Molly & Lily in the Kitchen

Grandma's Potato Soup

2011-04-23T22:31:00.000-07:00

7 medium potatoes, peeled and cubed
1 medium onion, chopped

Fry onion in 1/3 cup butter in large pot over medium heat until it starts to turn yellow.

Add 1 1/2 full Tbsps. flour and fry a little longer.

Add 1 tsp. paprika. Boil water. Add slowly to onion mixture. Bring to boil.

Add salt and pepper to taste. Add cubed potatoes and cook for 15-20 minutes.

Add one small container [8 fluid ozs.]of heavy cream. You can use milk instead but cream is yummier! Cook 3-4 minutes until cream is warmed through [do not allow to boil.]

Stir in 1 1/2 -2 Tbsps. vinegar just before serving. Sprinkle chopped parsley and some grated Parmesan cheese on each serving.Serve with hunks of fresh bread.

Sometimes I substitute a couple of leeks for the onion. Use only the white and pale green parts. Rinse thoroughly and thinly slice.

Optional: add some chopped carrots and/or celery along with the onion/leeks and any herbs you have on hand.

Turkey Gravy

2010-11-23T19:00:00.000-08:00

4 tablespoons turkey fat[from the drippings]
4 tablespoons flour
2 cups turkey stock, chicken stock or chicken broth heated almost to boiling
defatted drippings from the turkey roasting pan to taste
salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

Heat the turkey fat in a medium saute pan or pot over medium heat.
Whisk the flour into the fat and cook for two minutes.
Add the hot stock or broth whisking to combine.
Continue to heat, whisking occasionally, until the gravy shimmers and thickens, about five minutes.

Add the defatted drippings and the salt and pepper to taste and strain if desired.

Thin with a little more stock if necessary. Serve immediately. [About two cups eight servings.]

This is from the Washington Post---according to my aged newspaper clipping!

Yummy Yams

2010-11-23T17:01:00.000-08:00

This is our all-time favorite way to cook sweet potatoes for Thanksgiving.
I read the recipe over the phone to California Girl every year. She makes it, loves it, then promptly loses the recipe. So, a few days before the next Thanksgiving [namely today!] she calls, begging for the recipe, again! So, here it is, on the blog for all future Thanksgivings!

Yummy Yams

1/4 cup packed brown sugar

3 Tbsp butter at room temperature

3 Tbsp all-purpose flour

1/3 cup finely chopped pecans

6 medium yams or sweet potatoes--about 3 lbs. peeled and sliced 1/2 thick

1 1/2 cups heavy cream, heated.

Work brown sugar, butter and flour 'til well combined. Work in the pecans. Set aside. Can be prepared up to eight hours in advance and kept at room temperature...

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F and lightly grease a 9x13 pan.

Bring a large pot of lightly salted water to a boil. Add the sliced yams/sweet potatoes. Cook until crisp-tender, about 5 minutes. Do not overcook! Drain and rinse under cold running water.

Arrange yams in overlapping rows in the pan.[This can be done up to eight hours in advance of baking time, covered tightly with cling wrap and refrigerated.]

Pour heavy cream over yams and bake for twenty minutes.

Crumble pecan mixture over yams and continue baking 'til yams are tender and topping is browned, 20-30 minutes longer. Serves 8-12.

Tortilla Torte

2010-10-15T06:47:00.000-07:00

Our California Girl turned twenty eight this week.

Twenty Eight.

How is that even possible? Wasn't it just yesterday that she was in Mrs. Garrison's fourth grade class? And just the week before that, that all the kids in the neighbourhood crowded into our bedroom to hang over the sides of her crib and coo at the wonder of her, all curvy lips and petal-soft ears folded around her tiny-ness like a little pink rosebud? Not that life racing by me at breakneck speed is news....

Since I'm not there to bake her a cake, she decided to make one herself. One that doesn't even require baking. One she has loved since her teens. In a word [or two...] Tortilla Torte!

I searched and searched through my admittedly disorganized recipe "files." I almost gave up, but then it appeared, in a fairly predictable place. So without further ado, here it is, for California Girl, and you......

Tortilla Torte

1 12 oz. pkg. semisweet chocolate chips

2 8 oz. cartons sour cream

10 8" plain flour tortillas

In a medium saucepan melt chocolate over very low heat, stirring occasionally.

Stir in sour cream.

