GRANDMA'S KITCHEN
DIALOGUE
I don’t know why, but all that week the thought of going somewhere where someone was making food just for me made me think of when I was a little girl and how I used to look forward to visiting my grandparents. My papa’s parents had both died before I was born, but momma, both her parents were still alive, and we would go over to visit them every week, usually after we had all been at church.
(Pause in story as there is obviously a reflection on happy memories)
Grandma loved to cook, and I will always remember the wonderful smell of food that always seemed to be coming from her kitchen as soon as she opened the front door and we walked into her house. Often she would be baking some sort of bread, or maybe cake, and it was just magical waiting to find out what her surprise from the kitchen was that day. I have so many warm memories of that kitchen from when I was a little girl, memories that I never want to go away
SONG
Grandma’s kitchen
How I wish, that somehow
I could just go back there now
Spend another Sunday afternoon
Just one more visit
All of us sitting around the table
Just looking at her and grandpa
Even after a lifetime together
They were both still so in love
Still so in love with one another
DIALOGUE but more spoken over music in spoken jazz style
“I don’t know if it’s me or my cooking that he’s stayed for all of these years,” she always used to make that little joke, and we would always smile when grandpa told her “You know too well my love which of the two makes me stay here with you”. We would all laugh with them.
Cooking and life just seemed to be so interwoven with one another for them. Maybe that’s why they loved both so much, loved each other so much.
DIALOGUE – without music
Grandma’s special dish was meatballs with her own secret seasoning made with her very own, and very secret tomato sauce recipe. Nothing was ever allowed to come out of tins or packets, everything had to me made with “fresh ingredients and love”, that’s what she always used to tell me.
No matter how many times I asked grandma what her recipe was, she would never tell me. She would only look at me, smile and say “Viviana, that’s a secret between a mother and her daughter”. “When you are old enough, you will find that out from your mother”.
After dinner there was always a selection of baking to finish, a freshly baked cake or scones, but always some sort of cheesecake. That’s obviously where I get my love of cheesecakes from.
SONG
Grandma’s kitchen
How I wish, that somehow
Just to savour once more that smell
Of fresh baking in the air
Just one more visit
All of us sitting around the table
Just looking at her and grandpa
All of us still together
The sounds of laughter
Always floating in the air
I don’t know why, but all that week the thought of going somewhere where someone was making food just for me made me think of when I was a little girl and how I used to look forward to visiting my grandparents. My papa’s parents had both died before I was born, but momma, both her parents were still alive, and we would go over to visit them every week, usually after we had all been at church.
(Pause in story as there is obviously a reflection on happy memories)
Grandma loved to cook, and I will always remember the wonderful smell of food that always seemed to be coming from her kitchen as soon as she opened the front door and we walked into her house. Often she would be baking some sort of bread, or maybe cake, and it was just magical waiting to find out what her surprise from the kitchen was that day. I have so many warm memories of that kitchen from when I was a little girl, memories that I never want to go away
SONG
Grandma’s kitchen
How I wish, that somehow
I could just go back there now
Spend another Sunday afternoon
Just one more visit
All of us sitting around the table
Just looking at her and grandpa
Even after a lifetime together
They were both still so in love
Still so in love with one another
DIALOGUE but more spoken over music in spoken jazz style
“I don’t know if it’s me or my cooking that he’s stayed for all of these years,” she always used to make that little joke, and we would always smile when grandpa told her “You know too well my love which of the two makes me stay here with you”. We would all laugh with them.
Cooking and life just seemed to be so interwoven with one another for them. Maybe that’s why they loved both so much, loved each other so much.
DIALOGUE – without music
Grandma’s special dish was meatballs with her own secret seasoning made with her very own, and very secret tomato sauce recipe. Nothing was ever allowed to come out of tins or packets, everything had to me made with “fresh ingredients and love”, that’s what she always used to tell me.
No matter how many times I asked grandma what her recipe was, she would never tell me. She would only look at me, smile and say “Viviana, that’s a secret between a mother and her daughter”. “When you are old enough, you will find that out from your mother”.
After dinner there was always a selection of baking to finish, a freshly baked cake or scones, but always some sort of cheesecake. That’s obviously where I get my love of cheesecakes from.
SONG
Grandma’s kitchen
How I wish, that somehow
Just to savour once more that smell
Of fresh baking in the air
Just one more visit
All of us sitting around the table
Just looking at her and grandpa
All of us still together
The sounds of laughter
Always floating in the air
NOTE 1 – These words are from a 12 song cycle for a performance work called "Recipe For Love" The story is about that connection that we have between sharing food with the people closest to us, the memories that food can bring back to us, and of course our main girl/boy relationship story.
NOTE 2
There is a silent pause here as happy memories are obviously in her head, but then we change to sadness as “Empty Kitchen Cupboards” is the next song to come.
They are really two songs in one, but one happy, one sad, one hopeful, one knowing something has come to an end forever and the music reflects that – maybe one in major and the other in a minor key.
"Grandma's Kitchen" Copyright © Tom King 2022