As anyone who’s ever spent time in a grandmother’s kitchen knows, the best recipes aren’t written down. A pinch of this, a splash of that, butter the size of a walnut — these are the mysteries of holiday must-haves, the secrets to family recipes passed down to the daughters and granddaughters (and sons and grandsons too) who sit at their elbows.
Cooking is love; it’s family, history and tradition all rolled into our collective memories. And home-cooking especially is overwhelmingly female.
That history is something that Stephanie Noell, the special collections librarian at the University of Texas at San Antonio (USTA), sought to address when it came time to digitize the library’s 2,000 volume collection of Mexican recipe books.
UTSA’s collection, the country’s largest, holds books and manuscripts from Mexico and Spain that date back to the late 1700s. It’s diverse, with cookbooks from wealthy families featuring marbled endpapers and elegant calligraphy (gifted to daughters and daughters-in-law on their wedding day) while others are simpler, such as those women pasted together themselves. There are even letters containing recipes that sisters and friends mailed to share with family far away.
Now, these cookbooks are free to everyone. In July, USTA released the first volume in a new series of e-cookbooks designed for at-home cooks interested in learning to create authentic Mexican dishes.
Recetas: Cocinando en los Tiempos del Coronavirus / Recipes: Cooking in the Time of Coronavirus is comprised of three volumes: Postres / Desserts, released in July; Main Courses, due in the fall; and Appetizers and Drinks, which is set for early next year.
What makes the Resetas series special is that in each cookbook, the table of contents credits the women in whose cookbook the recipes appear. Dying to make churros? Resetas Postres has you covered, with a recipe written by two women in 1928. Mostachones (macaroons)? Credit Guadalupe Perez and her 1884 family cookbook.
We love the Reseta project because Mexico is home to cacao, chilies and vanilla, and if you’re like us, those ingredients sound pretty appealing almost five months into this cooking-at-home marathon we’re in right now.
More importantly, however, the project fits perfectly with our mission to elevate the stories of women in the world. We love the Resetas series because its goal isn’t just to share recipes; instead, it recognizes — and names — the women who created and recorded them. It’s a sense of ownership and validation that’s long overdue.
The Reseta series is free to download here. We also recommend the UTSA’s instagram feed for a fascinating behind-the-scenes look at the work archivists do.