The Famous Schmidt Cookbook

My dad comes from a family of nine kids. I have lots and lots of aunts, uncles and cousins! I have first cousins who are closer in age to my parents than to me. I have first cousins once removed that are closer to my age than my kids' age. (And, yes, I'm using that first cousin once removed thing correctly. I looked it up.)

Back in 1986, my aunt collected recipes from all our family members and combined them all into a cookbook. The original Schmidt Cookbook is full of all our favorites. There are little remembrances and quotes interspersed amongst the recipes, and handrawn artwork on the section dividers. This book was so popular, that even people who aren't Schmidts have copies of it.

However, after 20 plus years of constant use, those yellow cookbooks were starting to look a little ratty, and an original family of nine kids can do a heck of a lot of multiplying over 20 years! There began to be dreams of a new cookbook.

Putting together a cookbook is a big task! Or at least it was back in 1986. Fortunately, I found a company that does all the designing and layout for you. You just check the happy little boxes on the order form! So, for the new Schmidt Cookbook I used Morris Press Cookbooks. It completely simplified the entire process and they are very nice people to work with!

All I had to do was collect the new recipes and type them into their system. It was time consuming, but not hard. And, since everyone's old keepsake books were falling apart, I agreed to put all the recipes from the first book into the new one, so we could preserve our first book.




And, this is what we ended up with! Such a pretty book, although not as unique as the version a couple of my cousins and I first envisioned. We wanted it to have an outhouse on the cover. My husband wanted me to call it various versions of "Tastes Like Schmidt", but I lost my nerve.

The most important thing is that all of our family recipes are again preserved. There are 409 of them (recipes, not books). I know, because I typed each of them myself!

We "unveiled" the new book at the Schmidt Reunion in July. Everyone was thrilled with it, although a few were disappointed that I didn't go with Roger's more colorful title.

There are still copies left over, so let me know if you want your own! They're $6.50 a piece. That's only 2 cents per recipe!