Happy Birthday, Grammy Gertie!

Grammy Gertie will be turning 91 in a few days, an accomplishment the rest of us can't touch. In her honor, we are posting a few of her more memorable recipes today (see the posts below).

I did an interview project with Grammy a few years ago. It seems like a fitting day to post some excerpts of that as well. In her own words:

"I was born on the grounds of the Burkey farm. It was a big house, with a big barn and lots of cows. The base of the house was built on a sort of hill. You could open the basement door from the ground level. In it there was big, white room with shelves, and wheel after wheel after wheel of Swiss cheese. It was curing itself. It smelled wonderful in there with all the Swiss cheese. We sold the cheese to different places. I remember the big room where they kept the cheese.

There was a big barn. I liked the animals. We had a few horses. They did maple syruping. There were lots of woods. They’d get a couple thousand gallons of syrup each year. They needed the horses to pull the sleighs or the wagons through to carry the sap back to the sugar house. Of course there were sheep and pigs, things you find in a normal barn.

I didn’t have brothers or sisters – I was the only one. They were big farms, with a lot of distance between the houses. I probably spent a lot of time in the barn, and just walking around.

I don’t remember ever celebrating my birthday at school. There was a boy who had the same birthday that I did, but we never celebrated at school. At home, my mom would make a cake. My favorite cake was white cake with whipped cream frosting. Each year I’d have one of those – she’d make one for me. When I was younger, we’d have two or three neighborhood kids come in and have a little party, but I guess that was about it."