Ana Kennedy

By KATHERINE DEDYNA

Times Colonist staff

June 25, 2003

Every family has its special well-spattered recipes, its evocative black-and-white photos, the “tell-us-again” sagas of the way things used to be. But mom Anna Kennedy of Mill Bay and her daughter Barbara Kennedy of Victoria weave their family favourites into a tasty and touching little blast from the culinary past called Anna of Far Hills, A Lifetime of Cooking.

The book’s cover depicts Far Hills, the Shawnigan country house the family bought in 1949 and lived in for more than 50 years. Inside are more than 100 recipes interspersed with a pictorial story of Kennedy’s life: her girlhood in Foam Lake, Sask., where she was up at 4 a.m. to cook for the harvesting crew; a stint as a ranch cook in the Chilcotin for $20 a month where she met her husband, Bill, on a neighbouring ranch; her happy years with her growing family at Shawnigan Lake, where she and the other United Church ladies catered community events for more than 50 years and grew accustomed to making Cloud Biscuits for 300; and dozens of wedding cakes.

In an increasingly sophisticated market, there’s a certain charm in reading about the Lemon Pudding that Anna made for Dr. Somers while keeping house for him in 1937; the Cooked Red Cabbage she makes whenever Dotsi Cobbold comes for lunch (it was Dotsi’s husband who showed her how to debone a turkey) — and the Beet and Carrot Cake recipe courtesy of Gertie Poutney, who milked their cow when Anna was away.

Would modern kids go anywhere near beet cake? “If you didn’t tell them,” Anna laughs. “When it’s baked and you slice it, you’d think it was cherries.”

Her sticky cinnamon buns, made using a 1949 Robin Hood Flour recipe, and gooey with pecans and toffee-like topping, are another matter.

“Sticky buns have been part of our family for years and years,” says the tall and slim 86-year-old, who shows no sign of over-indulgence. She still walks three kilometres every day and has just driven over the Malahat from Mill Bay to whip up the latest batch in Barbara’s funky kitchen.

It was Barbara’s idea to weave the straightforward recipes for comfort foods — Baked Beans, Beef Stroganoff, Oven Stew and, the odd surprise, Mussels in Coconut Curry Sauce — into her mother’s life history.

“I thought it would be far more interesting than just a collection of recipes — you don’t have to know Anna to enjoy the story part,” says Barbara, who received encouragement from others in a UVic writing course.

Under a breezy photo of Anna, her sister and mother taken in 1920, Anna writes: “There was no refrigeration on the farm. In summer, we kept milk and cream in a lidded cream can on a rope hung down the well.” The good old days.

There’s even a recipe for making soap — under a 1933 photo of Anna and her prize-winning calf — should readers have a few kilos of rendered tallow hanging around.

A 1941 photo of Anna on horseback at the Chilcotin ranch is accompanied by a vignette that tells of the primitive conditions she was up against while cooking for 17 people with trucked-in food that included no eggs or vegetables.

But it was still rewarding. People who don’t cook are missing a lot of fun, says Anna, because the kitchen table is made for memories. These days, “Women simply don’t have time to enjoy it, it’s always rush-rush.”

Even Barbara cooks only for company.

The mustard-coloured mega-bags of flour perched atop Barbara’s purple cupboards indicate a love of design, not baking. “It drives [Ma] crazy that I’m not using it,” she laughs.

Anna of Far Hills is a finale to Anna’s cookbook legacy. She made her first cookbook at age 11 using wrapping paper sewn with her mother’s homespun yarn and later collaborated on four United Church cookbooks over the years.