Remove from heat and allow to cool.

Place`one tortilla on a plate.

Spread a scant 1/3 cup chocolate mixture on top.

Repeat until all the tortillas and chocolate are used.

Chill, covered, several hours or overnight.

Decorate the top with whipped cream [or 1/2 cup sour cream mixed with 2 tablespoons powdered sugar] and strawberries.

While I was typing this on here for her, I got a call from California Girl.

"So mom, where's the recipe?"

"I'm typing it onto my blog for you, even as we speak! This way, next time you want to make it, and I have once again lost the recipe, we'll both know where to find it."

She had gone grocery shopping earlier in the day, knowing that she needed, at least, tortillas, sour cream and chocolate chips.

I started to tell her how to make it when, suddenly, she stopped. Silence.

"You're not going to believe this mom! I got the sour cream; I got the chocolate chips; I even got the strawberries, but I forgot the tortillas!"

Kind of like trying to build a house without the bricks!

This cake looks like one of those expensive European tortes with the multiple layers of paper-thin sponge cake! And it tastes surprisingly good for something requiring so few ingredients and so little time.

So, Happy Belated Birthday, Cali Girl! Don't eat it all at one sitting!

Zucchini Bread

2010-07-22T18:16:00.000-07:00

Another favourite from when we had zucchini coming out our ears in the garden in Montana. We often made the mistake of seeing a zucchini on the vine, and thinking we'd wait and pick it the next day. Then, next day, when we went to get it, we'd find it had tripled in size overnight! So....lots of Zucchini Bread!

Ingredients:

3 eggs

2 cups of sugar

1 tsp. of vanilla

3 cups of all purpose flour

1 tsp. baking soda

1/4 tsp. baking powder

2 cups grated zucchini

1 cup of vegetable oil

1 tsp. of salt

1 tsp of cinnamon

1/2 a cup of nuts, chopped

Beat the eggs, sugar and vanilla together in a large mixing bowl 'til well blended.

Mix the flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon and salt together in a medium bowl. Set aside.

Stir the 2 cups of shredded zucchini and the vegetable oil into the egg mixture. Add the dry ingredients and stir until they are thoroughly moistened. Turn into two loaf pans and bake at 350 degrees for 50-60 minutes, until a skewer or a toothpick, inserted in the center, comes out clean. Let sit on a rack in the pan for ten minutes, then invert bread onto the cooling rack. Cool thoroughly.

Wrap in cling wrap or foil and store in the fridge.

Tina's Banana Bread

2010-07-22T17:36:00.000-07:00

I think I got this recipe when we lived in Montana..........Long time ago! Been making it regularly ever since.

Ingredients:
# mashed, ripe bananas
1/2 cup melted butter [or margarine]
1 [scant] cup of sugar
1 1/2 cups flour [I sometimes mix half brown, and half white, flours and throw in 1/4 cup or so of wheat germ.....
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt---barely.

Mix the flour, salt and soda together in a medium bowl.

Break eggs into a larger bowl.

Add the sugar to the eggs and blend well.

Stir the mashed banana, the half cup of melted butter and the tsp. of vanilla into the egg and sugar mix. Blend well, then stir in the flour mixture until it is incorporated.

Grease and flour a bread pan [9"x5"x3"].

Pour in the batter and bake at 350 degrees F for 1 hour.

It gets very dark but must be baked the full time to make sure it is baked in the middle! Poke it with a metal skewer. When the skewer comes out clean the bread is done. Let the pan rest on a cooling rack for ten minutes, then invert the pan over the cooling rack and gently remove the loaf from the pan. Cool thoroughly before eating or storing.

To store, wrap in cling wrap or foil. It tastes even better if you store it wrapped, in the fridge, for a few days before eating, and it freezes beautifully. Defrost by letting it sit at room temperature for about an hour....

Tastes very good with butter or cream cheese.

Can make 18 regular size muffins....Bake for twenty minutes at 350 degrees F. Cool in pan for five minutes or so, then shake loose and cool thoroughly on wire rack.

Note: A handful of chopped nuts can be added with the banana.

Hummus

2010-03-19T18:33:00.000-07:00

We can't have Tanya eating, or worse, feeding her husband, hummus that tastes like bean dip with peanut butter! I've been making hummus for several years now, ever since various of my children declared they were becoming vegetarians, whether I liked it or not! I have nothing against vegetarians but I would have preferred they waited until I was no longer in charge of their care and feeding.....

