Eat, Darling, Eat 

In the kitchen to learn the recipes of Japanese ancestors, the mother/daughter relationship changed.

Nobody knew what interesting character might join the family at the table, winter or summer, because Mum thought of a stranger as a friend not yet met.

The recipe for Mom's light-as-a-feather rolls came from the white lady that Grandma worked for.

​Some things never change: Mom's exaggerated memories, and Finnish pancakes for a holiday breakfast.

Learning to accept one another is a bumpy road for mother and daughter. Lasagna helps.

It was a miracle that in the midst of chaos, Mom would be so tender and considerate as to stop and put on music to bake cookies with her kids.

In a holiday-obsessed family, the weeks of preparation lead to a golden moment of calm: Mom's sticky buns on Christmas morning.

​Through her creativity and contacts, lavish holiday parties were Mom's way of investing in her daughter's future.

In which Eggplant Parmesan is the greatest form of love.

Generations have served oyster stew for Christmas breakfast. But a granddaughter's first Christmas will be spent with a group of oyster infidels.

It's hard being a teen. It's probably harder when you're adopted. Can Christmas baking help make peace?

In a little mining town near the High Sierras, mother and daughter make divinity (and get most of it in their hair).

There were typical teenaged clashes, but the kitchen was a place where mother and daughter often resolved their differences.

Mom found her recipe for Turkey Tetrazzini in a sorority cookbook—a tradition of sisterhood that she passed along to her own daughter.

Both mother and stepmother were awed by an unconventional Italian grandmother's culinary skills.

Thanksgiving nostalgia for a simpler time, all the way back to a rural farm in Mississippi.

For one mother and daughter, a big part of Thanksgiving fun is figuring out how not to cry over cutting onions.

A mother learns to make the perfect noodles for chicken soup and the ideal crust for blackberry pie to help her daughter recover from surgeries.

The best days always ended up in the food court at the local mall with Mom.

Making a traditional cornmeal porridge for their daughter was a peace offering and symbol of unity for dueling parents of different cultures.

For the kitchen-averse, a prescribed social role looms as a burden, an unwelcome destiny based on gender rather than desire or talent.

Mum didn't speak a word of English when she arrived in London, but the connection to her Nicaraguan roots—the memories and the tastes—went with her.

Dinner was ready when the smoke alarm sounded. But grabbing a meal with Mom still meant something.

Getting through a beloved mother's surgery was made easier by thoughts of her orange cake.

Eating was survival for generations of her Yugoslavian family. Now she wants to give her children something more: food that’s an expression of love.

Two young mothers, one from South Korea, one from Mexico, begin a lifelong friendship by sharing food for their children in a New Jersey park.

With its endless cheap food and entertainment, the local mall was a baby-sitter for a young mother going through a divorce.

An unplanned pregnancy became a symbol of hope for a family in post-war Germany, with a bucolic life of love and comfort foods. And then it was over.

From the mouths of babes.

​Maternal approval means a lot, at any age, and especially in the kitchen.

No matter how much scrubbing and spraying of air freshener ensued, Mom would return from work and exclaim, "Who cooked in this kitchen?"

From addiction to aspiration—a daughter fights the legacy of drugs left by her own mother.

Mom served health fare; Nannie served buttery garlic bread. Nannie told tall tales; Mom was grounded in reality. A daughter appreciates them both.

​When Mom serves low-cal everything and thinks her daughter looks fat in a bikini, body image gets distorted.

There was rarely much to eat or drink. But Mom had a night job cleaning offices, where her children would check the refrigerators for food.

​The gift of an Easy Bake oven opened the world of burnt fingers and traditional Filipino food, even though Mom wanted nothing to do with the kitchen.

A restaurant dinner alone with Mom seemed the height of sophistication to a pre-teen yearning for adulthood.

One dish, passed down through generations, can heal a feverish body or a bruised soul. 

Even living in shelters, with borrowed kitchen equipment, Mom had a way of making food taste like home.

Mom’s approach to dinner could be best described as “economic.” But it tasted like love.

Mom would kiss stale bread and say a little prayer before throwing it away so that no one she loved would ever be hungry.

Family responsibilities were too great for sit-down dinners together. But frozen Tupperware containers of Mom's meatballs made a fine after-school snack.

​With a culinary heritage of all things Cajun and Creole, a daughter of New Orleans announces to her mother that she's now (quel horreur!) vegan.

Mom could find the most delicious meals anywhere in the world. It was at afternoon tea in Paris where a daughter found they could break emotional ground.

Mom tried to work in a velvet cocktail outfit she made on a pedal foot sewing machine. But there was often nothing to eat until family came to the rescue.

An independent woman—a teacher who loved words—ages into a fog of unknowing. Her daughter helps lift the fog with…tater tots.

​A mother known for blackened kitchen disasters does whatever is necessary to stay close to her daughters after their father dies--even learning his recipes.

Mum moved to the other side of the world. A generation later: like mother, like daughter. But cooking keeps them connected.

​Mom's reputation for deliciousness spread beyond the family. But her recovery from tragedy was even more remarkable.

Somehow, baking brownies with Mom for a beloved brother and his fellow soldiers at war seemed to keep the troops safe.

​Eleven children in a tiny house in a tiny farm town—and Mom’s larder emphasized margarine and cream of mushroom soup. But Grandma was Greek.

A lifetime is preserved in the pages of a homemade recipe book, and there is love in every bite.

​How to stay connected to family and Russian heritage, thousands of miles apart? Cooking, via Skype.

​A daughter yearns for the love of a woman bitterly disappointed in motherhood, and finds some peaceful respite at the stove.

They made their way from war-torn Bosnia to America, a beacon of freedom, with cooking as a connection to the past.

