Talking and cooking with sisters Ellen Abrams and Judy Steinhardt, along with their daughters, nieces, and granddaughters, is like being let into a private, familial world. Conversations ping pong quickly across the table and over the telephone wires. As one sister recalls something, she often stops to confirm with the other. When did the green leather chairs arrive in the living room in their childhood home in Scranton, Pennsylvania? And the floral wallpaper? Dust has gathered on some of the memories, but others are vivid and clear, particularly those of their late mother Ruth Abrams — and two of her most cherished recipes, a hearty soup (known as Mom’s soup in the family) and a classic chocolate cake, which the family shared with us.

Ruth was a tall, magnetic, and an exacting woman, the sisters explain. She was the queen of her community, the type of woman everyone knew. “She had an opinion about everything and she was never afraid to express this...but she was also a really fun loving party girl,” Judy explains. Her shoes always matched her outfit, her makeup was impeccable, and she layered an apron over her skirt when she was in the kitchen cooking, which was in the mornings, so she could spend the afternoon playing cards.

In their hometown, Ruth held a reputation as a talented cook, hosting friends, cooking for local charitable organizations, and winning a Pillsbury cake competition. (She was nudged to write a cookbook, though never did.) Even during the week, family dinners were approached with care and precision. Every night, a three-course meal graced their dining room, carried to the table on individual plates that Ruth assembled in the kitchen. If she deemed the dish too white, she would add a sprig of something green or a lemon slice. Ketchup never made it to the table in the jar; it was always placed in a bowl on a saucer and accompanied by a small spoon. “That was one of the rules,” Ellen says.

Ruth’s cooking was mid-century American — the sisters remember potato chips topped with cream cheese and a tiny glass of tomato juice as dinner appetizers — tinged by her mother Helen’s Hungarian roots. Her repertoire included brisket, halibut in tomato sauce, her homey soup made with marrow bones, root vegetables, and packets of Manischewitz soup mix, and a chocolate cake with white icing and a bitter chocolate drizzle, among many others.

“She would make the effort to make the things we loved,” Ellen adds. But she made them alone. Being in the kitchen with their mother was a rare event for the sisters. “When we were doing things in the kitchen, there was a little bit of tension that it be done correctly,” Ellen adds.

As adults, the sisters refused to let the recipes fade away. Judy learned to make some of them, including pickled cucumbers when Ruth visited her in Bedford, New York. Meanwhile, Ellen mastered them over the phone, calling every step of the way to ensure Ruth’s recipes remained intact, including the soup which she now makes for Rosh Hashanah and the cake, which is a family favorite for Thanksgiving.

But there were more recipes to gather than phone calls and cooking sessions could allow. So, when Ruth was in her 70s or 80s, Judy and Ellen asked her to gather all of the recipes they had growing up. The project yielded two spiral notebooks filled with newspaper clippings and scraps of paper taped to the pages. “This was her answer to a cookbook,” Ellen explains. “Stained with the drippings of chocolate and butter and vinegar.”

Today, Judy’s daughter Sara has the notebooks, which she’s working on copying for the family — making sure Ruth’s recipes are passed l’dor v’dor, from generation to generation.