Monday, November 30, 2009

Spanish Rice

Take some rice. 2 c if you want to serve 8. Saute it in some fat for 5 minutes. Put either a can of diced tomatoes or a pint of home-bottled diced tomatoes. You want it to have onions and peppers and things like that in it. Add 1 t salt and 1 t cumin and 1 t chili powder, maybe a little can of diced green chilis. Cook it and stir it until the moisture is almost all evaporated/absorbed. Pour 3 1/2 c water over the rice. Boil. Lid on, heat to low. Cook 1/2 hour-ish, probably less if you are at a lower altitude than Utah.

Lemon Meringue Pie


This is perhaps the all-time favorite of the whole family. The buttery, salty crust with the tart lemony filling and the sweet billowy meringue: perfect. Prospective children-in-law must love it too in order to qualify.

Mom says: "I make it like the Joy, except I don't." Here is how she makes it.


Lemon Meringue Pie

Bake a nine inch pie shell.

Sift into a 2 or 3 quart saucepan:
1 1 /2 c sugar
6 T cornstarch
1/4 t salt
Gradually blend in:
1/2 c cold water
1/2 c fresh lemon juice
When smooth add, blending thoroughly:
3 well-beaten egg yolks
2 T butter
Add:
1 1/2 c milk
Bring mixture to a full boil, stirring gently. As it begins to thicken, reduce the heat and allow to simmer slowly 1 minute. Remove from heat and stir in 1 t lemon zest or about 1/4 t lemon oil. Preheat oven to 325 or 350. Pour it into the pie shell and cover with meringue:

2 egg whites, whipped till frothy
add: 1/4 t cream of tarter
Whip till stiff but not dry; peaks should lean over slightly. Beat in 1 T at a time:
3 T sugar or 4 T powdered sugar and 1/2 t vanilla.

Pie should bake for 10-15 minutes.

Eat it that same day.

Banana Cream Pie

Basically a vanilla pudding, perhaps stiffer. Mommy "probably from the Joy."

Then just layer it in a blind-baked pie crust with bananas, one or two, depending on your taste. Put whipped cream on it and serve it.

Mom's Grandma Atkin made this, and she served it when the pudding was a little bit warm and the whipped cream was cold.

Maple Cream Pie


This year, everyone at home got jurisdiction over two pies. Mine were maple cream and coconut cream, so I was pretty happy.

Maple Cream Pie

1 unbaked 9-inch pie shell
1 1/2 c cream
4 eggs, well-beaten
1/2 c maple syrup
dash salt

Topping:
1 c heavy cream
1/4 c maple sugar

Scald cream. Combine eggs and maple syrup and VERY slowly pour cream into egg mixture, stirring vigorously. Add salt and pour into an unbaked crust. Bake at 450 for 10 minutes and 350 for 30 minutes. After it is cooled, top with whipped cream mixed with the maple sugar.

Pecan Pie

Mommy wouldn't make this this year because it is "too sweet." It is rather sweet but I like it. This recipe is modified from one published in the Deseret News back in the day.

Pecan Pie

1/4 c butter
1 c light corn syrup
1 c brown sugar
3 large eggs, beaten
1/2 t lemon juice
1 t vanilla
1/2 t salt
1 1/2 c whole pecans
cinnamon
unbaked pie crust

Brown butter in saucepan till golden brown-- don't burn. In separate bowl, add corn syrup, sugar, eggs, lemon juice, vanilla, salt. Roll pecans in cinnamon, coating well, and arrange in bottom of pie crust. Pour mixture over pecans. Bake at 425 for 10 minutes, then 325 for 45-50 minutes.

Pumpkin Pie


Prepare a bottom crust, but do not bake it.

2 eggs, well-beaten
3/4 c brown sugar
2 c pumpkin
1/4 t ginger
1/4 t nutmeg
1 t cinnamon
1/2 t salt
1 2/3 c (basically a can) evaporated milk

Combine all filling ingredients and turn into a shell. Bake at 450 for 10 minutes, then a 350 oven for 30 minutes.

