Special Thanksgiving Edition

I am moving this week’s post up a few days to commemorate a family tradition. I will return to my regular Sunday schedule on November 30.

Happy Thanksgiving!

————————————————————

Grandma’s Yeast Rolls

Do you have a Thanksgiving family tradition?  I hope so, because that’s what makes the Holiday special.

Once again, this year, my sister and I will make Grandma’s yeast rolls.

My Grandmother and I were very close. I’ve written about her previously here and here. Grandma raised her family during the Great Depression on a subsistence farm in the “knob country” of Southern Indiana.

In case “subsidence farm” isn’t a familiar term, it means that everything Grandma fed her family was either grown, raised, or shot. Meals were prepared in a farmhouse with no electricity, indoor plumbing, or heat (beyond what was provided by her wood stoves). Every drop of water the family used was carried up to the house in buckets from a hillside Spring.

Grandma had many talents, among them were her yeast rolls. Everyone in that area of the country made yeast rolls, but it was widely acknowledged that none were as good as those made by Laura Coats.

After Grandpa died, Grandma sold the farm and moved to a small house in town. Our entire family would squeeze in there for Thanksgiving celebrations. Grandma cooked for days in preparation. The menu included: ham, turkey, green beans canned with bacon fat, sweet potatoes, beets, mashed potatoes, bread-crumb stuffing, homemade white gravy, rice pudding, pumpkin pie, and, of course, yeast rolls. 

Grandma put on this feast for twenty or more people, all on her own. Kids ate on a large metal folding table in her center room; adults sat at a table in her kitchen. The abundance of food lasted for days. I don’t know how she did it, but she kept up this tradition into her eighties!

This is a story about her yeast rolls.

Grandma always made the yeast rolls before any guests arrived, which meant their preparation was shrouded in mystery. 

Year after year, we looked forward to Grandma’s yeast rolls. We assumed that tradition would continue forever, but we grew up, and eventually, large celebrations came to an end. I was the first to leave, moving to Minneapolis with my new bride. My brother, Paul, was next, moving to Ohio.  We were all busy with our new lives and limited vacation schedules as grandma moved through the balance of her eighties and into her nineties.

I didn’t think much about it at the time, but it must have been hard for her, sitting alone, with no one to cook for on Holidays. Local relatives brought her into their homes, but that wasn’t the same. 

Every once in a while, a business trip would bring me within a few hours’ drive of Grandmas’s. Those visits were bittersweet; I never knew if a visit would be my last. 

The last time the whole family visited Grandma was for the 4^th of July Holiday in 1990. Grandma routinely got up early, claiming she never let the sun catch her in bed. I got up early, too, so that I could spend time alone with her. 

One morning, well before sunrise, I asked Grandma (who was 91 at the time) if we could make yeast rolls together. She protested briefly (in her world, men didn’t belong in the kitchen). I told her I wanted to learn how to make them so I could carry on the family tradition. 

“Well,” she sighed, “I reckon we could do that.” 

Then, for the first time in my life, I asked Grandma for her yeast roll recipe. Even then, I wasn’t sure what she would say, and I certainly didn’t anticipate her response.

It turned out that there was no recipe. 

At the time, I worked for a food company, a baking company, to be exact. According to my food science colleagues, cooking was an art, but baking was science. 

If that’s true, the science was in Grandma’s head and hands. 

Undaunted, I suggested that she put the ingredients into separate bowls, one by one, so I could measure them and create a recipe. Grandma didn’t like that idea. She said she couldn’t make yeast rolls like that. I finally convinced her that this was the only way her yeast rolls could be handed down to future generations, so she capitulated. 

Below is the recipe I measured out that early July morning:

The first thing you have undoubtedly noticed is the footnotes around the perimeter of the recipe. 

As you might have guessed, the story doesn’t end here.

My sister and I have been trying to duplicate Grandma’s yeast rolls for over thirty years. We’ve gotten better over time; most people say our rolls are delicious. But we know they are not as good as Grandma’s. 

The exact reason why remains a mystery.

Back on the farm, Grandma used raw unpasteurized milk from her Guernsey cow. Her shortening was lard, rendered from a hog the family slaughtered. The eggs came from her hen house, the water from a Spring. She then baked her rolls in a wood-fired oven with no temperature settings or gauges. 

Grandma’s rolls were acknowledged as the best on Daisy Hill, and when she moved to the city and had no choice but to use store-bought ingredients, people still said hers were the best. As a kid, I had plenty of meals in relatives’ homes and concurred with their assessment. 

Fast forward forty years. My sister and I have gourmet kitchens with fancy ovens. One would think we would’ve unlocked Grandma’s secret by now. 

The notes along the perimeter of the recipe document procedural adjustments I’ve experimented with over the years. Every year at Thanksgiving, I call my sister and ask how her rolls turned out. Her answer is usually “Really good!”  

But then, I ask, “Are they as good as Grandma’s?”

“No,” is her consistent reply. 

Today, once again, I will combine yeast, sugar, and water, and then add milk, eggs, salt, shortening, and flour. I’ll knead the dough and let it rise. I’ll then form dough balls and let those rise before sliding them into the oven. 

When they are done cooking, I’ll turn the yeast rolls out onto a paper grocery sack (Grandma’s instructions). I’ll allow them to cool for a few minutes, break one open, slather it with butter, and call my sister. 

According to Helen Keller, “All that we love deeply becomes a part of us.”

Ernest Hemingway explained why: “No one you love is ever dead.”

Grandma’s spirit lives on through the mystery of her fabulous yeast rolls. It’s hard to believe, but now I’m  Grandma’s age, and my sister isn’t far behind.

The tradition continues; Maybe this will be our year!

————————————————

Former blog posts can be found here by subject category and here chronologically. 

You can subscribe to my latest posts by filling out your email address at the bottom of this page.  

My first book, Towards A Life Well-Lived, can be purchased by clicking this link. Proceeds from sales are donated to Peace In Schools, a Portland, Oregon-based organization that supports mindfulness training in high schools. 

Stay tuned for my new book, The Secret Within, which I expect to make available in time for the Holidays.