My grandmother Vera taught me many different skills: to sew, embroider, knit and decorate the house. She could keep my attention for hours being so creative and passionate. Within a day we could sew a whole wardrobe for my new doll or we could put together a handmade present for my parents. This skill was very helpful especially during the times when one could hardly get anything in the shops. She would buy ordinary things and turn them into something special.
Until the age of three, all my clothes were fully embroidered by my grandmother. All my hats, scarves, socks and vests were knitted by her. She would also make sure that they all fit me perfectly. At the age of seven, we started to enjoy the making together.
She was fascinated by Russian folklore and would show it in her own way. When one entered her kitchen, it would feel like entering a gallery. On the walls everywhere, there were wooden boards of different shapes, painted in traditional style and nicely finished with varnish. The paintings would shine and attract attention. One would never say that those were simple cutting boards to be used in the kitchen.
She created different collections, inspired by nature and animals. We would sit together at the table, think of a new theme and start with a pencil sketch on the board. Then we mixed gouache to get the needed colours and started painting. At the end, we would add a 5mm painted frame and finished the whole drawing with a varnish. Vera also taught me to paint wooden spoons. Afterwards, we would use them together to drink soup and enjoyed those beautiful spoons nicely cooling the warm dish.
Recently, I discovered that many of our neighbors still have kitchen boards painted by my grandmother that were given to them as a present.
I still have her sewing machine, paper templates and knitting needles. I still wear her white collars, hand knit with a special hook, which I attach to a simple dress for a fresh flair. I am grateful to say that this belonged to my grandmother and was made by her.
Gulnaz Mamedovna Alieva (85 years old)
babylya Gulya
My grandmother Gulya is a good cook. She is the keeper of family traditions and recipes through the years. A typical menu: yogurt soup with sorrel, flat cake with meat and pomegranate seeds, pilaf with lamb and dried fruits and hot tea with preserves for desert. At the end of a visit, you get a small jar with jam or eggplant paste on the condition that you return the empty jar. It is common that friends bring something from their stock in exchange.
My grandmother is now 85, and I am allowed to help her with making preserves and buying all that is needed at the market, though only under her total control. We make jams from figs, apricots, carnelian or white cherries and from quinces, my favorite. My grandmother stores all these preserves and hands out parts of the collection to family members and friends carefully, so that the stock doesn’t run out before the next summer.
Here is the recipe my grandmother allowed me to share:
Clean five medium quinces and cut them very thinly lengthwise. 1 kg of quince requires 1 kg of sugar and 250ml of cooled boiled water. Start by preparing sugar syrup in a big metal pot by warming 250ml of water until body temperature. Then add sugar and stir until it starts to boil. Switch to a low fire and add the cut quince. Leave the mixture on the fire until it starts to boil (8-10 minutes). Switch the fire off and cook it again in 12 hours until it just starts to boil on a low fire. Repeat 2 times every 12 hours, for a total of 4 repetitions. Store the cooled jam in small jars and keep them in a cold place. The pieces of quince should stay crispy.
Other jams can be made using the same recipe and proportions. Carnelian cherry jam contains a lot of vitamin C and is perfect in combination with hot tea if you have a cold. Apricot preserve will be very unusual if the inner nut is placed back inside each fruit. All the preserves are sweet and work perfectly as lemonade syrup or as a sugar replacement in tea,but my grandmother simply uses the preserves as a dessert next to hot black tea served with a slice of lemon.
Inara Nevskaya
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