Mom made fabulous crispy doughnuts—based on Portuguese and African traditions—especially to please Dad’s sweet tooth. Then Dad left.

From tearing up Mom's garden for rose petal "soup" to gorging on luscious summer fruit along a rural path, memories of a Canadian farm childhood.

Her Bahamian family defined a new neighborhood, and fresh local catch produced delicious dinners. But not for a dramatic and devious child.

With perfect thinness an almost unattainable goal, a lot of childhood was spent watching Mom watch her figure with Weight Watchers.

Sometimes a true Mom is someone else.

As her mother embraced American culture, the Indian home cooking of her heritage got left behind—which was fine with her daughter, until it wasn't.

​Like many of her Italian neighbors in South Philadelphia, she had no filters or fear, and left an indelible impression in the kitchen.

​A daughter comes to understand her mother as a sweet soul with a tough life, transported from Mexico to Iowa, and still feeding the world.

A not-skinny mother of skinny girls shares the abiding satisfaction of good food that begins with her French heritage.

Mom was a former nun who left the order to have a family. With four boys and four girls in nine years, the only time to relax and engage was while cooking.

​Peeling potatoes and cracking open a coconut, a daughter rediscovers a mother who seemed like a gentle ghost but was there all along.

A chef traces her career back to the three matriarchs of her family, who stirred the pots along the way.

In an Italian family, sauce can enhance, bind, disguise, drown, or overwhelm a meal. And Mom can do the same.

With one of Mom's cupcakes in hand, all is right with the world.

A daughter of Egypt becomes vegan. It does not go well with her mother. Baklava is the peacemaker.

​Whether you're kissing, missing, or dissing Mom, a collection of anecdotes for the holiday.

A first generation Greek-American helps win World War II (only a slight exaggeration) and then feeds with the world with her sweets.

Three generations make their lives about service, gratitude, faith, and daring to be different—along with the proper way to snap green beans and shuck corn.

​Nine kids, eight of them girls, all trying for the same bite of Mom's cookie dough.

​A mother cajoles, remonstrates, chastises, and hugs, but can't get her daughter to eat, until....

For a decade, Mom lived apart from her four daughters. And when she returned home, she'd forgotten how to cook—or so she claimed.

Three generations of women shared a deep-fried, ricotta-filled, marinara-soaked love of Italian food and tradition.

A simple breakfast, modified over the years, connects four generations of French women.

A Japanese mother gets up at the crack of dawn to prepare a lunchbox for her daughter, but it's leisure time in the kitchen when they share secrets.

Time, understanding, and cooking make a fractured mother/daughter bond whole again.

Seeing her daughter grow up in an exotic new world (and take over the kitchen), a French-Canadian mother realizes who's the mature one.

She wore perfectly applied scarlet lipstick, but those lips never touched peanut butter or pork chops.

Arranged marriage, assimilation, estrangement, and ultimately understanding—a powerful Indian odyssey.

For a home-schooling mom, broad life lessons—and brownies with a surprise twist—are on the curriculum.

Barefoot, wearing blue jeans and no makeup, Mom was content with her books and bourbon. Then she discovered Julia Child.

Flashback to the days when dinner might include Henny Penny Salad, and the Little Juniors dancing school might produce a young lady.

Mom was a character, but one who kept the family together, body and soul (especially in the kitchen).

A revealing conversation with Mom—eased by pecan pie.

Maria Grazia DiPaolo and her daughter-in-law had issues, ever since the former thought she should have been invited on the latter's honeymoon.

A rare lapse in the rules leads to a memorable night in the kitchen with Mom—and Easter sweet bread.

The kitchen was seldom the scene of warm mother-at-the stove moments--with one exception: delicious fried matzoh for Passover.

Like Cher as Mrs. Flax in Mermaids, finger foods were a favorite. But it was important to teach her daughters that eating habits could be risky business.

Quick and easy, in bulk, was the general theme of cooking for a large family, but Irish soda bread was the crown jewel in Mom's kitchen.

Homemade spaghetti sauce, Chanel No. 5, and bleach—and lessons about respect. That's what Mom is made of.

A journey away from simple Midwestern style, and back again, to find a connection with Mom.

It took decades to meet her mother--and to discover how a simple bacon-and-egg breakfast led to her birth.

Two prime (and intrinsically contradictory) obligations for women: making food and losing weight. A look back at one mother's mid-century messages.

A challenging childhood with adult responsibilities leads to the art of forgiveness.

With flowers in orange juice glasses, a spritz of perfume, and a mad mix of guests, it was magic time.

A bowl of lentils constitutes a bit of mischief--and a poignant entry in the memory bank.

February 14th means Mom's birthday, a cross-country chat, and stuffed cabbage.

How could steel-cut oats compete with Count Chocula cereal? A daughter grows up.

Pirates and Jane Austen and turkey gonads—oh, my. From movies in the bomb shelter to “Commie muffins,” a memoir of kibbutz life.

A young mother brings a bit of her Parisian upbringing to a new life in Mexico--in the form of crepes.

Mum was tiny, but a towering fortress of strength and love (with a hint of spice).

An Italian pastry chef likes everything precise and symmetrical. But Mum's apple tart is perfection.

A mother from Mumbai becomes a food detective for a daughter who can't eat.

Mom was best at making reservations, but the house was impeccable.

Watching her mother in the kitchen seemed like the height of femininity, but in the Muslim culture, the feminine mystique is complicated.

Despite being overworked and overlooked, a mother finds happiness in creating a favorite comfort food.

Love was withheld, but cooking was taught.

In one African-American home, you don't have to be Jewish to expect freshly baked challah for Friday night dinner.

Awesome Italian women, poignant revelations, and stuffed artichokes.