Photo captions can be short, incomplete, mysterious, or full of clues. It all depends on who’s writing it and when. The caption on this image is different.  It’s in two parts in a different script and the authors are arguing. When I saw this image sitting in a bin, I had to have it.  It’s the first time I’ve ever seen a caption quite like this.

We’ve been using this image to demonstrate the digital photo organizer MemoryWeb’s back/front photo linking feature. This is definitely a caption that we don’t want to lose and back/front linking means I don’t have to search for two separate images. They are together in my MemoryWeb account.

In my quest to find the truth behind the caption, I’ve fallen into research rabbit holes (as genealogists call them) and now know more about the subject of the caption than likely his living family did.

But I don’t know everything and that’s where I could use a little help.

Let’s start at the beginning. There are five basic clues present on/in the image—photographer’s name, a location, the identity of one caption writer, what they are wearing, and the father’s name.

The caption casts doubt on the father’s career. Was he a success or was he a failure?  That’s the big question.  

Photographer and Location

Henry Grimsehl of 229 Prospect Ave., near 5^th Ave, Brooklyn, N.Y.  took this group portrait in Prospect Park. That’s easy. The imprint is on the back and the place is recognizable.  He was a German immigrant who took pictures in New York City and later in Brooklyn. He was a photographer in Brooklyn from about 1892 at that address, and after 1902 at 299 Prospect. Grimsehl died in 1919.

The group posed in front of the Prospect Park Concert Grove Pavilion. It still stands and is undergoing restoration. The restaurant on the left-hand side of the image was demolished in 1946. It’s mentioned in the caption as proof of a man’s success and that’s where the story gets interesting.  

The Caption

I love that Edmund Voigt signed his caption. “Prospect Park Brooklyn where Dad held the restaurant and café concession.”  That part seems clear, right?  Not so fast. There is a person in a chef/cooking staff outfit standing in the center of the image. Edmund continues. “That might be Dad on right standing looks like him except the mouth.”

Above his statements is where the argument starts. An unnamed person, “Dad Helmuth Voigt was not a successful businessman. He would start a business, go broke then leave it. Never could save anything.”  Seems pretty apparent that there is no love lost between the writer and their father.  Below Edmund’s identification is “that is NOT Dad, no I’m afraid.”

From their caption, we know that both commenters are children of Helmuth and that one of them was Edmund. There’s no gray area in the disagreement.

Tracking Helmut

Finding Helmuth’s life story took time. Ancestry.com, MyHeritage.com, various newspaper databases, Ellis Island, FamilySearch.com, and Google. I now have a timeline of his life with gaps. You’ll see what I mean. Rather than research backward from his death, let’s build a timeline working forward. Dating photos often involves doing extensive research to find clues that relate to an image in hand. Not everything I’ve found is relevant to the image, but it’s a good idea to accumulate as much information as possible.

16-year-old Helmuth Voigt/Voight, born 13 October 1865 in Meisenbach, Rudolstadt, left Bremen, Germany aboard the General Werder which departed Bremen, Germany, and arrived in New York on 19 June 1882.[i]

From 1882 until 1889, there is a gap in Helmuth’s story. In 1889, he’s living in Waterbury, Connecticut, and is naturalized on January 14 of that year. While he claimed to live in Waterbury, only a Michael Voigt/Vogt appears in the city directories for 1886 to 1889. Although Helmut did live there in 1907 and 1908. Of course, it’s possible for Michael to be a relative of his, but there is no proof of that at this point. [ii]

Helmuth’s next stop is San Francisco where he states his occupation in voter registration rolls as a waiter in 1890 and a steward in 1892. In 1893 he marries an English immigrant, Jennie Thomas in Santa Clara.  It’s the first marriage for both. [iii]

According to his 1897 passport application, Helmuth Voigt, a resident of Brooklyn, stated that he wanted to return to Germany for three months, but instead didn’t return until early September 1898. It doesn’t appear that a wife traveled with him.[iv]

For photo identification purposes, the passport included physical details. He stood 5 ft 6 ¾ inches had a high forehead, gray eyes, and a prominent nose. He had a fair complexion, oblong face, and light-colored hair.  This description will be handy for sorting through the men in the group portrait.[v] 

Searching the Census

With a known relationship of father and son in the caption, it was time for a census search.  Helmut and Edmund appear together in 1910, 1920, and 1930 census for Schenectady, New York. 

