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February

Grandma's Kitchen

COOLLECTING ARCHIVE

Bea Forte

7/26/20262 min read

At the end of the day, my favorite cake would be baked and my share of it carefully wrapped just for me. That was their way of reminding me how loved I was.

That's what love looked like to me. Not just the cake itself, but the making of it. The fact that someone remembered what I loved. The fact that they spent all day in a hot kitchen so I could take home something sweet.

To this day, I love to bake for the ones I love.

There's a word in Portuguese, partilhar, that means more than just dividing something into pieces. It means giving part of yourself. Your time. Your hands. Your kitchen.

That's what my grandma did. That's what my mom still does. That's what I'm trying to do here.

Brigadeiros are one of the first things I learned to make with my mom. Little chocolate truffles, rolled in sprinkles, made with just three ingredients. Later, when I moved to Philadelphia and my husband and I were dating long-distance, one of the first things I made for him were brigadeiros. I packed them carefully, sent them on the train with him. He ate half on the train ride home, the rest before bed.

Sometimes I still make them just for myself and eat them straight from the pot while watching a movie. But honestly? They always taste better when they're shared.

Love isn't just something you feel, it's something you do. You make it. You bake it. You wrap it carefully and hand it to someone and say, without words, I remembered what you love. I made this for you.

This month's bundle includes my brigadeiro recipe, the one my mom taught me, the one my grandma would have loved. I've also given you letter paper and a prompt: Write to someone you love. It could be your partner, your mom, your best friend, or your future self. Tell them why they matter.

Make something. Write something. Share it.

That's what partilhar means.

Partilhar é amar.

To share is to love.

Love, Bea

Dear Coollectors,

When I started designing this month's letter, I kept asking myself: What does love mean to me? What was my first reference for it?

And all I could think of was my grandmother's kitchen.

Her name was Beatriz. I was named after her.

Growing up, once a week, my grandma, my aunties, and my mom would gather in the kitchen and bake. All day. All sorts of cakes and breads, never forgetting to include everyone's favorites. And coming from a large family, that usually meant twenty cakes spread across the kitchen counter by the end of the day.

I remember me and my cousins arguing about who would get to lick the spoon and the bowls of leftover dough. (We all wanted the chocolate one.)