I gripped the matte silver handle bar and braced myself for the worst: a black, burnt, hard-rock kugelis sitting in the middle of the oven. Surprise, surprise. For the fourth time that I cooked it since summer, I had still not managed to successfully recreate my grandmother’s masterpiece. Kugelis, a grated potato pie, is a traditional Lithuanian recipe that my grandma has perfected and always prepares during my stay. I vividly remember the day she agreed to teach me how to properly cook this dish.

My grandma and I entered through her apartment’s front door and trudged into the kitchen, both of us carrying heavy bags of food we had just bought from the market. I carefully placed the bags on the countertop to avoid smushing anything and joined my grandma at the sink to wash my hands with her rose-scented soap bar. I tied on a deep burgundy-colored apron with her initials, B.G., monogrammed on the front. Cooking this “welcome-back” dish is my grandmother’s way of showing her love and joy for my long-awaited arrival to Lithuania. Eager to learn how to cook kugelis just as well as she does — maybe even a tad better — I began to empty out the bags from our morning’s excursion: small hand-picked potatoes, onions, and freshly-laid chicken eggs. Since I was the clueless one in the kitchen, I followed the master chef.

My grandma pulled out a knife and started to peel the potato with the non-bladed side. When I tried to peel like her, the potato slipped out of my hand. After many unsuccessful attempts, I proudly managed to peel two, while my grandma had downsized the entire hill of potatoes to half without any complaints. I looked at how effortlessly she was doing the job. Her aged hand with stubby short fingers gripped the potato and rotated it slowly, while her other hand with the knife moved swiftly along its surface. She squinted her eyes slightly and furrowed her brow, which softly accentuated her forehead’s creases. A grin spread from cheek to cheek, breaking her determined expression. I couldn’t tell whether she was thinking how inept I was at peeling potatoes or whether she was enjoying our bonding time. Nevertheless, she didn’t criticize my humble skills and instead encouraged me: “Bandyk. Jau geriau.” (Keep trying. You’re doing better already). The more I peeled, the easier and faster it became, until a blister formed on my thumb from the constant rubbing with the wooden handled knife. I was on the verge of quitting, but instead decided to endure the minor pain. We then switched over to grating the naked, starchy potatoes. It was through this food preparation that I realized my grandma connected me to my Lithuanian heritage by the traditional food we were cooking and the language we spoke together. 

I reached for the onions and peeled off their flaky shells. As I sliced the first one into half, then fourths, and eighths, my eyes started to sting. My vision became blurry, and my nose started to run. Finally submitting to the fiery sensation, I reached for a napkin to wipe the tears from my eyes and blow my nose, just as my grandma immediately appeared by my side to finish slicing the onions. I sat down on a wooden stool and watched her hands expertly control the knife. Her eyes must’ve been made of steel because she didn’t wince even once. Perhaps when I am her age I will have steel-like eyes too, but until then I will have to slice many more onions.

While my grandma was sautéing the onions, I watched the sizzling, hard, rectangular-shaped, translucent pieces in the oil transform into enlarged golden-yellow, soft bits. I asked her: “How did you become such an expert in cooking kugelis?” She slowly turned to look at me deep in thought. Skillfully maneuvering the knife, she said that during the Soviet Occupation, there wasn’t much variety in the food, so the potato was one of the main staples. “My mom would cook many different potato meals, of which kugelis was my favorite,” she said.

I then asked her what life was like when she was a 17 year old like me, to which she replied: “It was the end of World War II and the Soviets had attacked again. I frequently hid under bridges to avoid getting killed or deported to Siberia when I was your age.” She sighed and then recounted turning on the TV, only to see the station losing connection. “Apparently, that night on January 13, 1991, the Soviets tried to reoccupy Lithuania. They attacked the TV tower and killed 14 unarmed civilians.” I realized how different my life was from hers during the Occupation. I finally understood that my grandma’s stories were not just a way for her to share her past experiences of struggle or success but a way for me to trek through a major part of Lithuania’s history. With Lithuanian culture suppressed during her childhood years, I felt proud to be able to freely and openly celebrate my Lithuanian heritage and proud for what my grandma overcame along with what my country accomplished.

I swung open her pearl white refrigerator door and reached for the pouch of raw milk, which I knew had a much stronger taste than the watery pasteurized milk I drink at home in Bradenton. My grandma boiled the milk, while I grabbed the frozen bacon and cut it into smaller pieces. I scraped the bacon bits into the same onion pan and poured in extra oil. They became crisp, sturdy pieces and turned a deep-burgundy. Suddenly, spritzes of oil landed on my hand. I jumped back from the stove and yelped in pain. With hesitation overriding my confidence, I remembered that I was in my grandmother’s kitchen with her by my side. Deep down, I knew that if she was cooking the bacon, she would ignore the little stings and carry on. With fear still flowing through my body, I mustered up the courage to take the spatula and did just as she would’ve done.

I mixed the boiling milk, grated potatoes, eggs, bacon and onions. I poured the mixture into a rectangular glass dish and put it into the preheated oven. Until the timer went off at the 60 minute mark, we prepared the sauce with fried bacon, sautéed onions and sour cream. We opened the oven when the timer rang, and to our delight, we had successfully baked kugelis. As my grandma placed the steaming dish on the stove, its scrumptious aroma filled the kitchen. My grandma took a serving spoon and carefully excised a big corner piece for me and a middle section for her. A soft, thin, dark-brown crust housed the moist, mushy inside. I poured the sauce on top and garnished both pieces with parsley leaves for some color and flair to the dull tanned yellow pie. As I took my first bite, the silky sauce meshed perfectly with the chunky bits of bacon.

My grandma and I nodded at each other in approval of our successful cooking. I began to think about how much effort we had put into making this dish. I saw how much patience my grandma had acquired throughout her 84 years of practice at perfecting kugelis. Her strong will to tough out any challenging situations revealed the burning desire within her to always finish what she started. I admired my grandma greatly; I knew that I wanted to grow up into a composed and persevering woman like her.

My mom called my name and I snapped back into reality. That’s right—I had managed to cook a completely burnt kugelis. But no big deal – I scraped the entire pie into the trashcan and decided to try again. I took a whole bag of potatoes from the pantry and started to peel, not with a peeler, but in the way my grandma had lovingly taught me. She was the one who encouraged me to persevere through life’s challenges, just like she and the generations that came before her.