In Jennifer Indig’s family, there are always her grandmothers’ cookies: thin mandlebread from grandma Mitzi and shortbread cookies topped with caramel, nuts, and chocolate, or turtle cookies, from grandma Syl. At every Rosh Hashanah gathering Jennifer and her husband have hosted since they started dating, cookies have graced the table. For their wedding rehearsal dinner, Jennifer’s mother Shelley baked countless cookies for dessert and mandel bread for guests to enjoy the next morning. But, in Jennifer’s family, a holiday or celebration isn’t required for these cookies to be served — there are often some stashed in the freezer, ready to be taken out of their cold home and enjoyed. 

Freezing her grandmothers’ cookies is a habit Jennifer inherited. Grandma Mitzi, her maternal grandmother, always kept her thin mandel bread stashed in the freezer for friends who would come by to play bridge. When Jennifer started to take an interest in cooking and baking, grandma Mitzi shared her recipe in her Florida kitchen where she spent the winter. Mitzi would purchase all of the ingredients and have them ready for a visit, but, “She would wait until I got there because she wanted to make them with me,” Jennifer says. 

Mitzi’s recipe was also passed down on a recipe card in a box Jennifer inherited when her mother Shelley passed away. It was tucked in among cards for other recipes including grandma Syl’s turtle cookies. Syl, whose full name was Sylvia, and her sister Liz (who family lore says invented this recipe) always kept these cookies on hand in their freezers. When Jennifer and her family arrived in Tucson for the family’s annual Thanksgiving celebration at Liz’s home, her father Alan would “go to see if the grandma Syl cookies were in there,” Jennifer says. 

When Jennifer delivered her first child, her mom was gravely ill with cancer, but insisted the family host a baby naming. Unable to bake or to attend because of her illness, Shelley’s best friend came over the day before to drop off sweets. Sadly, Shelley passed away a week later. More recently, when Jennifer’s brother had his first child, the family once again hosted a baby naming. “I know, had my mom been alive, she would have baked all of these recipes,” Jennifer says. “That’s the way she would have given of herself for this event.”

Living in New York and planning to fly to Chicago for the naming ceremony, Jennifer diligently baked and froze batches of grandma Syl and grandma Mitzi’s cookies, along with a recipe for Kermit or raisin walnut cookies from her sister-in-law’s grandmother Carole Lindes. “So there were cookies represented from all of these generations,” she says, even though her grandmothers and mother couldn’t be there. 

Jennifer, who gave birth to her son this week, had already mentally prepared to make cookies for the freezer for her son’s bris later this year. Those plans were halted by the pandemic. Still, Jennifer plans to bake cookies when she returns from the hospital. Of course, they will be popped into the freezer, ready for when family comes to visit.