When we lived in Belgium we used to buy the most delicious hummus from a vendor at one of the local open air markets. Back in the States, all we could find was the supermarket variety, a very anemic cousin of the real thing. And so the experiments started. I have made it with peanut butter, but never with soy sauce. Here is a version that seems to work for us:

2 cans of chickpeas
1 cup of tahini
1/4 cup olive oil
juice of one lemon, more if you like it lip-puckery!
3 Tablespoons water
good pinch of cayenne pepper
dash of Tabasco
several cloves of garlic, chopped
salt to taste
1/2 cup of chopped parsley [and a little more for garnish]
1/4 tsp paprika

Place all ingredients in food processor bowl and puree until smooth. Taste for seasoning. Amounts of all ingredients can be adjusted until you have a blend that tastes right to you. Good luck. It's so easy to make. You'll never buy store bought again....I hope!

Serve in a bowl sprinkled with extra chopped parsley and the paprika.

Can be used as a dip with crackers, or spread on bread....or eaten with a spoon!

Lily's Delicious Salmon Rub

2010-02-17T18:39:00.000-08:00

This is one of our favourite ways to season salmon........

1 Tblsp brown sugar

1 tsp each garlic powder, oregano, chili powder, paprika

Salt to taste

1/4 tsp thyme

Mix all together and sprinkle on salmon...Grill....Serve....Ummm, ummm, good!

Irish Soda Bread---with Raisins

2010-02-05T17:50:00.000-08:00

This recipe was in the latest [Feb/Mar.2010] issue of Cooking Club.com,in preparation, I'm sure, for St. Patrick's Day. I've made it twice in one week, so I think that means it's a keeper! Here it is, so I won't be fumbling through a stack of the magazines, trying to remember which issue it was in, and also for Pauline, my good blog friend.

Rustic Irish Soda Bread

1/2 cup dried currants or raisins

1/2 cup hot brewed black tea

2 tsps caraway seeds [I'm just quoting the recipe here. I hate caraway seeds which are a common ingredient in soda bread, so I always leave them out!]

1 cup all-purpose flour

3/4 cup whole wheat flour

3/4 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

3/4 cup buttermilk

2 Tblsps packed brown sugar

1 Tblsp melted butter

Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Grease a pie pan or small cookie sheet. I sometimes just sprinkle the pan with flour, no grease. Pour the hot tea over the raisins in a small bowl and let sit for ten minutes. Drain well.

Crush caraway seeds, if using, to release nauseating smell---oops! I mean fragrance!

Whisk flours, soda and salt together in a large bowl. Stir in raisins and, if you must, caraway seeds.

Combine buttermilk, melted butter and brown sugar. Gradually stir into dry ingredients just until they are moistened.

Knead dough a few times dusting with a little flour to keep it from sticking. Form the dough into a ball and place in pan. Flatten slightly to a thickness of 1 1/2 to 2 inches.

Dust lightly with flour and, with a sharp knife, cut a 1/2 deep cross on top of the bread. Legend has it, according to the magazine, that this allows the fairies or the devil to escape........sounds like a lot of mullarky to me!

Bake for 30 to 35 minutes or until the bread is golden brown, sounds hollow when the bottom is tapped and a skewer inserted in the center comes out clean.

Cool slightly on a wire rack before slicing. Try not to eat the whole thing at one sitting.....or maybe that's just a problem for me!

Note to Pauline: My favourite recipe for Brown Soda bread is in the post titled "Give Us This Day Our Daily Bread." You might also like my recipe for Tea Scones.

Cioppino---Fisherman's Stew

2009-12-04T18:21:00.000-08:00

Today started out so gray and rainy, I decided it would be the perfect day to finally make some stock from all the fiddly little bags of shrimp shells I had saved over the past six months and stuck in the freezer. Besides, the natives were getting restless. Complaining that there were so many of those little bags in there that there was no room for important items, like ice cream!

So I dug through and found them all and chucked them in a pot and poured some water over them [about six cups] and set the heat on medium. Meanwhile, I chopped some onions, carrots and celery and added them to the pot, along with a few bay leaves, some peppercorns, some chopped garlic and some leftover tomato paste [about two tablespoons]I had in the fridge. Then I sliced half a lemon into the mixture, stirred it all together and simmered it for about an hour. Half an hour would work, but I had all day!