Edmund was born in 1910 and he had a sister Lillian four years older. Sometimes enumerators add a bit more information. For marriages on this page, she put a superscript 2 or 1 next to the M for married.  It’s the second marriage for both Helmuth and his Scottish immigrant bride of two years.  While Minnie is Edmund’s mother, Lillian is not Minnie’s child, her mother’s nationality was given as German (likely a mistake), and a place of birth of Connecticut.  Further searching identified Minnie as Mary Boyd.  Perhaps Lillian was born to Jennie and Helmuth, but so far, no birth records or death records fill in that blank.[vi]

Enumerators collected information from who they could and that lead to discrepancies. The 1920 census asks year of immigration and naturalization which for Helmuth the enumerator wrote 1890 and 1895. It’s definitely worth looking at each census to study all the columns. Ten years later Helmuth’s immigration date in the census was 1880 when in fact he arrived in 1882. It’s important to verify the data given in a census record. [vii]

Dating the Image

Notice that I had a gap in the timeline between 1898 when Helmut returns from Germany and the census of 1910.  It’s an interesting coincidence. You’ll see why.

There are plentiful clothing clues in this image from what infants wore to older women. It’s a broad spectrum of fashion in a particular time period. Always look for the most fashionable woman in a picture. Babies can wear hand-me-downs and older folks may don their best but outdated outfit for a portrait. The small straw sailor hat was worn by the woman on the left and the hair ornament sticking up the hair of the oldest woman help date the image to circa 1899-1900. This image fits neatly into the timeline, exactly where there is a gap. The missing information includes a lack of a census record for Helmuth.

In 1900, Helmuth would be 35.

Let’s take another look at the photo. In it, there are clusters of people. They are likely posed in family groups.

 On the left, it’s a young woman, an older middle-aged/older woman, and standing behind them is a man who could be in his thirties. 

The cluster in the middle consists of a seated man in his probable 40s flanked by two boys likely less than 10. Behind stands a man about the same age in a chef cap. Both men have dark hair and eyes.  They bear a resemblance to each other and to the woman with the sailor cap.

On the far right are two twenty/thirty-something women (one with a baby) and a man possibly thirty-something. He has lighter hair and eyes.  Since Helmut’s passport application identified him as having a prominent nose, high forehead, light hair, and grey eyes it’s clear that’s why Edmund suggested it was his father.

Edmund pointed him out to be his father with the exception of the mouth. Lillian didn’t support his identification. If it isn’t Edmund then who is it and why did Edmund mistake the man for his father? At the time of his birth, Helmuth was 45. Perhaps his appearance had changed significantly since the photo.

I spot some family resemblances in the men, especially the men with mustaches. They could be brothers. The woman in the tiny hat could be their sister and the older woman their mother. The light hair and eyes on “Helmuth” make him stand out. It’s just another puzzle in this picture for which I don’t have evidence.

Food and Family

It could be a family photo celebrating a significant event. For instance, in 1897, there was an Emil Vogt who operated a restaurant at the Park Circle Hotel, opposite the entrance to Prospect Park as a “competent caterer.”  It’s possible the food business ran in the family. Edmund later becomes a baker. Helmut always claimed to be a waiter. [viii]

Helmuth Voigt died in Schenectady in 1936, where he’d lived for 28 years.  His obit mentioned him being a waiter for 27 years, a fact that is confirmed through city directories and census research. In the 1907 city directory for Waterbury, Connecticut Helmuth worked at The Elton, a luxury hotel still in operation. It’s the only mention of an exact place of employment for him. There is no mention in city directories of him being associated as an owner of a series of businesses. As for Helmuth being a failure, there is a discrepancy. At the time of the 1930 census, he owned a house worth four thousand dollars in Schenectady, New York (and a radio).[ix]

 There are so many missing details. When I look at this photo, I see the groups as possibly representing branches of a family. There could be other Voigts living in the area or perhaps they aren’t Voigt’s. Helmut lived at various times in Brooklyn, northern California, Schenectady, and Waterbury/Hartford Connecticut. When he died there remained a connection to Brooklyn.

