Grandma Grandma’s Cookies & Bread Pudding (01/22/2025)

My son was visiting. In anticipation, I made snickerdoodles. I thought he might enjoy a cookie or two. He was very gracious and took two but asked where Grandma Grandma’s cookies were. I apologized because there were none – yet. I promised to make them the first thing the next day. I didn’t realize they were actually his favorites.

The next day as I’m stirring things together, my son stood next to me and checked out my cookbook that contains all my favorite recipes from over the years. As he read the names of the recipes, he stopped at bread pudding and asked when I made that. I told him that I usually make it when his dad needs an attitude adjustment – when I’m trying to happy him up after a bad or stressful experience or period.

Funny how food can bring us comfort. For my son, I just found out, it was Grandma Grandma’s cookies that only I made. Truth was, it was a recipe from his great grandma, Grandma Dean. The kids called her Grandma Grandma. She passed away when Kirk was still young, so he never realized that the recipe was hers. I guess he always thought it was something unique to our family. And now I understand that just the sight of them make him feel like he’s home.

Kenneth’s bread pudding started when he was very young. His family lived on a dairy farm where there weren’t a lot of extras but there were always milk and eggs and bread – the essentials. His mom would make bread pudding for special days and special occasions to celebrate. It is delicious with a special buttery cinnamon sauce. For 55 years, when Kenneth needs a lift, I stir it up. And just the smell of it brings a smile. It makes him feel like he’s home.

What yummy smell or sight makes you feel like home? Most of us have one or two that remind us of our earthly and physical homes, the home of our youth, the home we can’t wait to get back to after a long day. What about our heavenly home? What stirs us to think of our heavenly home and life in abundance with our LORD?

For me it is times of silent comfort and peace, it is times filled with the loving presence of others who share a love and a life. “Home” is woven within my memory and my being. I do long for it. I believe that is normal. When the LORD commands us to love Him with all our being, I believe it is because when we do, with all our mind, heart, soul and strength, we are at home in Him. It is, after all, as Paul reminds us, “Him in whom we live and move and have our being.” (Acts 17:28)

Until tomorrow, let us all love well.