My Two Mothers: A Memoir With Recipes

My five-year granddaughter Amelia insists my entire family join in a huddle in the living room before leaving our home after a birthday party,a holiday meal, or just in-the-middle-of-a-week-night at Mimi and PopPop's house. She encourages us to come out of this huddle shouting, "Yay, family!" Even at her young age, Amelia has gotten the notion that being part of a family is something special to celebrate. If I've set this tradition in motion and influenced her, or my other grandchildren's desire to part of my family, I can rest knowing that I've done my job. My own love of family, cultivated long before I was born, by my grandmother, my mother, her sisters and brothers in the house at 435 Union Street in the Carroll Gardens section of Brooklyn, this is where I grew to appreciate having a loving family. It was that house, that family, those home-cooked meals that motivated me to present to you this book, My Two Mothers: A Memoir With Recipes. " The small 'village' she was born into and grew up is mostly gone. Patricia has shared her experience with us and we are richer for it." Rashidah Ismaili AbuBakr, Author of Cantata for Jimmy