The smell of something sweet wafts through the house on Michigan Avenue as Nina Ochs bakes anise cookies and remembers her mother and grandmother’s Italian confections.
Made with sifted dry ingredients and oil measured in the shell of an egg, the soft, cake-like cookies have a distinct licorice flavor.
“My mom measured the oil using an egg shell,” Ochs said. “Normally, people will weigh out the oil, the shortening or the butter. My mother used shells of oil. She would crack the tip of the egg and remove the egg then measure the oil by egg shells. If you’re making a half a recipe of anise cookies, that’s six eggs so you would do three egg shells of oil for that recipe.”
Perched on the kitchen counter is a cookbook Ochs created along with a large 3 pound wooden rolling pin she uses, a 1947 wedding gift for her mother, Mary Ochs.
Preserving recipes and sharing stories about her family are important to the 69-year-old Monroe woman who started baking and cooking at age 10.
She often bakes with her sister, Ann Okkerse of Monroe and gets help from friends like Carol Miller and Lillian Williamson, both of Monroe, when she has large orders to fill.
Recently, Ochs and Miller started making and selling a variety of jams using Okkerse’s recipes.
Spending time in the kitchen is relaxing to Ochs, who likes to try new recipes and tweak old ones. She’s currently working on creating cherry chocolate biscotti.
In 2017, she started Nina’s Authentic Italian Cookies, a home-based business where orders can be placed by phone.
“Around Christmastime, I always made a lot of cookies for my neighbors and everybody that I knew got cookies,” Ochs said. “People started saying I needed to start a business so I did and got into the Monroe Farmers Market.”
Baking about four days a week, she makes a variety of cookies like anise and lemon drop, biscotti, pies, breads and cupcakes. She also has sugar free, gluten free and vegan options.
She posts on Facebook when she is attending an event so customers know where to find her and her confections. Customers can contact Ochs to place an order.
“I also bake for Easter, Mother’s Day, Thanksgiving and Christmas,” she said. “I will have a list on Facebook. Cookies and biscotti are sold by the pound, cupcakes are sold in a four pack and my pies are either 9- or 10-inch.”
Using family recipes is a way for Ochs to preserve her family’s history with future generations.
She estimates many recipes date back to the 1940s.
“I do have a recipe of my grandmother’s for oxtail soup and that’s got to be the oldest one from the early 1900s,” she added. “I started collecting recipes to do a cookbook and it turned into a family tree with pictures.”
Ochs says it’s important to know where you come from.
“I used to talk to my mom all the time and I loved her stories,” she said. “And I would tell these stories to my nieces and nephews. If they don’t know where they come from, they won’t know this history. It’s important to preserve that so that they can tell their children.”
— Contact reporter Lisa Vidaurri-Bowling at lvidaurribowling@gannett.com.
This article originally appeared on The Monroe News: This Monroe woman preserves the past with stories and authentic Italian cookies
Reporting by Lisa Vidaurri Bowling, The Monroe News / The Monroe News
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