Mashed Potatoes

Mommy dictation:

Select your potatoes according to the number of eaters-- one potato per eater. Peel, wash, and cut them in quarter (or smaller) pieces. Cover them with salted water. Boil them for 25 minutes. Adjust the time depending on your altitude. While they boil put in a bowl (here's where you can get creative): salt, pepper, powdered milk, butter, and a little paprika for color. Pour the water off, saving a little in a cup. Put them in the bowl. Beat them up with the beaters and add a little extra water if you need to.

Turkey


Reb says, "Now teach me how to cook a turkey."

Mom says:

That's the easiest thing in the whole wide world!

Thaw him in the fridge. Then take him from his packaging and rinse him all over and dry him and salt his cavities. Then heat up the oven to 325. Get out your roasting pan. Now salt him on his top side and his bottom side. Start him with his breast side down for half the time. Then turn him over and finish baking him.

Stuffing


This is pretty much quoting Mom's oral dictation:

First you have to cut up in cubes some corn bread and some rye bread and some whole wheat bread and some white bread, and how much you cut up depends on how much you want to make. For the quantity [Mom] usually makes, half a loaf of each will do. Dry it in the oven at about 200. Put all the bread cubes in a big bowl. Saute onion and celery in butter; maybe half an onion and 1-2 sticks of celery. Stir that in. Sprinkle in rubbed sage to taste. Lightly moisten with chicken broth-- don't make it mushy. Add it a little at a time so the bread can absorb it. Beat up an egg and stir it in. Season it to taste. Put it in a buttered 9x13 pan (or two 8x8's). After you have removed from your turkey drippings sufficient to make your gravy, baste the dressing with the rest of it. Or you can stir it in before you put it in the pans. Bake at 350 until crusty and hot, perhaps a half hour.

Dixie Salad

Invented in Utah's Dixie for the use of pomegranates. I decided this year in a poorly quantified comparison study that, in fact, the small, beige, sort-of-ugly pomegranates that Grandma sends (straight fromUtah's Dixie) are in fact sweeter than the kernels that come from the plump red supermarket fruit. Hmm.

Dixie Salad

cube some yummy eating apples
shell some pomegranates
chop some pecans
stir them all up with whipped cream

Daddy Dixie Salad

don't put in pecans.
put in pistachios
or almonds
or cashews
but don't put in yucky old cockroach pecans.

Sannali Dixie Salad

Play around with the matrix-- she claims yogurt works.

Reija Dixie Salad

Chop up a Snickers bar and put it in.

Oh, and that reminds me of a joke. What do you call a ticking cow?
Abominable.

Wienerstube

I think these are a polarizing little cookie. I love them: I like how they are coal black. I like how they are spicy and chocolatey. I like how they are crisp but tender. But I think other people think they taste burnt because they look black and because the flavor combination is unusual to American taste buds. That's ok-- I'll eat them all. From Maida Heatter, these are supposedly German.

Wienerstube

1 ½ c AP flour
1 ½ t baking powder
¼ t salt
¾ t cinnamon
¼ t allspice
½ t finely ground black pepper
Pinch cayenne
¾ c black unsweetened cocoa powder
6 oz unsalted butter
1 ½ t vanilla extract
1 c sugar
1 egg

Sift together dries. Cream butter. Add vanilla, sugar; beat. Beat in egg. Gradually add dries. Tear off a strip of wax paper 16 inches long. Place dough down the length, forming a heavy strip about 10 in long. Fold the long sides up around the dough. Pressing against the paper with your hands, shape the dough into an oblong about 12 inches long and 2 ¾ inches thick. Wrap the dough in the paper. Put in freezer or refrigerator several hours, until firm. Oven to 375. Line cookie sheets with parchment. Unwrap the dough. Cut with sharp knife to ¼ inch slices. Bake 10-12 minutes.


