Trove Of Recipes Dating Back To Inquisition Reveals A Family's Secret Jewish Roots
"With the holidays approaching, it's the time of year for families to come together and
share their traditions. But which traditions?"
"In a trove of old family recipes, Genie Milgrom found clues that led her to Inquisition-era Spain and her family's hidden Jewish heritage. Milgrom is a Cuban-American, now 65, who was raised a devout Catholic. Several years ago, when her Mom became ill, Milgrom went through her things and found a collection of recipes that had been recorded and handed down by generations of aunts and grandmothers. Some of the recipes traced all the way back to Inquisition-era Spain and Portugal."
"At her home in Miami, Milgrom pulls some of the recipes from a shelf. Many are written on yellowed paper in faded ink. "You can see old handwriting and little snippets of paper," she says. 'So this was just pages and pages and hundreds of these. ... Some are just crumbling'"
"As a girl, Milgrom says her maternal grandmother taught her some of the family's food customs. Many years later, she realized they revealed their secret Jewish roots."