I turned off the heat, let the mixture cool for a while, then strained it through a sieve and discarded all but the liquid. While it was cooling, I googled "seafood soup" and found this great recipe for Fisherman's Stew, or, if you want to sound very fancy, Cioppino! It was on a site called New Italian Recipes, by a couple of characters calling themselves Aunt Aletha and Dear Old Dave.

Cioppino Ingredients:

1/4 cup Extra Virgin Olive Oil
8-10 canned or bottled oil cured anchovies, diced
4-6 cloves garlic, sliced thinly
2 bay leafs
1/2 cup diced celery
1 medium to large onion, diced
1 roasted red bell pepper, diced
1 cup good rose or red wine
3 T red wine vinegar
1 quart homemade fish or shrimp soup stock
2 cups or more, (depending on how thick and how tomato-y you like it) homemade tomato sauce or a 28 oz can diced tomatoes
1/2 cup fresh basil, chopped or 2-3 T dried (add to seasoning mix if dried)
Dash or two of Tabasco Sauce
2 T Worcestershire sauce
1/4 cup fresh Italian Parsley
2-3 T fresh lemon juice

Seasoning Mix:

1 T salt
1 T black or mixed whole pepper
2 T dried oregano
1 T fennel seeds [since I hate fennel, I left this out!]
1 T fresh or dried rosemary leave

Seafood:

Just about everything works in Cioppino and Italian fish Stew or Soup recipes, but here are our recommendations:
1/2 lb. medium shrimp (save shells for making seafood stock)
1/2 lb. scallops
24 fresh mussels
1 lb. firm white fish, chopped in 1 inch pieces (cod, catfish, halibut, orange roughy, etc.)
16 fresh clams (optional)
(Fresh or canned oysters can be added if you like them)

Fresh bread of your choice, garlic baked if desired, and lots of it. (The juice is incredible)

Prepare the Cioppino:
Heat olive oil to medium and add anchovies. Add garlic after about 3 minutes.

Add bay leaves, onions, celery and bell pepper plus 1/2 of the seasoning mix. Sauté for 6-8 minutes.

Add wine, vinegar, Tabasco and Worcestershire and reduce by 1/2. Pour in the quart of shrimp stock, then add tomato sauce, basil and rest of the seasoning mix. Simmer about 5 minutes then add the lemon juice.

Add the fish and shellfish, cover and cook about 7 more minutes. Remove any of the mussels and clams that don't open.

Sprinkle the completed Italian fish stew with parsley. Serve with fresh, Italian bread.

This recipe serves four easily.

The Cioppino turned out delicious! I felt so virtuous using oregano, basil, rosemary and even a lemon from our own garden!

I'm not a big fan of anchovies, but they practically melted into the warm olive oil and just blended with the garlic for great flavour. If I hadn't made it myself I wouldn't have guessed there were anchovies in it.....

I used shrimp, scallops, mussels, and catfish, and since it was my first time making it, I stayed pretty much with the letter of the recipe. Didn't go off on any "creative" tangents!

We polished off an entire loaf of fresh Italian bread with the Cioppino. It was a huge hit with the OC, who is not given to superlatives, but I could tell he loved this one. Even when all the seafood is gone the juice is delicious mopped up with the bread.

The fact that I put it on here the same day I first made it is a testament to how good it was! I'll be making this again. It is a little pricey, but if you consider how much you'd pay for a meal like this at a restaurant, it's worth the splurge once in a while.

Apple Brined Turkey

2009-12-03T06:55:00.000-08:00

The OC found this recipe for turkey on the Weber barbeque site several years ago. It was the tastiest turkey we'd ever had, and so has become a Thanksgiving staple, both at our house and at Lily's.

For the brine:

2 quarts apple juice

1 lb brown sugar

1 c. kosher salt

2 quarts water

3 oranges, quartered

4 oz. fresh ginger, thinly sliced (mandolin)

15 whole cloves

6 bay leaves

6 large cloves garlic, crushed

1 turkey, 12-14 lbs

Vegetable oil for brushing turkey

In a large saucepan, over high heat, bring the apple juice, brown sugar and salt to a boil, stirring to dissolve the sugar and salt. Cook for one minute, remove from the heat and skim off the foam. Allow the mixture to cool to room temperature.