Ginger Cookies

From the M-m-m-m More Cookies booklet published by Pillsbury in 1987. I think we made these fairly frequently, and they are yummy to me.

Ginger Cookies

2 c sugar
1 ½ c butter, softened
½ c molasses
2 eggs
4 ½ c AP flour
3 t soda
½ salt
2 t cinnamon
1 t cloves
1 t ginger
½ t nugmeg
Sugar to roll

Cream sugars, fat, and eggs. Stir in mixed dries. Fridge 1 hr. Oven to 350. Roll balls in sugar. Bake 8-12 min till set (should flatten). 10 dozen.

Crisp Chocolate Snaps

I suppose this is a lesser cookie in the Matheson cookiesphere, but I remember them, and I like them. So here they are. From the M-m-m-m More Cookie booklet, published by Pillsbury in 1987.

Crisp Chocolate Snaps

2 c sugar
1 c brown sugar
1 ½ c butter, softened
2 t vanilla
3 eggs
6 oz unsweetened chocolate, melted, cooled
½ t red food coloring, optional
4 c AP flour
2 t soda
1 t salt
Sugar to roll in

Oven to 350. Beat sugars and fat till light and fluffy. Add vanilla, eggs, chocolate, food coloring, blend well. Stir in mixed dries. Can be refrigerated to facilitate easier handling. Roll balls in sugar. Bake 8-12 minutes until set (should flatten). 6 dozen.

Linzer Cookies


We just barely made these. They're on the cooling racks. They smell delicious and I am liking to eat them, so even though I do not have a special linzer cookie cutter, I'll keep the recipe anyway. The recipe, I believe, came in the box of Fox Run brand linzer cookie cutters.

Linzer Cookies

1 1/4 c almond flour, or hazelnuts and almonds, ground fine
1 c unsalted butter
2/3 c sugar
2 large eggs
1 t vanilla
2 c AP flour
1 t baking powder
1 t cinnamon
1/4 t salt
1 t lemon zest
powdered sugar for dusting (I haven't used this yet)
1 c jam (the recipe suggests seedless raspberry. We're using guava right now, which is surprisingly not too tropical. The jam needs to be fairly smooth.)

Pre-heat oven to 375. Cream butter and sugar till light and creamy. Add eggs, then vanilla. In separate bowl, mix dries and spices. Add dries to wets, beat to combine. Place in freezer till firm, 30-40 min. Dust a surface with flour, roll dough to about 1/8". Cut even amounts of tops and bottoms. Bake cookies 8 minutes. Cool. Use about 1 t jam per sandwich cookie.


Yellow Turkey Casserole


A great favorite of ours for leftover turkey. If I post this on the blog, perhaps no one will have to ask for it again. Maybe if I get the courage I will ask Mom for the recipe for the other yellow turkey casserole. The other yellow turkey casserole? Yes. It has a creamy sauce, and I like it too. But this is the one with the little noodles and the rice.

Yellow Turkey Casserole

Butter a 9X13 glass dish.
Cover the bottom of the dish evenly with 2 c. raw rice.
Sprinkle evenly across the rice
1 t. salt and 1 t. curry powder. You may use more curry powder if you like.
Chop or dice
3 c. of leftover turkey or chicken meat.
Spread the turkey evenly across the rice.
Mince 1
/2 to 1 onion, 2 stalks celery and saute in butter until soft. Spread the vegetables evenly across the turkey.
Make according to package directions
one packet of the dry chicken noodle soup which wants 4 c. of water, with this change: use 5 c. water. You may substitute part or all of the water with chicken broth.
Ladle the hot soup over the stuff in the dish. Be careful so that you disturb things as little as possible. Save the noodles until last so that you can distribute them evenly over the surface of the dish.
Cover with foil and bake at 350 degrees F for one hour.
Uncover and serve.