sharing the world's most delicious heritage

"The picture attached to the story belongs to a time before World War II (around 1934- 1935): Before my grandmother experienced war as an adult, before losing her firstborn boy to typhus and malaria when he was just only 13 years old. She was 102 years old when she died.She was my role model (and still is), motivation, and storyteller. She continues to give me hope, make me smile, and remind me not to have regrets and follow my heart's desires. One day, we spoke of the food scarcity during the war, how people would repair their clothes rather than get new ones, and how families would create simple recipes to make ends meet. That day, she told me that she operated on a family chicken. You can imagine my shock. The family chicken (named Fancy) had stopped laying eggs and could not bob her head and would make weird sounds. Fancy could not eat anything and was losing weight. When my grandmother examined Fancy, she realized something stuck in her throat. She decided to operate on Fancy because getting daily eggs were essential for her family. She cut Fancy's throat with a sharp knife, removed the little twig, and sewed it with a sterilized needle. Miraculously, Fancy survived."

"My Grandmother comes from a very small village in Macedonia called 'Marvinci'. She is the youngest of nine siblings in a farming family and is one of my favourite people in the world. I grew up listening to her stories of how her and favourite older brother, Borris, would get up to mischief as children. She would tell how they'd fill their pockets with dry meat and run out into the fields to eat it because as the youngest, they only got pigs fat on bread and potato stews. She made me laugh all the time, after her stories she always has a chuckle as if she is absorbing everything that's happened to her and turning it into a positive. My Grandmother was always cooking something when I was a kid. Always trying to feed me- I was always too skinny to her- typical ethnic Grandma. Whilst my parents were at work, I'd be at my Grandparents house gardening with them, playing cards and then in the kitchen picking at the vegetables Baba would be slicing for the meal. One of my favourite meals to date is 'Sarma'. It's a pickled cabbage leaf filled with rice and meat that is seasoned with vegeta, red paprika, salt and pepper. I've never attempted to make it myself because I don't think I could meet my own expectations. Baba cooks it to perfection every time, but always cooks a little extra rice and meat because the biggest kid would always be close by ready to 'taste-test' as I like to call it. In a nutshell, this woman is my hero. Understanding, accepting of everyone & kind-hearted." - Makedonka

“My grandmother is Liliane. And when I discovered the Grandmas Project I thought it was for her. At least, a great opportunity for me to talk about her and the happiness she brings to the whole family through her cooking. Then we had to choose the recipe and it was a difficult choice because it is a golden cooker! I could have talked about spätzles, dumplings, roasted potatoes (still unknown to this day), logs, pies and I forget so much! And then my choice fell on spritzes. But what is this funny animal? Well, simply a cookie! So why this choice? Even she was surprised when I told her about it. My answer is simple: they are delicious! Sometimes coconut, sometimes almond and they are also extremely rare because she only makes them once a year, at Christmas. That makes them even more valuable. Finally, it is because she is not alone in doing them. Indeed it was my grandpa, Emile, who helped him by turning the crank of the machine, by putting on some elbow grease as they say! And then grandpa left us, so last Christmas my dad helped her. That means they have a story for me, and a great story, so I thought they were perfect for me to allow me to talk about her, about both of them by the way, about pleasure, happiness and shared moments and to tell them how much I love and thank them.” - Laurie

“Gratienne no longer cooks, but if that were the case and if I were a director, I would ask her for her recipe for floating islands! It's really this recipe that springs from my childhood memories, when, for her, cooking was part of our family rituals. And then, maybe there was less desire on her part: the dessert for our family meals became a mint-chocolate or vanilla-chocolate Viennetta. This year, on the occasion of Christmas, my sister had hoped to make this family Viennetta herself! It's off to a late start. Maybe we will manage to do it for Gratienne's 86th birthday, which we will celebrate together in March! To bear witness to our special bond with my grandmother and to keep track of our family history, I created the blog www.lamaisondegratienne.fr.” - Magalie