Sarah Geiger loves to bake and to read. So maybe that’s why our cooking interview eventually turned to books! As we sat in the Geiger’s family room she pointed out a series of books written by Louise Andrews Kent. “My mother liked to read cookbooks and began reading the Mrs. Appleyard series in the 1950s,” she noted. “The author cooked with real butter and cream and avoided things like white bread, MSG, and other food additives. She had so many requests for her recipes, that she put together a personal cookbook that was eventually published as Mrs. Appleyard’s Kitchen.” Written with a large dose of good humor, cookbook reviewers agree that Mrs. Appleyard makes cooking fun.

Subsequent books are centered on life in rural Vermont and the gathering of friends for food celebrations. Of course, Mrs. Appleyard always provides recipes and cooking instructions. “The books are charming and very entertaining,” Sarah explained. Although her collection is not complete, she does own quite a few including a couple that she inherited from her mother.

For those of you already familiar with Sarah, better known as Mrs. Geiger to her students, you are aware of her connections with literature and the written word. Hired by USD 435 in 1981 to teach English at Abilene High School, she has been teaching some sort of communication skills ever since. That includes stints as an English teacher at AMS, teaching GED classes when her children were young, and her present assignments at the high school that include journalism and photography courses. She also is in charge of the newspaper (Booster) and yearbook staff.

Essentially, Sarah teaches her students to capture the present and remember the past even though their articles and features are not usually food based. However, Sarah does manage to bring her passion for baking into the classroom. For example, when the Yearbook Staff is putting in extra hours, Mrs. Geiger’s homemade brownies with ice cream are a welcome treat. Right before Christmas a biscuit and gravy breakfast has become a Booster tradition – one that the newspaper staff looks forward to every year.

Sarah traces her baking and cooking skills back to the family farm, located just outside of McPherson, Kansas. When she was twelve, her oldest sister left for college and her mother issued the ultimatum, “You are going to have to start cooking if I’m going to continue painting.” Mrs. Riddell, a skilled and talented tole painter, operated a home-based business and so the cooking chores fell to the oldest girl in the family.

“I had helped in the kitchen but had very little experience on my own. At an earlier point in time I could either join 4-H or enroll in dance class. Dance won out.” Sarah reminisced. She started off baking and explained, “Mom set out things in the kitchen and would then be in the next room if I needed help.” Toffee bars were one of her first endeavors and according to Sarah, “They were easy for a kid.” These bar cookies begin with a shortbread base that is topped with a layer of chocolate bars that melt over the surface. From toffee bars, she branched out into brownies using a 1928 McPherson Methodist Cook-book as her guide. Both cookie recipes are still family favorites and the brownie recipe is the one Sarah makes for the AHS Yearbook Staff. Either is just right for about any occasion.

Other early food memories involve Sarah’s maternal grandmother. “My mom was an only child so when her parents retired they moved to McPherson to be close to the grandchildren. We’d go to grandma’s house every Saturday for lunch and although she was really a good cook, she’d let us select our favorites for the meal which usually consisted of jelly on crackers, sardines or Vienna sausages, black olives, chocolate milk and cookies.” Not high on her list these days but certainly a memorable meal back then, she revealed. Sarah still makes Grandma Jones’s Cheese Pennies and describes them as slice and bake appetizer crackers that are really tasty.

Tony Geiger, Sarah’s husband, loves chocolate meringue pie and she makes it for him every Father’s Day and for his birthday, along with liver and onions. The couple’s children, Ben, Caroline, and Susie, are also fond of the pie but take a pass on liver!

A homey kitchen with an efficient work triangle and a double oven is deemed by Sarah as the ideal workspace. It’s also the perfect place to bake batches of her Butterhorn Rolls. The recipe was included as a part of a wedding gift from Janet Whitehair and Sarah’s been making them ever since. “I’ve never had a failure,” she pointed out.

Another recipe for Lace Cookies can be traced back to her childhood. Her mother made a classic version with nuts. These cookies get their name from the lace-like holes that form as they bake. These exquisite cookies are very fragile and delicate, with a crisp texture and buttery taste. Sarah loved the cookies but didn’t really care for the nuts so now makes Mrs. Appleyard’s version that uses oatmeal.

During the summer the Geigers grow tomatoes and Sarah makes a lot of BLT sandwiches. But, she can’t think of homegrown produce without being reminded of jars and jars of home canned produce that her grandmothers “put up” each year. “Food was so precious to them and I admire how good they were at preserving what they had on hand.” However she does lament the fact that much of her German heritage, on her father’s side of the family, has been lost. “Following the First World War there was such a trend to fit in, that my grandmother lost all her German ways, including cooking.”

Consequently Sarah strives to keep family traditions and heritage alive. Preparing recipes from her past is one way she likes to pay tribute to her family. “When I make recipes from my youth, I like to picture my grandmother or mother standing beside me as I work.”

Mrs. Appleyard was a firm believer in the theory that when friends and family get together, the food should not only be appropriate for the occasion and for the people involved, but also should be nothing short of irresistible. Sarah’s irresistible recipes use familiar ingredients and are just right for almost any occasion.