According to a front-page article in the Times Union newspaper of Schenectady at the time of Helmuth’s death, “a rush message was sent to Brooklyn.” Two phonograph records were then sent back to Schenectady. They contained funeral music and burial service in lieu of a clergy person. There were German organizations in Brooklyn and it’s possible Helmuth maintained connections with one of them. The newspaper doesn’t state whether the recordings were in English or German.[x]

Edmund lived with his mother for the rest of her life and never married.  When she died in 1960, her obituary mentioned another child, Mrs. John George Schilke of Bristol, Connecticut who was Lillian. Searching for information on Lillian turned up an obituary for her husband where his wife is Lillian Frances Ehle, a curious find. Perhaps Lillian’s mother was actually German and didn’t carry the Voight name. It’s possible but unlikely that Lillian had an earlier marriage unless she married in her teens. Minnie’s survivors included her two children, three grandchildren, and nine great-grandchildren.[xi]  

How the photograph ended up in a Pawtucket, Rhode Island antique shop is a mystery.

Remaining questions.

There are still so many unanswered questions about this image from how it came to be in the Voigt family to who’s in it. It seems possible that Lillian and Edmund would have met other Voigt relations, but perhaps not.  Lillian is adamant in the caption that it is not their father. It’s possible that Lillian was mistaken and the man with the right height and coloring was her father and one of the women is her mother. Or one of the women is Jennie.  If that’s the case, there is yet another mystery. 

I’m looking for:

• When and where did Helmut marry Minnie/Mary Boyd? Could there be another marriage?
• What happened to his first wife Jennie? And were there any children?
• Evidence of businesses in which Helmut was involved
• Why is Lillian stating her maiden name as Ehle?
• Why isn’t Helmuth in the 1900 U.S. census?

I’m convinced this is a solvable photo problem. With 12 descendants living as of 1960, work could be done to contact them to see if anyone has a photo of Helmut.  It’s slow going to contact living descendants even when you discover the names of Lillian’s three children. Fingers crossed.

Endnotes

[i]  Year: 1882; Arrival: New York, New York, USA; Microfilm Serial: M237, 1820-1897; Line 44; List Number:836. Ancestry.com. U.S., Passport Applications, 1795-1925 [database on-line]. Lehi, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2007; Roll #484; Volume # Roll 484-01 Apr 1897-16 Apr 1897, Passport number 1530 dated April 13, 1897.

[ii] Ancestry.com. U.S. Naturalization Record Indexes, 1791-1992 (Indexed in World Archives Project) [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010. This collection was indexed by Ancestry World Archives Project. National Archives and Records Administration (NARA); Washington, D.C.; Index to New England Naturalization Petitions, 1791-1906 (M1299); Microfilm Serial: M1299; Microfilm Roll: 36; MyHeritage.com, U.S. City Directories, Waterbury, Connecticut 1886-1889, 1906-1907.

[iii] Ancestry.com. California, U.S., Voter Registrations, 1900-1968 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2017. California Marriages, 1850-1945. Database. FamilySearch.org: 6 January 2021.

[iv] Ancestry.com, U.S. Passport Applications, 1897; List or Manifest of Alien Immigrants. Helmuth Voight. 1898. https://heritage.statueofliberty.org/passenger-details/czoxMjoiNjAyOTA1MDgwMTAwIjs=/czo4OiJtYW5pZmVzdCI7  

[v] Ancestry.com, U.S. Passport Applications, 1897.

[vi] Ancestry.com. 1910 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Lehi, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2006. Year: 1910; Census Place: Schenectady Ward 7, Schenectady, New York; Roll: T624_1078; Page: 6B; Enumeration District: 0199; FHL microfilm: 1375091; Ancestry.com. U.S., Social Security Applications and Claims Index, 1936-2007 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2015. Original data: Social Security Applications and Claims, 1936-2007, Edmund Voight. ; MyHeritage.com, New York Newspapers, 1806-2007, Obituary. Mary Elizabeth Voight. Schenectady Gazette, June 11, 1960.

