Beloved Christmas Recipes Teach Social Media Star About Legacy
By Movieguide® Contributor
Internet personality and chef Brenda Gantt celebrates Christmas with special traditions — recipes that have been handed down from her mother and mother-in-law.
“Nothing heralds the coming of the holiday season for me like cooking up a batch of peanut brittle,” Gantt wrote for Guideposts. “Long before my family is due for our Christmas meal, I get to work in the kitchen — alone. Alone with Jesus and the memory of my precious mother, who handed down her recipe. I like it that way, since peanut brittle can’t be prepared with the grandchildren underfoot. It’s simply not safe to have them anywhere near the sticky, boiling hot liquid.”
“I wasn’t allowed in the kitchen while Mama made her peanut brittle until I was a full-grown adult,” she continued. “She added the peanuts to that rolling boil of sugar syrup, stirring and stirring, until it was time to test a drop in a cup of tap water. If the cooled drop tasted hard and crunchy, the mixture was ready. If not, Mama kept up the boil, talking about Jesus all the while, which was Mama’s way.”
READ MORE: HOW THESE ACTORS LOVE TO CELEBRATE CHRISTMAS
After the birth of her two children, Gantt and her husband, George, decided to “alternate between our families for the Christmas gathering.” That meant picking up one of her mother-in-law’s recipes.
“One year, we’d stay in Andalusia with his parents, and the next, we’d travel the three hours to Tuscaloosa to be with mine,” Gantt said. “George’s mama and mine were as different as night and day, and so was the way they did Christmas. What ‘MeMama’ (as the children called my mother) and ‘Granny,’ my mother-in-law, did have in common was an abiding love for the Lord.”
“Granny had raised five children — four of them hungry boys. She worked outside the home as well, as a schoolteacher,” she continued. “There was hardly time to make a big to-do in the kitchen, and she wasn’t much for a fancy table, even at Christmastime. But she did go all out with one dessert among the store-bought Christmas candies — her glorious orange slice cake.”
“George grew up with this holiday confection chock-full of pecans, coconut, sugared dates and orange slice candy, topped off with an orange juice glaze,” Gantt wrote. “Granny probably favored the cake because it was practical: She could make it ahead and freeze it, the glaze keeping it fresh. A cup of black coffee and a slice of her cake was simply perfection.”
For Gantt, though, Christmas is about more than cooking. It’s about legacy.
“Gathered at my house for Christmas, my children and grandchildren find a spiritual legacy on the dessert table: MeMama’s peanut brittle and Granny’s orange slice cake. In this way, I honor these very different but very loving women, and I thank the good Lord for the influence they had on me,” she wrote.
God reminds us in Psalm 127 that “Children are a heritage from the LORD, offspring a reward from him.” What better way to honor the Lord’s gift of family this Christmas season than to pass down a beloved tradition to your children this year.
READ MORE: SADIE ROBERTSON HUFF ON IMPORTANCE OF CHRISTMAS TRADITIONS: ‘HOPE FOR THE FUTURE’
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