When I think about it, I imagine one community’s potluck led to sharing handwritten recipes on note cards and scrap bits of paper that were later kept in a recipe box. I imagine that recipe box filled with collected bits of flotsam and jetsam was later transformed into a meticulously organized and handwritten notebook of favorite recipes. Then, I imagine some enterprising housewife carefully reproducing her own notebook multiple times to hand out to friends and family at future potlucks. Although the first known publishing of a community cookbook came from a group of women raising money during the Civil War, I imagine community cookbooks had a humbler beginning at the table of a potluck.

Kimi is also a Culinary Consultant & Cooking Instructor. Follow her blog No Return Ticket or find Cooking with Kimi on Facebook and Instagram.