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Other than the odd community cookbook and some Eastern Star cookbooks I don’t recall my mother buying cookbooks. She moved into the house my dad was born in so the old Canadian flour books (Purity, Robin Hood and Five Roses) were probably already on the shelf.

My mum was a good cook, nothing fancy, just good meat and potatoes fare. She was an even better baker…especially pie. We had pie for dessert 6 out of 7 nights (I often saved my piece for breakfast the next morning ….5 kids in the house, I had to hide it). That pastry recipe was from an elderly neighbour and that’s the recipe I use to this day. She had a few notebooks (I just passed them on to my daughter for safekeeping) filled with recipes from family and friends.

I grew up in a small Canadian railroad town with a large Italian community so in spite of our British and Swedish heritage I make a good Sunday sauce and the best meatballs…a good cacciatore, all recipes from neighborhood friends. My mother-in-law was from another small town with a large Ukrainian community. I have (and use) the local Ukrainian Women’s League cookbooks she cooked from. My father-in-law of Scottish heritage grew up in a small northern Manitoba farming community with a large Ukrainian contingent. Those well used community cookbooks have a special place on my shelf too.

Now that is the way to learn to cook!

My mother had the large Encyclopedia of Cooking by Mary Margaret McBride. She had bought it in sections at the grocery store. It also doubled as a booster seat for the 3 of us kids. As I got older she got into Southern Living cookbooks and many others.