Miriam's kitchen

As a girl, Elizabeth Ehrlich loved to visit her grandmother's kitchens. These were busy, onion-scented, Yiddish-accented places. Within their steamy plaster walls, the grandmothers - remarkable women of insight, strength, and grace - preserved and handed on history, tradition, community connection, humor, and wry lessons of life. As an adult, Ehrlich followed the path of her assimilating clan, forgetting the kitchen lessons. Her memory was awakened by her mother-in-law, Miriam. A Holocaust survivor who had suffered unspeakable losses, Miriam cooked the flavorsome dishes and carried on the…