All of this started about 42 years ago, when my late wife and I started making all sorts of meals together, and this continued on for decades. We were thinking of publishing these, but never did (that was before the Internet age). For the last four years, I have been continuing what we had going, but with much guidance and assistance from my very long-time super-friend, Claude. It's time now to compile these and to present them.
My ancestry is 100% Polish. I still speak and write it fluently, and I love Polish music, food, and everything else. I have lived almost all my life in Canada. My late wife was 50% Irish ancestry and 50% Scottish. My friend Claude is 25% Scottish, 25% Irish, and 50% Ukrainian. My friends' ethnicities are anything and everything.
Living in Canada is truly something special. You get to buy and taste foods of nationalities from around the world, and you learn to make them, too. Over the years, we did exactly that. We were able to buy and use ingredients for Chinese, East Indian, Italian, French, German, Hungarian, and other dishes.
All three of us are experienced writers. We all found that recipes are often carelessly written, incomplete, vague, and that they have you scratching your head, wondering "what does THAT mean?" My parents said the same thing, and my late wife often said: "I don't think that anybody proofread this." Besides that, you DO have to use your own brain, too. If it says "fry all of this in
one teaspoon of butter or oil," and you immediately discover that your food burns, sticks, and stinks to high heaven, then you must decide to use more butter or oil!
And so it goes. Happy Cooking!
Joseph, in Memoriam Marilyn, and Claude
British Columbia, Canada, August, 2025
