There is a healing aspect of the feminine we are in touch with everyday without even realizing it. An ancient ritual that connects us to our ancestors, nourishing and healing our body and soul. It’s cooking the food we eat. This is especially evident around the holidays when we pull out the recipes handed down to our mothers. These traditions passed down from generation to generation create an invisible link between us and our ancestors. Even though time and space may forever hold us apart we catch a glimpse of each other through the food we share in common.

There is a magic that takes place in the kitchen that has more to do with our memories and feelings of warmth and comfort that come when we create these same dishes our distant family members prepared and shared with their families. A connection is created to our shared past every time we whip out great-grandma Vera’s recipe for pumpkin cheesecake or grandma Zelenka’s famous cracker stuffing. We invoke their memory and all the memories that have been created every time this dish was cooked. A powerful connection to the past that circles back around to us as we stand in the kitchen preparing these same meals.

Ultimately food is healing and cooking is alchemy. There is a magical combination of history, or should I say herstory, tradition, family, and love that is wrapped up in our grandmother’s cooking. And even if our grandmothers are no longer with us in this world a piece of them comes through to nourish and nurture us when we follow their recipes. It’s a lovely continuity across generations that exists and we can participate in it anytime we wish.

Every Thanksgiving and Christmas I make Grandmother Tess’ cranberries. They are delicious and a little unusual, somehow Jell-O makes an appearance in them. My mother never got along with her mother-in-law but loved this recipe and it made up for some of the misgivings and hard feelings. My mother still cooks it to this day. I like to think that every time she does that forgiveness deepens and heals old ancestral wounds as well. Not only does this dish remind me of the gifts of my grandmother to our family, it also reminds me to take what is useful and good from the people we build our lives with and around.

There is something about bringing the past into the future through the hands of women that feels so right. This is more of the energy we need in our fast-paced and increasingly angry and numb world. This is the connection to the nourishing feminine that is missed completely or lost in oversimplified and generic labels placed on women and mothers. Somehow alive in that food, the recipes handed down for who knows how many generations, we find ourselves new again in the old.

These are the gifts lovingly handed down from our grandmothers that keep us all connected as we venture forward.

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