[vii] Ancestry.com, 1910 United States Federal Census; Ancestry.com. 1920 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010. Images reproduced by FamilySearch. Year: 1920; Census Place: Schenectady Ward 13, Schenectady, New York; Roll: T625_1263; Page: 8A; Enumeration District: 192

[viii] Newspapers.com, advertisement. Park Circle Hotel. July 4, 1897.  Brooklyn Daily Eagle

[ix] Newspapers.com, notice. “Phonograph Record Provides Funeral Service,” Times Union (Schenectady, New York), March 13, 1936, 1.  U.S. City Directories, Waterbury, Connecticut 1907; “United States Census, 1930,” database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:X4T5-JZ7 : accessed 15 July 2021), Edmund W Voigt in household of Helmuth Voigt, Rotterdam, Schenectady, New York, United States; citing enumeration district (ED) ED 17, sheet 22B, line 56, family 485, NARA microfilm publication T626 (Washington D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, 2002), roll 1644; FHL microfilm 2,341,378.

[x] Newspapers.com, notice. “Phonograph Record Provides Funeral Service,” Times Union (Schenectady, New York), March 13, 1936, 1.

[xi] MyHeritage.com, Obituary for Mary Voight. Schenectady Gazette, June 11, 1960. Ancestry.com, “Obituary of J. George Schilke,” Hartford Courant, May 2, 1965.

The post A Photo Mystery and a Family Argument appeared first on Maureen Taylor.

This week was a scorcher. Three 90 degree plus days in a row. One humid afternoon my grandmother popped into my head. She made the best lemonade. In a second I was time traveling in my memories to when I was 4. My Mom worked and Nana watched me and my sister.

It was the summer that she finally let me help her in the kitchen. I suppose it was a way of keeping me busy, but at the time my goal was to be the best assistant I could be. My assignment. Roll the lemons. That’s it. She’d place the lemons on her brown porcelain enamel kitchen table. With her arthritic hands, she’d demonstrate. Take a lemon and place your hands on it and move it up and down the table as far as my arms could reach repeatedly until they were soft. It was hard work for little arms. I’d kneel on the chair and press down on the fruit as I rolled.

There was no air conditioning in her third-floor walk-up. A small metal-bladed fan in the corner of the kitchen created the breeze. The lemons weren’t refrigerated in the icebox, her name for a refrigerator that recalled days before there were such things. They were usually kept in a bowl on the counter.

I’d pick up a warm lemon and smell the citrusy scent. It took both of my small hands to hold that yellow fruit on the table. I’d roll and roll until my arms ached. Then I’d ask, “Are they ready?” She’d pick it up and poke it with her fingers testing for the right amount of softness so the fruit would release its juice. Usually, the reply was not yet so back to work I’d go. Eventually, she’d take over to finish the task with her strong arms making the motion.

Next, it was time for making the juice. She had a small glass squeezer with a fluted cone in the middle and a pourer on the side. It was a kitchen essential. Freshly squeezed juice happened only one way in those days. You’d take the lemon, slice it in half, putting one half cut side down on the flute and move your hand in a semi-circular motion. Juice and pulp would collect in the glass making it easy to pick out the seeds. I seem to remember that at least six lemons were needed.

Then she’d get her glass pitcher. It’s the one I own today. It has a molded pattern on the outside. It’s a shrine to the life of a woman who raised five children and lived upstairs from us until we followed the pattern of so many families and moved from the city to the suburbs by the sea.

Into the pitcher would go the juice, pulp, water, lots of sugar, and of course ice. Her long-necked spoon would mix it all together. Nana was an expert. She never measured anything when she made things, be it a drink, chowder, or a pie. She knew by sight the right proportions. She’d made this so many times she could gauge its readiness by the color of the beverage.

Finally, it was time for a taste. Oh, that was my other job. She’d pour a little bit into glasses for each of us. Too tart and it needed more sugar. I can’t remember a pitcher of lemonade that was too watery. All that work and we’d all drink down that cool beverage in less time than it took to make it. It was a treat, one that didn’t happen often enough.

Nana died in 1968 and the pitcher retired. It sat in a box in my parent’s basement until given to me. At my house, it’s in the china cupboard too precious to use.

Instead of a pourable lemon drink, I make lemon sorbet and put it in frozen lemon cups. I use an old-fashioned style juicer I bought from Food52, (made by Kilner) and a hand crank ice cream maker that sits in the freezer. There isn’t a time when I follow these steps that I don’t think of my grandmother. She’s guiding my hands as I roll the fruit and juice it.

