Flavors From The Past: Memoirs and Recipes

Wilma Weiland Diekhoff grew up on an 80 acre farm near Hartsburg, Illinois, which is the setting for most of this story. After many years of talking about publishing a book on her life, this story began, interspersed with recipes from families and friends. Her husband, Delmar also grew up on a farm, but near Delavan, Illinois. All farm ground in this area is rich and fertile, and families could make a decent life on the farm. With the German heritage, people were hard working, conservative, and maybe just slightly stubborn. To put this book together, Wilma and her daughter Linda worked their way through stacks and stacks of recipes, and some of these, unfortunately, have no name to give credit where it is due. If names have been omitted from an original recipe, please accept apologies. Some of the recipes were so vague, they had to be cooked or baked to see if everything was included. Ancestors obviously took some things for granted in writing the recipes down! You might also note that the recipes contained in this book have no pretense of controlling calories. Foods were prepared with rich butter and cream, sparing no flavor for the price of a few calories.