stuffed with notes, cards, and recipes goes to a sibling, Nancy shares an idea for solving that long-lost desire in her own way. That one isn't a cherished book on her kitchen shelf, and it's even stuffed with a few notes from her mom, as well. It's sort of a stand-in for a family heirloom.

Key Things You'll LearnHow to figure out vague old recipe instructions that aren't standard to today's cooking methods, so that you can actually cook them, or try to do so, for your own family and friends. We'll take the guesswork out for you. But you have to do the cooking!Why writing nothing down is normal. There really is a history lesson there that we all have to be thankful for today.Why trying a recipe yourself matters, and why you don't have to get it right. Every recipe always seems to turn out just a little different with each home cook. That's OK, and it's one way to bring an old tradition forward to today's tastes.Five ways to preserve any recipe today, no matter how you cook. You can use something as simple as a photo sent via text or email, or write the recipe on a standard 3x5 index card and share it. We also share other ideas for doing this today. Text-thread photo to a formal recipe card: you'll get concrete, low-effort ways to make sure a recipe doesn't die with the person who made it.How to find a family recipe nobody wrote down? It's easier than