With the extra time at home my son and I have been baking a different cookie each weekend. Baking is such a sensory process involving hearing the whir of the mixer, feeling the sticky batter as you knead it, smelling the aroma, looking for the right doneness and tasting your delicious treat. There are tons of memoirs, stories, and poems that have been about baking. Whether it’s a cozy mystery about a bakeshop owner or a memoir filled with life lessons and recipes, the culinary arts can be a great place to get inspiration for your writing.
Track down your favorite family recipe and brainstorm around it. What memories do you have making it with your grandparent, parent, or your own children? What part of the world is the recipe from and how did it make its way to your own kitchen? What other things do you associate with it? You can use your brainstorming for a poem or it could work its way into a fictional piece about someone baking for a special occasion. Perhaps it will inspire a memoir.
If you don’t have a recipe on hand, it’s the perfect time to reach out to a family member or friend whose passed culinary prowess has impressed and get one from them. Or borrow a cookbook and find a new recipe. Hoboken Residents can even take cooking classes from home with Universal Class such as bread baking 101.
This is the third in our new blog post series of writing prompts. We feature our favorite books and media with you earlier in the week, but every Friday we are sharing writing prompts to get you cooking up your own literary creations.
You can share what you are baking up with us in the comments!
Written by:
Aimee Harris
Head of Reference
Hoboken Library Staff Picks 