Meet the Mom

To understand Nanette Frantz’s  frame of reference toward food you should know about her Grandma Smith’s  messy kitchen.  There was always stuff on her countertops.  Much of that stuff was canned goods of the homemade variety.  She loved to can, mostly things she grew herself.  Nanette’s  love of gardening and home canning grew from a childhood fascination with Grandma Smith’s kitchen to a way of life.

Since getting married over three decades ago, Nanette has always canned fruit, vegetables, soups, meat, etc.  Her daughter, Olivia, grew up eating home canned foods and now engages in food preservation too.  They gather in the summer to cut, clean, and prepare summer’s bounty.  Nothing can match the glory of eating the best summer has to offer in the dead of winter.  It somehow holds the promise of another spring, another summer, another harvest. 

From the love of food preservation came a fondness for pure and simple homemade foods that began for Nanette early in life.  There was never been a time when she didn’t like to cook.  As a child she had children’s cookbooks, she  clipped recipes from magazines, and experimented with cooking for family members.  Before she married, she started collecting recipes in a metal recipe box (before the age of computer scanning and that glorious resource known as the internet).  The recipe box was gold with orange and brown mushrooms on it—for those of you who were alive in the 70’s you can probably visualize it.

Nanette’s other major influence was a grandmother who was a fabulous baker.  She could make the most wonderful rye bread and holiday goodies.  Every Christmas she made a Swedish tea ring to pay homage to her Swedish heritage.  She is gone now, but every Christmas Nanette makes that same tea ring for the family.

Nanette’s husband, of thirty five years, has enjoyed the culinary journey of wife and daughter.   He and Nanette live in Indiana with their dog Shelby.  They, including the dog, enjoy camping and even visit local farmers’ markets during their travels.

Food is tied up in emotions, memories, traditions, and milestones that mark and enrich our lives.  This “attitude” toward food is something Nanette and daughter, Olivia, share and they’d love to share it with you!

Getting to Know Olivia

            Olivia Coons was born loving the four walls of a kitchen.  She grew up learning how to cook while underfoot of her mother whether it was weekly dinner, or a special holiday meal.  Starting at the age of 10, Olivia began growing an herb garden with nearly 40 different types of herbs.  She soon began collecting snippets of recipes from newspapers, magazines, and about anywhere else she could find them.  Kitchen gadgets started appearing on Olivia’s Christmas lists, along with William Sonoma cookbooks.  At the end of her sophomore year of high school, Olivia was the youngest person accepted to the third ranked culinary school in the nation.  Olivia’s love of cooking has been life-long to say the least.  While she decided to pursue schooling and a career in education, she still enjoys cooking for her husband, her family, and her friends.  Olivia rarely meets a recipe she isn’t excited about collecting, trying, and sharing.  She also loves preserve food by canning, via both the water bath and pressure methods, and freezing.  She currently is embarking on a “back to the basics” portion of her recipe collection where she is striving to make basic kitchen staples that she long took for granted whether in the grocery store or restaurant setting.

            Olivia resides in northern Indiana.  She has been married for one year to her husband Dan.  They have one beloved pet, Annie, a mixed lab, retriever, and collie.  Olivia teaches middle school and also enjoys expressing her creativity through scrapbooking and card making.  She is a demonstrator for Stampin’ Up!, a home-based scrapbooking and card making supply company.    In the summer, you can most likely find Olivia in her garden, tending to both vegetables and flowers.  Many of the garden’s veggies end up in the canning recipes Olivia undertakes in the summer.  Olivia’s family is very important to her, and she enjoys spending lots of time with them!  She and her husband attend St. Anne’s Episcopal Church in the town they reside in as well.

            Expressing creativity through teaching, cooking, card making, and other various forms, is important to Olivia.  She welcomes questions and comments either here on the blog, or via e-mail at: chickensoupforthebowl@live.com