My family’s long attachment to lemons dates back at least to my grandmother. We clamor for lemon cake, lemon meringue pie, lemonade, and now my lemon cups. It’s a consistent love for a citron taste that connects the generations.

Unlike my maternal grandmother, my paternal grandmother didn’t consider herself a cook. She’d make meals that were edible but not fancy like pot roast on Sundays. I’ve already written about her family famous lemon meringue pie and how I discovered the filling was made from a box.

Sometimes our memories give us a false impression of a moment. Digging deeper into the lemonade origins I found that Sunkist® lemons were widely available in local grocery stores during my childhood and before. You could buy six for 29 cents. If that number sounds familiar it should. That’s the exact number of lemons Nana used for her beverage.

While I’d romantically like to believe that her lemonade was an old family recipe. The facts look a little different. On the Sunkist® website is a recipe for their lemonade. It looks suspiciously like the one that Nana made minus the rolling.

Whatever the origins of her recipes, she made them her own by including family into the details. Including me in the cooking, gave me a life-long love of being in the kitchen.

The post Summer, Lemonade, and Nana appeared first on Maureen Taylor.

Serve up a Helping of Photos

If you’re overwhelmed by relatives wanting to know “what’s for dinner” and “when will it be ready” then redirect their attention. Keep them busy.

• Pick out your family photo mysteries and put copies in a scrapbook with a blank facing page for comments. Leave a pen attached to the book and ask for each person to write something about the picture such as the details they see or who it might be.
• Make sure they sign their name beside their remarks. They might see something you’ve overlooked. That cantankerous relative could turn into your personal genealogical gift giver when he identifies a photo of your second great grandfather.
• Encourage relatives to bring their own mystery photos in a similar scrapbook. Leave the originals at home. This activity is for copies only. You wouldn’t want a dot of gravy in the middle of a priceless heirloom.

Get Them Talking 

Oversize nineteenth century pedigree charts often came equipped with a bar across the top so the owner could show off their lineage by putting it on display.

• Purchase an oversize chart, fill it in (as much as possible) and pin it up in a prominent spot. Family members are sure to gather ‘round it talking about the folks you’ve mentioned. Want a tree worth framing. Check out the offerings by FamilyChartmasters.com. They can tackle even large family trees.
• Get the teenager in your house (or another interested family member) to tape record the stories of childhood escapades, memories of favorite foods and past holidays. These sounds will mix together for a piece of oral memorabilia worth keeping.

These activities will keep those restless relatives busy until dinners served leaving you with some quiet time in the kitchen. It’s a long holiday season; so keep the chart, scrapbook and camera handy for the next gathering. You’re sure to generate some genealogical cheer.

The post Make Relatives Work For Their Supper ? appeared first on Maureen Taylor.

As a child, I’d watch her make it using My-T-Fine lemon pudding topped with a fluffy meringue all in a homemade crust. The ruffles in the edges formed by my mother’s finger.

It was fussed over as well as cursed. A baking cautionary tale. The crust was never right. The filling often failed. All sorts of things happened to this pie:

• Cool it too quickly, and the meringue weeps.
• Add too much water to the filling, and the crust gets mushy.
• Put in too hot an oven, meringue cooks too quickly and crust burns.

Mom scrutinized each pie looking for both flaws and perfection. Her own worst critic.

No matter the outcome, the family didn’t care. It was that cool citrus taste on the tongue that soothed. To me, it was the expression of my mother’s love. The pie is wrapped up in my memories of her preparing those meals. It’s my favorite. Instead of a birthday cake, I’ll take a pie. She knows it.

The other night I asked her about cooking in the family, precisely those things made by my paternal grandmother. My Mom is the one living older adult that still remembers Nana cooking in her kitchen. To my surprise, she said, “I always loved your grandmother’s lemon meringue pie.”

Wait.

“What? That’s your pie.”

She laughed. “No, it isn’t.”

“Your grandmother made the best pie. I’ve tried to copy it.”

Whoa. Really?

