The restaurant has remained in the same family throughout its history and Adela Gonzmart, one of the authors, is part of that family. Ferdie Pacheco, the other author, is a Ybor City native who spent a good part of his life in and around the Columbia. Both add many anecdotes about the restaurant and the family. It is a delicious reading experience.
Anyone interested in traditional Florida cooking will find Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings’ classic, Cross Creek Cookery, a delight. If her name sounds familiar, it’s because she is the Pulitzer-Prize winning author of The Yearling. After her success with The Yearling, she wrote a non-fiction account of her life at Cross Creek in rural central Florida. Since she enjoyed entertaining and was quite proud of her cooking skills, Cross Creek described many of her favorite dishes. That book was published in 1942 and was picked up by Book-of-the-Month Club. A special armed forces edition was sent overseas during World War II. As a result, she received a lot of mail wanting recipes for those dishes. Cross Creek Cookery was published later that same year. From the introduction:
Men in the Service have written me from Hawaii, the Philippines, Australia, Ireland and Egypt. Always there was a wistful comment on my talk of foods; often a mention of a boyhood kitchen memory. Eight out of ten letters from Cross Creek ask for a recipe, or pass on a recipe, or speak of suffering over my chat of Cross Creek dishes. Read More →
