38 questions to prompt food memories
In a previous post we outlined the four basic steps to begin preserving your food memories. After you have gathered recipes and photographs, the real fun begins: the remembering. The story sharing. And the cooking.
If you’re ready to begin capturing the stories that make up your food heritage, hurray! I recommend you start by hosting a family get-together (in person or virtually during these socially distanced times). Set a simple menu—one that includes some of your family’s favorite comfort foods and, most definitely, dessert—and an agenda: to talk about the foods and the holiday feasts and the kitchen antics that make you laugh, smile, and drool.
Memories flow when you’re all reminiscing together (“Remember that time…?”), and the communal feeling around a family dinner table adds to the story sharing appeal.
Print out the questions below (you can download a printable guide here) and pass it around the table. Or select your 10 favorite questions and write them on index cards before the get-together; then people can pick from your deck of cards to get the conversation going.
If your family is not as into the project as you are, or if you prefer to work alone, consider the questions writing prompts instead of conversation starters—it doesn’t matter how you gather your food stories, simply that you do.
Food-themed family history questions
THE KITCHEN OF YOUR CHILDHOOD
How was cooking in your home (either growing up or when you were raising your family) similar to or different from other families in your neighborhood?
What do you remember about holidays and special events?
Describe the kitchen of your childhood: what color were the walls? was it small or big? was there a window, and what was the view? what were the smells? the sounds? were the pots and pans hung on hooks or hidden in a cabinet? was there a pantry filled with…? did you do anything other than cook there—gather with friends, do your homework, talk on the telephone?
What are some of your earliest food memories?
What are some of your favorite food memories?
What are some of your funniest food memories?
Were there any foods you hated but were forced to eat as a kid? (Did you eat them or sneak scraps to the dog?)
What did you talk about around the dinner table when you were growing up? What about now?
What did your mother (or the primary cook in your family) wear when cooking? An apron? A house coat over her work clothes? A sauce-stained sweatshirt?
Were there any comfort foods from your childhood that hold a special place in your heart—in other words, what was your family’s “chicken soup” for the soul?
Did you have a regular day of the week for take-out food (such as pizza Fridays or, a more recent example, taco Tuesdays)? If so, what was your to-go restaurant of choice?
What did you snack on when you were little?
Were you ever a picky eater? Describe when, and if/how you got over it.
Free Guide: Preserving Your Food Memories
Download this free printable guide that include all the family history questions in this post as well as bonus tips for preserving your family food heritage.
ALL GROWN UP
How did you learn to cook?
Who taught you some of your most important kitchen lessons? Tell me about them.
What were your experiences making some of your first dishes?
What cooking triumphs (or disasters) stand out in your memory?
How has cooking changed for you over the years?
What foods always cheer you up?
What meal do you most often cook for those you love?
What junk food is your guilty pleasure?
The way we cook at different stages of our life can be revealing. Do you remember the dishes you relied on when you first went out on your own? Did you cook at all during college? If not, do any celebratory meals or meals cooked by a visiting parent stand out in your memory? How did cooking change after you had children? When they got to be teenagers? When you went back to work?
If you moved away from your home, are there any foods that you would miss that are indigenous to the area or especially well-made in the region?
Do you eat for comfort, for health, for enjoyment? Talk a little bit about your relationship with food over the years.
Do you remember the first time you tasted the cuisine of a seemingly exotic culture? What was it, and did you like it? What were the circumstances?
Do you have one or more cookbooks you return to again and again? Have the chefs you admire changed over the years?
HERITAGE RECIPES
What are your oldest recipes and where did they come from?
What are some of your family’s unique food traditions?
Are there recipes that particularly represent your family’s culture, religion, or regional background? Do you know how to cook them?
Are there any recipes in your family that seem unusual or unique?
Is there a recipe you wish you had gotten from an ancestor but that was never written down? What memories does it hold for you? Have you tried (successfully or not) to recreate it?
Do you have handwritten recipes from your parents and grandparents, and if so, where do you keep them?
FAMILY & FOOD
Who are/were the best cooks in the family? Tell me about them.
What family dishes would you miss the most if you never tasted them again?
Who sat/sits at the head of your table, and is it a position of honor?
Do you say grace before eating, and if so, is there a particular prayer or approach to what is said (e.g., something you’re each grateful for, something nice you did that day, etc.)?
How were birthdays celebrated in your family? Did you have the same cake every year, or something new? Was it homemade or store bought? Did you put an extra candle on the cake for good luck?
What other food traditions do you uphold (or have you abandoned from your childhood)?
Do you enjoy entertaining large groups of people around food? What types of celebrations? What kind of host are you?
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