“No matter how many times I tried I couldn’t duplicate your grandmother’s pie. She’d show me, then I’d try. I had her write down the recipe, but she’d accidentally leave out an ingredient. No matter how many times I watched her, I couldn’t make the same pie. It never worked out. ”

Now that my Mom has reached the age where she’d rather buy a pie than make it, I’m interested in making my own lemon confection. But this new information about the pie’s origin has called everything into question.

Whose pie is this really?

“How did she make it?” I asked. “Did she use instant pudding the way you do?”

“Nope. Your grandmother made it from scratch. Fresh ingredients. She was an old-fashioned woman who never used a recipe. She’d made it so many times she didn’t need one.”

Nana was a woman of another century who lived on limited means. I didn’t think of her as poor, but looking back that’s what she was. She made do with what she had.

The ingredients in the pie are simple. I know my grandmother made her crusts from flour and Crisco. The flour was courtesy of the food surplus program of the Kennedy Presidency to aid the less well-off. Once a month, she received powdered milk, flour, and cheese. An enormous bar of yellowish-orange cheese always sat in her refrigerator. As children, we didn’t know where it came from. Once I was old enough to ask, it made me sad to hear that she “went without.”

She’d worked as a young woman, but once married she stayed home to raise five children. Her self-employed husband ran the family painting and paper-hanging business. A trade he’d learned from his father and grandfather. It was a family business. Work fluctuated with the season, and everyone contributed to the family’s survival.

Her crust was perfection. Flaky and flavorful. She’d taught my mother how to make the same base for the pie, it was rest of the pie that was the problem.

The filling of lemon, eggs, cornstarch and butter was what my mother couldn’t duplicate. As a modern woman, my mother did what was necessary. She bought a box of pudding mix. My-T-Fine was the only one that would do.

The yellow of the pie pudding fills my mind with memories.

My grandmother loved to sit with me and color. Her favorite crayon, “yella” she’d say. It was in an accent passed down with the generations.

In the summer, it was my job as a very little child to roll lemons on her enamel topped table. The citrus scent filled my nose. Even today, lemon makes me think not just of pie but of warm days. If I wanted lemonade, I worked for it. Lemon after lemon rolled until soft. I could feel the hard fruit soften until I thought they were ready. She’d test them to see if they were the right feel and give them back for more rolling if not. I’d press down on them intent on getting them right the first time.

Next, I’d watch her cut those in half and use her glass juicer to squeeze the liquid out of the fruit. It was a cloudy milky yellow when mixed with water and lots of sugar that became tart and sweet on the tongue. The taste of summer.

Lemon yellow is not my favorite color, but it’s forever associated with a tall woman with wrinkled hands and blue eyes. If taste is genetic, then I’ve inherited her love of the fruit. It’s reflected on my tree at the holidays in a large glass slice of pie. Lemon, of course.

At the next holiday dinner, I’m going to surprise my mother and try to make grandmother’s pie. Alas, I don’t have her recipe, but I’ll find one in an old cookbook and give it a try. Maybe I’ve also inherited her talent for this particular pie. We’ll see.

Download my recipe for Chocolate Orange Zucchini Cake 

The post I’ve Got Lemon Meringue in My DNA appeared first on Maureen Taylor.

In many places, a Waffle is a cultural symbol, a popular treat, or an essential ingredient in everyday life. From Syria to Vietnam to their Dutch origins, waffles actually unite the world. For me, a waffle links me to my childhood, connects me to my husband and is the batter between me and my children.

My first memory of these coffered confections is from my pre-school years.

We lived in a tenement house in the smallest city in Rhode Island. At one square mile, streets were filled with three-decker dwellings where mill workers and tradespeople lived. There was a family on every floor. In our building, we were the middle of the sandwich. Nana was on the third floor; us on the second, and an unrelated middle-aged couple on the first.

Breakfast was uneventful eggs, cereal, or hot porridge. One Sunday, the downstairs neighbor knocked on the door and presented a red gingham kitchen towel-covered plate to my mother. The smell was amazing.

My sister and I rushed to the table for the big reveal. “What are those?” we asked wide-eyed and open-mouthed. Our mother said the magic word. Waffles.

The woman downstairs not only made the waffles, but she also floated them in a lake of maple syrup and topped them with confectioners sugar. It changed my life.

