It was finding her grandmother's hand-written cheesecake recipe that inspired Hampstead dentist Dr Linda Greenwall to create a cook book.
Such scraps of paper link us to family and the past, but can be handed on to the next generation says the South African-born dentist.
"I found my grandmother's little recipe and realised that all those special memories created with the food that we taste, the food of the old country, are important to maintain," she says.
"That food has travelled thousands of miles and helped people through difficult times, it was cooked from the heart and often from memory. When we eat it at certain times over the years we are connected to those people and stories."
Food Memories The Cookbook started as a lockdown project after Dr Greenwall temporarily closed her practice and spent precious time with family preparing daily meals. They soon realised they needed to expand their repertoire, and sought dishes from extended family, friends and even patients. Many are now in the cookbook, which champions the vital role that food plays in Jewish culture and tradition.
"Our family has emigrated from many countries and collected recipes from all over the world. Each country had an influence on the way we prepare meals and cook. These recipes remind us of happy times and the family gatherings we enjoy together: Shabbat, Yomtovs and Simchas. I wanted to collect and collate them before they fade into distant memories," said Dr Greenwall, who hails from three generations of dentists and founded her business in Elm Terrace in the early 90s, when it was rare to find a female-owned practice.
"It still is," she says, adding that the practice was given a boost when the Ham&High's women's editor Ruth Gorb interviewed her for an article.
Dr Greenwall, who is both vegetarian, keeps Kosher, and doesn't eat sugar, has gathered family stories along with the 295 recipes. Dishes draw from the rich Jewish diaspora and some, like a Hungarian cherry cake, are attached to painful memories of hardship and prejudice. The recipe's very survival is a poignant testament to the endurance of the human spirit.
"Everyone has a story, and a recipe is really a story through food," says Dr Linda whose family fled Lithuania to escape persecution, bringing their food traditions with them - like the Jewish meat pies or perogen that she still bakes today.
In the book she explains how she returned to Eastern Europe and discovered many family members had perished in the Holocaust.
"One lady arrived in Australia and didn't know the hardship her grandmother had gone through, because often people didn't talk. They were escaping racial oppression. People have amazing stories and this simple food carries your memories and family values for the next generation to understand what food was eaten and why."
The book includes healthy salads, snacks, and soups and Dr Greenwall has tweaked some recipes to reduce the sugar and oil content and added her own twists to Jewish classics which she hopes will inspire ideas to serve at family get togethers.
She is saddened that the tradition of learning to cook at your grandmother's knee is on the wane, with fewer knowing how to cook traditional dishes such as Shabbat Challah and Shabbat Chicken Soup.
"Many people don't learn from their grandmothers until it's too late. I wish I had asked both my grandmothers a lot more questions," she says.
Dr Greenwall isn't making that mistake, baking 'Granny's hazelnut cookies' is a regular activity with her three-year-old granddaughter.
"She says 'I'm going to Grannny's to do some baking'. They only take 15 minutes and though she's only little, she can stand on a chair and mix them at the kitchen counter. We roll out those cookies together and she will always have those memories." 
Food Memories The Cookbook costs £48 and all profits benefit The Dental Wellness Trust, the charity founded by Dr Greenwall, which provides oral health programmes to tackle tooth decay amongst disadvantaged children in the UK and South Africa, including a mobile dental unit at the Dental Centre for Refugee Children in Camden.
Comments: Our rules
We want our comments to be a lively and valuable part of our community - a place where readers can debate and engage with the most important local issues. The ability to comment on our stories is a privilege, not a right, however, and that privilege may be withdrawn if it is abused or misused.
Please report any comments that break our rules.
Read the rules here