November 12, 2020 at 11:14 a.m.
Rhinelander native publishes traditional family cookbook
'Grandma's Best Recipes' chronicles family history
Rhinelander native publishes traditional family cookbook
By Stephanie Kuski-
Rodefeld, born and raised in Rhinelander, grew up in the Seabloom family and is a 1989 graduate of Rhinelander High School. Much of her youth was spent at the Oaken Bucket Cottages on Thunder Lake because her family has owned that resort for generations.
When she married her husband Nels, the couple packed up and moved to Arkansas only to find their forever home on a cattle ranch in Maud, Oklahoma just one year later.
"We have about 460 acres that we own and then we lease about another 130 (acres) or so, and we run anywhere from 75 to 100 cows," Rodefeld said. "It's a full time job on top of our regular jobs."
Rodefeld works for the Department of Commerce, but when she clocks out of that job, she clocks in at the ranch to care for their chicken, cattle and other livestock.
Rodefeld said she and her husband don't eat the beef they raise, but rather hunt for their meat whenever it's in season because they are both outdoor and hunting enthusiasts.
"When we decided to buy some land, the best option for us at the time was through a farm loan program, and part of that was a requirement to run cattle so we started doing that," Rodefeld explained. "The cattle pay the land bills and give us the land to do our hunting and fishing on. It's a symbiotic relationship - they help us do what we want to do."
In spending ample time outdoors, Rodefeld said her other passion is wildlife and nature photography, a hobby her late mother Jeano had also cherished and one she put to good use in compiling this cookbook, as most of those photos were taken by Rodefeld herself.
In this way, she said growing up in Rhinelander had a big impact on her love for the outdoors.
"My mom passed away when I was very young, and we lived right next to my grandparents," Rodefeld recalled. "My grandfather being on a resort, we went out fishing a lot with our guests. Since I was a little girl, just a toddler, he's been a huge influence on my fishing. My dad was into skeet shooting and all that, so I learned to handle firearms very young. When I met my husband, that took off with deer and bear and elk and moose and anything else we can hunt."
While her Grandpa Art was a big influence on her love for fishing, her grandmother Dorothy Seabloom had a big effect on her cooking, she said, and this cookbook was heavily influenced by her traditional recipes.
"My grandparents had a lot of Swedish influence from my great-grandmother and great-grandfather, so a lot of the recipes we got were from Sweden," Rodefeld said. "They traveled a lot when my dad was young. They were in Washington state, they were in Georgia, they were in Varadero, Cuba, for a year. So they picked up a lot of good recipes from the places they went and they made a lot of good friends. That was the internet of the day: you'd meet friends and share recipes."
"When you're a child of the Depression and your garden is your main source of food, you learn how to can and pickle," she added. "Borrowing a cup of sugar is how you stay connected with your neighbors and friends."
As with many recipes from the older generation, oftentimes her grandmother's recipes call for "a dash of this," "a sprinkle of that" or "a touch of this," because they cooked with whatever was available during the Great Depression. Rodefeld said she modified some of these recipes to cater to modern day measurements, but left some as is because of the stories behind them.
"A lot of it is trial and error," she said. "I learned by watching... so I found myself doing the same thing, because that's how I learned to cook... Nothing was ever written down, you just did it and you tasted it and if you needed something else, you stuck it in there."
The beginning of the cookbook gives context to many of these recipes and Rodefeld credits those family members for their contributions to each recipe.
"The story in the beginning explains everything from when my grandmother married my grandfather, they got married and he went off to war," Rodefeld explained. "So he was in World War II and he was a prisoner of war. When he was gone, she had my dad, and so she was a war bride with my dad. So the story evolves from her getting married to having kids to Grandpa coming back from POW camp and getting a job with the paper company and moving to all these different locations around the states and Cuba. So it chronicles her story."
This way, these recipes and anecdotes are a reflection of her family's history, and Rodefeld chronicled those oral histories simply by writing them down and compiling everything together.
This process actually started off as an informal means of keeping her family history alive, and ended with a published cookbook for the masses to enjoy.
"About 10 years ago, I put the book together, but I did it just for me and my aunts and uncles and cousins," Rodefeld added, "just so we had it as a family."
That book compiled almost a decade ago consisted of recipes written on half pages thrown together in a three-ring binder, which she distributed to her family. With the help of her second cousin Penny Weigand of Bellissima Publishing in California, she eventually had the opportunity to actually publish the cookbook and even add some recipes of her own.
Rodefeld said she's modified many of her own recipes over the years to suit her tastes. But having moved several times in her adult life, she said the culture of where she's living affects the food she's cooking.
"You adapt to where you live," Rodefeld commented. "When I was in Arkansas, that was a little bit different cooking... But we weren't there long enough to get in touch with that. But in Oklahoma, there's a lot of Mexican food... So it's pretty much a product of where you live."
"We've been in Maud now I think since 2002, so we've really gotten to know our neighbors and they've become like family to us," she continued. "So a lot of the recipes I'm getting have a lot of that southern touch to it, like okra, corn meal, Mexican food, that kind of thing. So I'm picking up a whole other end of cooking down here."
"Grandma's Best Recipes" is divided into sections, starting off with sweets and desserts. Rodefeld reminisced about her grandmother's traditional Fattingman recipe, or a type of Norwegian cookie made during the holidays.
"A lot of my favorites from (my grandma) were the Christmas cookies and the sweets and stuff she really put on for us for Christmas," Rodefeld recalled. "She made Christmas special for all of us."
Fudge, caramels, and of course, Grandma's Christmas sugar cookies, are featured in the dessert section of the cookbook. Next comes dips and snacks, and later, breads and pancakes, where Rodefeld provides recipes for lefse (a traditional soft Norwegian flatbread) and Swedish pancakes. The next section features side dishes, which includes recipes for beet pickles and potato pancakes.
Rodefeld also features an array of main entrees in her cookbook, including many traditional Swedish dishes.
"One of the family traditions was lutefisk," Rodefeld recalled lightheartedly. "It's a rather foul-smelling fish that I guess is a Swedish delicacy. So every Christmas, grandmother would bring great-grandmother up to her house along with all the sisters and she would cook this lutefisk."
"Those of us who knew it, we cleared out pretty quick," she laughed. "It was pretty nasty, but it was a delicacy and a tradition for great-grandmother, so grandma made sure she had that up until the end."
Even though Rodefeld said she isn't a fan of the Swedish delicacy, it was still important for her to include it in the book because it was a part of her grandmother and great-grandmother, and she kept all of their recipes for good, bad or indifferent.
Other main dish recipes include those for Danish chicken, Swedish meatballs, wine spiced duck, corned beef and kielbasa, among others. Rodefeld ends her cookbook with a miscellaneous section containing jams, spreads and other odds-and-ends, in addition to some savory soups and family mealtime prayers.
Rodefeld's cookbook "Grandma's Best Recipes" is available for purchase on Amazon books.
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