Sherry Purdom

Aunt Jessie's Magic Ketchup Sherry Purdom

At 75, Aunt Jessie travels each summer to her native western Kentucky home, Golotown. She is known for "Aunt Jessie''s Ketchup" she produces from a family recipe during her stays. Using the sun ripened Kentucky tomatoes that are grown in family and neighbor''s gardens, she cooks up batches of the ketchup in her small blue pale trailer that was her mothers. One special summer Aunt Jessie''s ketchup turns magic when it receives a blue ribbon and $100 at the annual Fancy Farm Picnic. The win instills a desire to try a much larger competition in her winter Chicago home. After listening to dee-jay Joel Sebastian, announce the holiday cook-off contest on the WLS radio station, she decides to enter her homemade ketchup in the contest. The only dilemma she faces is trying to make the trip in Chicago''s snow storm. The fact that she has never driven and doesn''t know how, isn''t an obstacle. Instead, she asks for the help from Butterbean, a young man from the nearby grocery who delivers her groceries. The excursion and dilemma she faces prior to the contest convey a most heart-warming message about family, rural roots and recipes handed down from generation to generation.