A STROLL DOWN MEMORY LANE - with recipes

I have fallen behind with posting recipes. I've been "poorly." Nothing major. Enough to slow me down and my family urging me to rest.

My friend, Ruth Farrow, gave me two recipes for Shortbread. One from her grandmother and the other from her Great Aunt Zena, her grandmother's sister. When Ruth was ten her grandmother and great aunt vied for Ruth's attention. Her grandmother, a clever seamstress, made Ruth a pretty blue dress. Her great aunt, not clever with a needle, also made Ruth a dress. It wasn't a great success but Ruth loved it. Below are the recipes.

Great Aunt Zena's Shortbread. A true Scot's recipe!

1/2 pound of butter
1/2 cup berry sugar
1/2 cup of rice flour
1 3/4 cups of flour (One and three quarter cups)
Dash of salt.

Sift the dry ingredients
Knead the dry ingredients into the butter. Form two rolls, wrap in plastic wrap and chill in the refrigerator.

Slice into cookies (should be thick enough not to burn. I'd guess at least one quarter inch. My mother used the same recipe and pressed the butter/dry ingredients into round cake tins and baked them slowly. For the cookies. 275 F. for 20 minutes Longer for the kind my mother baked. She's no longer with me so I can't ask her any questions.

Ruth's Grandmother's Shortbread

1 lb. butter
1 cup light brown sugar
4 cups flour
dash of salt.

I think the dry ingredients can be stirred up by hand. Brown sugar would stick to the flour sifter.
Ruth assumes the cooking instructions are the same as for her Great Aunt Zena's recipe.

Butter makes everything taste good. Please don't substitute margarine. Treat yourself once a year to real Shortbread made with real butter. Julia Child used butter wildly. Her recipes call for butter for browning meat, onions, garlic.

I'm looking for recipes from all over the planet. I have two from a reader in Virginia. They'll be be posted tomorrow. Please send me your favorite old recipes to: anita.birt@gmail.com

I have a list of all the recipes posted. If you remember seeing one and lost it, drop me a note and I'll send it to you.

Anita
www.anitabirt.com