Paper short abstract:

Kitchen was the area of women's labour, creativity and knowledge. Oral transmission was a centuries old form of passing down the culinary knowledge. With increasing literacy among women handwritten recipes were composed. The recipes recount stories of Slovenian families and their food culture.

Paper long abstract:

In the past hundred years, kitchen in Slovenia was, due to the lack of sufficient living spaces, often considered as the main living room. Since the idea that processing is essential for the "proper" or better kind of food was widespread in different cultural environments, kitchens were, as Claude Lévi-Strauss observed, spaces where nature was transformed into culture. In Slovenian homes of the past, the knowledge regarding the processing of foodstuffs and the preparation of meals belonged to the women's domain, and was transmitted orally within families from older generations of women to the younger. With greater literacy among women in the second half of the 19th century and at the beginning of the 20th century, collections of handwritten recipes were created, which were handed down through the female line of families. These contained recipes for everyday dishes as well as for some precious family recipes for special meals, which marked the important family occasions. On the basis of the analysis of the handwritten recipe anthologies and the related material acquired through narrative interviews, the author will examine the preparation of everyday and festive dishes, and the innovations that were implemented in Slovenian cuisine at the end of the 19th century and at the beginning of the 20th century. She will address the issues of integration and exclusion on the basis of culinary knowledge, the strengthening of the sense of belonging to family and broader social groups, and the preservation of family traditions.

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