First You Take the Dough...

When I was growing up, this innocuous little statement was a humour detonation device in my family.

Whispered innocently at just the right time  - meaning the worst time - would put an instant smile on my dad‘s face…quickly from there devolving him to a shoulders shaking, eyes squeezed shut, fingers covering his mouth (as he tried not to guffaw inappropriately in the middle of some tirade of my mother’s) mess. And everyone would get in trouble and it was great fun. 

The line had come from a cookbook my first grade class had put together, full of recipes written by the kids.  My recipe was for the kind of buns my grandmother made. The first line of my recipe was “First you take the dough.”

As the legend went, my six-year-old self had proudly brought the mimeographed cookbook home and watched my parents reverently open the construction paper cover that I had lovingly decorated…

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