In a 5-gallon plastic bucket (Home Depot bucket works great) or other container large enough to easily hold the turkey, combine the water, oranges, ginger, cloves bay leaves and garlic (use a plastic trash bag inside the bucket to minimize the mess and cleanup effort). Add the apple juice mixture and stir.

Note: If you are in a warm climate you can use an insulated cooler instead of a bucket.

Remove and discard the fat from the turkey cavity. Reserve the neck and the giblets for another use, or discard. Rinse the turkey inside and out, drain, and submerge the turkey in the brine. If necessary, top with a heavy weight to make sure the turkey is completely immersed. Refrigerate for 24-hours (i.e. leave in your garage overnight).

Remove the turkey from the brine and pat with paper towels until dry. Tie the legs together with cotton string. Lightly brush the turkey with vegetable oil, and place on a roasting rack set inside a heavy gauge foil pan. To collect drippings for making gravy, pour a little water into the foil pan and replenish as needed to keep drippings from burning. Remove pan from under turkey about 30-minutes before bird should be done and make gravy. Continue cooking turkey until done.( we stuff the turkey with 2-3 quartered apples which are discarded when we carve the bird--meant to keep the inside moist) Grill indirectly over medium heat. When the wings are golden brown, after about 40-minutes, wrap them with aluminum foil to keep them from burning. Brush the rest of the turkey with vegetable oil. When the turkey breast is golden brown, after about 1-hour, cover the turkey with aluminum foil to prevent the skin from getting too brown. He turkey is done when the juices run clear, the internal temperature of the thickest part of the thighs is 180oF, and the internal temperature of the breast is 170oF. Figure about 11 to 13-minutes per pound.

Transfer the turkey to a cutting board or platter, cover loosely with aluminum foil, and allow to rest for 20-minutes before carving. Makes 12 to 15 servings.

Perfect Piecrust

2009-06-11T19:04:00.000-07:00

I use this recipe and one other [Vinegar Piecrust] whenever I need pastry, whether it's for Apple Pie, Chicken Pot Pie or Meat pies. It never lets me down. The trick is to mix it just until it holds together. Over-mixing makes any pastry tough. I usually have to use a little bit more ice water than called for, but I add it sparingly.....

Flaky Pastry for a Two Crust Pie

Mix 2 cups of flour with 1 tsp salt.

Cut in 3/4 cup shortening [I use Crisco]until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs.

Sprinkle 5-6 Tblsps cold water, a Tblsp at a time, into the mixture, stirring lightly with a fork until pastry is just moist enough to hold together. Shape into a slightly flattened ball and chill until needed.

For a One Crust Pie use 1 cup of flour, 1/2 tsp salt, 1/4 cup plus 2 Tblsps shortening, 2-3 Tblsps ice water and proceed as above.

Cake-n-Cheesecake

2009-03-29T20:20:00.000-07:00

This is one of my all time favourite dessert recipes. Got it from a neighbour when we lived in Montana, waaaay back in the mid 1970s. So. Thirty plus years. And I've easily made it a minimum of six times each of those years......Giving us a total somewhere in the 200 cake range? It's simple to make and it's always a hit!

Read the recipe all the way through before you start.

Filling:

1 8 oz. pkg. of cream cheese
2/3 cups of sugar
1/2 cup of sour cream
1 tsp. vanilla
2 eggs

Cream the cheese with the sugar.
Add sour cream and vanilla.
Blend in the eggs.
Mix well and set aside.

Cake

Sift together:

1 cup of flour
1 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp salt

In a large bowl cream:

1/2 cup of butter with 2/3 cups of sugar.
Add 2 eggs, one at a time, beating well after each.
Add 1 Tbsp milk and 1 tsp vanilla.

Add dry ingredients to creamed mixture and blend well.

Turn into a greased 10" pie plate [I use Pyrex.]Spread batter evenly over the bottom and up the sides.

Pour the cheese mixture over the batter.
Bake at 325 degrees for 40-45 mins. until no longer jiggly in the center.
Cool on a wire rack. Top with strawberry glaze and chill until ready to serve.
Sometimes I skip the strawberry glaze. It's yummy all by itself! But for company it looks prettier with fruit on top....