From that point on I’d think about waffles as a neighborly gesture, one that would influence key points of my life. We have no idea why she decided to indulge us with her cooking. Perhaps she missed her children. Or maybe she thought to delay a rent increase imposed by my father. We never really knew this downstairs couple. Today I wish I’d asked her about the waffle tradition.

When they moved, we begged our mother for waffles until she relented and bought a waffle iron. Winter Sunday night’s featured old movies on the television and if we were lucky, breakfast for dinner. Waffles prepared the way our former neighbor had. Nothing else would do.

A Medieval Tradition

While ‘to waffle’ means ‘to vacillate,’ countries around the world are linked through a culture of these indented creations from the medieval period to today.

The first waffle recipe dates to a Frenchman’s instructions to his wife in the 14^th century. The ingredient missing from today’s mixes? The wine he advised her to include.

In the 15^th century, Belgian waffle irons resembled their modern descendants. The ingredients of eggs, sugar, and flour are familiar to us, but these ancestors also contained grated bread, wine and spices. Sugar as a valuable commodity made these waffles available in only wealthy kitchens until the introduction of beet sugar. Francois I, King of France from 1494-1547 loved his waffles so much he had a waffle iron cast in silver.

By the 18^th century, these grid patterned treats were everywhere in Europe with varying names and ingredients by country. Whipped egg whites, yeast, chocolate and butter could be added. At the beginning of the 18^th century, New Jersey residents held “wafel frolics, parties where hosts served waffles.”

All was well until the waning of their popularity at the beginning of the twentieth century. The 1904 St. Louis World Fair lore credits a Syrian immigrant, Ernest Hamwi, a waffle vendor, with creating a waffle cone so visitors could eat ice cream after he ran out of dishes. As the world watches political events in Syria, let’s not forget that America’s iconic summer treat wouldn’t be the same without Hamwi.

Waffles in the Family

In the 1920s, recipes for waffles began disappearing from cookbooks at the same time that home waffle irons and pre-made mixes relegated their making to homes rather than street vendors.

My mother always used Bisquick. No juggling of measuring cups and multiple ingredients. Milk and the mix with an egg combined with a few minutes in the iron and it was done. Little mess and even less fuss.

My first purchase in my adult apartment was a waffle iron. No mixes for me. It was about trying to recreate that long remembered texture and flavor from my childhood.

I soon discovered that once you had a batter, you could improvise. I wasn’t content to have them for a meal. Friends came for chocolate waffles covered in ice cream or blueberry ones with whipped cream. A vegetable waffle as a side dish ended up in the trash.

Turns out all that experimenting connected me to its history. If I’d asked my grandmother, she might have told me about eating potato waffles (popular in England and Ireland) Are these still popular? Let me know.

Eventually, I settled into a routine and made traditional American ones. No Belgian deep-pocketed ones for me. Round seemed sacrilegious. Square waffles divided into quarters. None ever tasted as good as those made by the woman downstairs though.

It was my husband that continued the waffle tradition with our children. They equate them with Dad’s cooking. My husband currently prefers them made from a blue corn meal mix produced by a centuries old grist mill in Rhode Island. I’m seeking a perfect gluten free variety. And our children love the mix favored by their grandmother…Bisquick. Nothing fancy. No extra toppings just pure and simple the way my neighbor made them. Of course, I showed them how to sprinkle just the right amount of confectioners sugar on the top.

When I asked my son what he needed for his first apartment….you guessed it. A waffle iron. I think he’s living on them. It’s now a three-generation obsession.

The world of waffles continues to evolve. Hot dogs wrapped in waffles are popular in Vietnam, while fried chicken and waffles has made The Waffle House restaurant a success. My new waffle obsession is to find old recipes and try them. Potatoes, spices and maybe even a little wine will let me travel around the world and through history one batch after another.

National Waffle Day

Don’t forget to mark August 24, 2017, in your calendar. It’s National Waffle Day in honor of Dutch-American, Cornelius Swarthout of Troy, New York who received a U.S. patent for the first waffle iron.

Send me your favorite waffle recipe or tell me about your family history of waffles. I’d love to try some new varieties.

Fill out the information below to try Mémère’s Raisin Cake or Poor Man’s Cake:

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