It has been my great pleasure this past year (2005) to review the recipe collection of my late husband, Ralph Merola, and select recipes that were his favorites.
My goal in doing this was to memorialize these recipes for Ralph's daughter Michele Merola Zwartjes and her daughters, Molly and Annie, so that they could enjoy reading about and preparing his favorite meals in the future, or just enjoy reading about Ralph's love of food and cooking. It seemed like a nice way to remember someone very special, who loved good food intensely, and who is no longer physically present in his kitchen.
The project soon became a very interesting and healing adventure for me, bringing forth wonderful memories of some of the very best times with Ralph - cooking and eating and discussing food!
As I began to compile the recipes, it occurred to me that it would be fun to illustrate the book, so I made some drawings and also enlisted the help of family and several artist friends to help me. Special thanks and hugs to artist friends Christine Cohen, Sandy Bellak, Marilyn Bagshaw, Win Normandi, and John D. Moore.
Aside from the many recipe books in our library (a very good number of which are Italian, of course), Ralph collected recipes from many sources, and put them in stacks for trying out later. I guess that of the recipes in the stacks, we probably only tried about 20% of them, played with them, and eventually discarded the rest. The recipes that actually made it into one of three large three-ring binders were usually those that we tried and liked a lot.
Therefore, most of the recipes in this website are from our three-ring binders, with many changes to some, and few changes to others (I have obtained permission where I felt a recipe was copyrighted and unchanged from its origin). In addition, there are recipes from friends and family that were really special to Ralph (although I don't know the origin of some of them). I also conferred with Ralph's daughter Michele regarding many favorite foods she recalled her Dad enjoyed.
I am also grateful to Ralph's first wife Christine Ferguson who is, in my opinion, the best cook in the family, and who fueled Ralph's insatiable appetite for good food by preparing great meals and encouraging his lifetime quest for great eating experiences.
This project began because I wanted to create a cookbook for Ralph's daughter and granddaughters. The idea of having the cookbook on the web frankly never occurred to me. I mentioned my book to my friend Raul Parolari while on a walk one day, and he said to me, "Colleen, have you ever considered putting this on the web?"
I am deeply grateful to Raul for his expertise and assistance in creating this website. Mille grazie, Raul!
May we all continue to enjoy and experience life, and all its wonderful flavors, to the fullest! As Ralph would say, Buon Appetito!
Colleen Johnson
February 2006
Important Notice and Disclaimer: Where appropriate, permission from copyright holders to certain recipes has been sought and granted. Most recipes presented in this website have been collected from many friends, articles and cookbooks over many years, and modified in many ways. Feel free to make your own modifications and improvements to these recipes! All of the artwork contained in this website is protected by copyright, and should not be reproduced without the express permission of the artist.
If you would like to contact mewith suggestions for the website, recipes or otherwise, please click on the box "contact Colleen", present at the end of every page.