My Aunt Thelma was known for her amazing cooking and her royal treatment of her many dogs over the years. She never had any children of her own so she also treated all her nieces and nephews like royalty too! I threw out all my very old spices but I think I will keep this one. That day, she had me retrieve HER Paprika from a box she had kept back her spices in when she moved to assisted living. This is HER Paprika. It must be decades old! I won't cook with it but, yes, I will treasure it, or at least the tin, and the memories it evokes.
I really can't imagine just how old this is! Very, very old, I am sure! We tease now, that everyone raved that she was such a good cook because by the time she got the meal done and served it was so late we were all starving!! She truly was an outstanding cook and entertainer!
Here is a recipe that is very close to the directions she gave my Mom and I that day.
I love this photo when she was young! This was taken at the Adolphus Hotel in Dallas. Aunt Thelma of course is the lovely one in the hat! That is my dad to her right in the Navy uniform.
She was a very elegant, regal, and refined lady! She was like a mix of Elizabeth Taylor and Martha Stewart!
This is Aunt Thelma's famous recipe in her handwriting for hot chicken salad! We all loved eating this in her home. She also made a mean carrot cake!
I still have this beautiful cotton handkercheif she gave me at my wedding and I carried it with my boquet as my "something old". My delightful Aunt Thelma was the only girl with three brothers. We cousins tease and yet truthfully say that we don't know for sure how many times she was married. Six, maybe seven? Our favorite of her husbands, and the one she was happily married to until he passed has to be our Uncle Fritz, or Fred. He was a criminal lawyer in Dallas and always had season tickets to the Dallas Cowboys!
Aunt Thelma and her brothers. Left to right, Robert, James D., my dad, and W.J.
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My mom, Dixie, Aunt Thelma, and Aunt Audrey. sister-in-laws
Aunt Lillian, Uncle W.J., and his sister, my Aunt Thelma.
Siblings and spouses. All in heaven now except the youngest, Aunt Audrey is still doing well and has survived them all.
This was at Aunt Thelma's 90th Birthday! Bill and I at her birthday luncheon in Kemp, Texas. She was very lucid and lovely as always, even at 90! This was in the summer and she passed the following November.
My beautiful mother, Dixie with Aunt Thelma at the Birthday party.
My oldest brother, Marc, with Aunt Thelma.
She was quite a lady! Many summers I flew up to Dallas by myself and got to spend a week with her. If my mother only knew what all Aunt Thelma taught me and let me do, I bet Mom would not have let me go! She taught me how to play poker, she let me drive before I was 16 and I realize now that my Uncle was usually pretty well inebriated when he came to pick me up from an afternoon of swimming at their country club! He drove me back to their lovely home in the country with a glass of scotch in one hand and the other on the steering wheel! I had no idea that was not really ok. I didn't drink, still don't and my parents didn't so I didn't really know that was dangerous. I must have had really good guardian angels! Aunt Thelma would cook, decorate, feed her dogs on china plates, garden, and entertain lavishly yet simply and elegantly. She worked at the court house several years and then got a job with her Aunt Sibil at the trade mart selling fine linens and the likes. She later ran a catering business and she bought, redid, and resold many darling houses in the Kaufman Kemp area. She delighted her siblings and their kids often with lovely weekends, holidays, parties, and various celebrations. Aunt Thelma touched my life by teaching me to live beautifully and savor every day. She demonstrated how to live graciously and how to make wherever you find yourself living, the most beautiful place you can and to entertain and love your family there often! She loved life, food, men, dogs, beauty, martinis, and much more! She said that she was really a Methodist even though the rest of her family were and are all Baptist! Laughter, good food, beautiful surroundings, and fun are all things that came to my mind when I found that tin of my Aunt Thelma's Hungarian Paprika.
This is Aunt Thelma's famous recipe in her handwriting for hot chicken salad! We all loved eating this in her home. She also made a mean carrot cake!
I still have this beautiful cotton handkercheif she gave me at my wedding and I carried it with my boquet as my "something old". My delightful Aunt Thelma was the only girl with three brothers. We cousins tease and yet truthfully say that we don't know for sure how many times she was married. Six, maybe seven? Our favorite of her husbands, and the one she was happily married to until he passed has to be our Uncle Fritz, or Fred. He was a criminal lawyer in Dallas and always had season tickets to the Dallas Cowboys!
Aunt Thelma and her brothers. Left to right, Robert, James D., my dad, and W.J.
div>
My mom, Dixie, Aunt Thelma, and Aunt Audrey. sister-in-laws
Aunt Lillian, Uncle W.J., and his sister, my Aunt Thelma.
Siblings and spouses. All in heaven now except the youngest, Aunt Audrey is still doing well and has survived them all.
This was at Aunt Thelma's 90th Birthday! Bill and I at her birthday luncheon in Kemp, Texas. She was very lucid and lovely as always, even at 90! This was in the summer and she passed the following November.
My beautiful mother, Dixie with Aunt Thelma at the Birthday party.
My oldest brother, Marc, with Aunt Thelma.
She was quite a lady! Many summers I flew up to Dallas by myself and got to spend a week with her. If my mother only knew what all Aunt Thelma taught me and let me do, I bet Mom would not have let me go! She taught me how to play poker, she let me drive before I was 16 and I realize now that my Uncle was usually pretty well inebriated when he came to pick me up from an afternoon of swimming at their country club! He drove me back to their lovely home in the country with a glass of scotch in one hand and the other on the steering wheel! I had no idea that was not really ok. I didn't drink, still don't and my parents didn't so I didn't really know that was dangerous. I must have had really good guardian angels! Aunt Thelma would cook, decorate, feed her dogs on china plates, garden, and entertain lavishly yet simply and elegantly. She worked at the court house several years and then got a job with her Aunt Sibil at the trade mart selling fine linens and the likes. She later ran a catering business and she bought, redid, and resold many darling houses in the Kaufman Kemp area. She delighted her siblings and their kids often with lovely weekends, holidays, parties, and various celebrations. Aunt Thelma touched my life by teaching me to live beautifully and savor every day. She demonstrated how to live graciously and how to make wherever you find yourself living, the most beautiful place you can and to entertain and love your family there often! She loved life, food, men, dogs, beauty, martinis, and much more! She said that she was really a Methodist even though the rest of her family were and are all Baptist! Laughter, good food, beautiful surroundings, and fun are all things that came to my mind when I found that tin of my Aunt Thelma's Hungarian Paprika. Thank you Lord for my Aunt Thelma and how I have part of her in me today. Thank you for family and food and good memories!
I hope you all have an "Aunt Thelma" in your life. I hope you can be an "Aunt Thelma" TO someone in your life!
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