With the prescience that comes from loving someone all your life, Claire Johnson’s grandfather, A.C. Simmons, insisted his wife Dorothy write down the luscious recipes that brought her family to the table for decades. He turned them into a cookbook that now is falling apart, but the tantalizing goodness that comes from the old-fashioned comfort food is still bringing smiles to the Johnson family.

Claire, who calls Southlake home, had lunch with her grandmother every Wednesday for years, enjoying the bounty of her table until Gramma moved to an assisted living facility. Even then, Claire and Gramma shared lunch on Wednesdays until Gramma passed away three years ago.

“Now I cook from her cookbook to be close to her,” Claire says. “She expressed her love through her cooking.”

Gramma’s mac and cheese is a family favorite; she made it every Wednesday for Claire’s daughters, Jenna, 17, and Lea, 15. Lea used to finish off the whole creamy bowl all by herself.

The girls, like their mother, have Gramma’s magic touch in the kitchen. Jenna bakes tomato dishes on Tomato Tuesdays, a practice she instituted in 2020. Lea, whose interest in art has left little time for cooking, is the baker in the family, drawing raves from her mother and sister for her lemon bars.

Gramma would serve pork chops with cream of mushroom gravy, relish salad and pecan pie with the mac and cheese. When you need the warmth of good, old-fashioned comfort cooking, take a page out of Gramma’s cookbook. The smile begins at the end of your fork.