Living in Montana, Bobby Wallace missed his mother’s funeral in February 2022 while he was ill with COVID-19, unable to travel home to the Wyoming Valley.
Now, he wants to honor and celebrate her in a way he couldn’t then.
Wallace, a multimedia reporter and photographer in Joliet, Montana, has published an online book of generations of family recipes he found while cleaning out his mother’s house in Wyoming after her death.
Bonnie Wallace
“It was such a blessing,” Wallace said of his discovery. “There were all my mom’s, grandmother’s, and great-grandmother’s favorite recipes all in one place.”
The free online book, Bonnie’s Family Favorites Cookbook, is available at amazon.com.
“It’s very indicative of Northeastern Pennsylvania. There’s a lot of Polish recipes. There are a lot of bazaar foods,” Wallace said. “There is no end to what you can do with potatoes and onions, put it that way.”
Other recipes include Italian, German, French, Middle Eastern and Slovak recipes “that reflect the many ethnicities that make up Northeastern Pennsylvania’s diverse cultural heritage,” Wallace said.
Wallace, 56, said his family is “99 percent” of Polish descent.
His mother was an Ostowski. His father’s ancestors came from Poland, but the family surname was changed to Wallace along the way to sound less ethnic, he said.
Wallace said every family has at least one relative who is “the keeper of the recipes as well as records, preserving them to pass on for generations yet to be born.”
His mother was that person in his family, he said.
Wallace said his mother’s recipes range from desserts like “Lemon Yummy” to main courses like Chicken Francaise to comfort foods like cottage cheese and noodle casserole.
He also found an entry for Victory Pig-like pizza.
“Let me be clear, it’s not Victory Pig’s recipe. I’m not sure if anyone has their recipe,” Wallace said. “But it is a close approximation for people who live away and can’t get access to it.”
Wallace’s mother was born and raised on Hazle Street in Wilkes-Barre. Her father and his brothers operated “Ostrowski Brothers Meat Company.” She attended Wyoming Seminary, then Penn State and King’s College. Throughout her career, she was employed as an information systems director, a systems analyst, and a programmer for several companies in Northeast Pennsylvania.
Wallace’s mother started compiling family recipes, as well as ones she’d collected from friends and co-workers, in the 1980s. With almost every recipe, she would write a brief description about the dish, who liked it, its origins and on which occasions it was served.
Following her death, Wallace, who is an author of four books himself, thought it would be a good idea to make his mother a posthumous author by compiling a book of her recipes.
“This was a cathartic way to make good on my mom’s wish that these recipes be passed down to future generations,” Wallace said. “I miss my mom, and I always will. But with these recipes, when I make something from the cookbook, it’s a little like being a kid again sitting around the dinner table with my parents, eating some of the foods I grew up with.”
Originally Published: August 1, 2025 at 2:08 PM EDT
Dining and Cooking