Strawberry Glaze

You can keep this as simple as slicing strawberries and arranging them on top, if it's going to be served right away, and if your strawberries are nice and sweet. Or you can make a glaze from

2 cups of crushed or chopped berries
1/2 - 3/4 cup water
2 Tbsp sugar
1 1/2 tsp cornstarch

Stir sugar and cornstarch together. Add water and berries. Cook and stir over medium heat until liquid thickens and becomes clear. Let cool slightly before pouring over the pie. Cool completely. After serving [if there's any left!] cover and refrigerate. As you can see from the picture, I wasn't quite fast enough with the camera....

Tea Scones

2009-03-04T14:13:00.000-08:00

My recipe for these scones is on an ancient piece of lined copybook paper. It is worn thin with age, all brown-spotted and tattered, and I'm afraid, if I don't get it on the blog here soon, it may just get thin enough to disappear altogether! Don't count on these scones to make you, or any part of you, disappear though! With fully one and a half sticks of butter there's very little chance they'd help anyone trying to lose weight! But it's okay to indulge once in a while!

3 cups all purpose flour
2 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
3/4 cup butter [1 1/2 sticks or 6 oz.]
3/4 cup dark or yellow raisins, or currants, washed and dried
1 cup buttermilk
1/4 cup light cream

Combine flour, baking powder, sugar, baking soda and salt. Stir with a whisk to blend well.
Cut butter into flour mix with knives until it looks like coarse meal. I switch to a pastry cutter to finish the job.
Add raisins or currants.
Gradually add buttermilk, mixing only enough to wet the dry ingredients. If needed add a little more buttermilk until the ingredients hold together.
Turn out onto a well floured surface and pat gently [or use a rolling pin]to 1/2" thickness.
With a sharp floured knife cut into 2" -2 1/2" strips, then crosswise into squares.
Place on a buttered cookie sheet, leaving a little breathing room between!
Brush tops with cream and sprinkle with a little sugar.
Bake at 450 degrees F for 15-18 minutes, until golden .
Serve warm with more butter, jam, marmalade, cheese, or all by themselves! With a big cup of tea, of course.

Whenever my mother made scones she wouldn't let us eat them 'til they cooled off. "They'll sit like stones in your stomachs," was her rationale. What a waste! They're best eaten warm from the oven, though there's nothing wrong with them toasted the next morning for breakfast, if they last that long.

Brickle

2009-01-27T10:30:00.000-08:00

Sometimes the best medicine for soothing the soul and calming ruffled feathers is chocolate! I made a batch of this last night [I had actually meant to make it for Christmas..... So goes my life!] Then, this morning I spent a few hours at HQ with the Ancient Ones. Listening to my father-in-law refusing to listen to anyone because no-one could have as tight a grip on the facts as he does. Oy! So, when I came home, I was delighted to find the brickle in the fridge, and ate way more of it than was prudent. But,it made me feel much better!

40 Saltine crackers
1 cup [two sticks] butter
1 cup brown sugar
1 12oz pkg chocolate chips
chopped nuts

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F
Cover cookie sheet with foil.
Place whole saltine crackers in single layer on foil.
On stove, melt butter and brown sugar. Bring to a full boil and cook 3 minutes.
Sprinkle chocolate chips on top.Leave until melted. Spread the chocolate evenly over the crackers and sprinkle with nuts.
Refrigerate for at least 4 hours.Break into pieces.
Store in airtight container in refrigerator.

Eat Your Broccoli---Again!

2009-01-25T19:50:00.000-08:00

This recipe is a tiny bit more complicated than the first broccoli salad, but still very easy and delicious. They are both best eaten the same day they're made, as if kept too long they turn soggy. That's not a problem around here, ever! You might wish there'd be a little left for lunch the next day......

Broccoli, Mushroom and Salad

1 whole egg
1 egg yolk
1/3 cup sugar
1/2 tsp dry mustard
1 1/2 tsp cornstarch
1/4 cup white vinegar
1/4 cup water
1/2 tsp salt, divided
1 Tbsp unsalted butter, cut into bits and softened
1/2 cup mayonnaise
4-5 cups broccoli florets, blanched, if desired
1 cup raisins
1 cup mushrooms, sliced
1/2 cup chopped red onion
6 slices bacon, cooked until crisp and crumbled
1/4 tsp black pepper

In a small bowl, whisk together the egg, egg yolk, sugar,mustard and cornstarch.

In a small saucepan, combine vinegar, water and 1/4 tsp salt. Bring to a boil over medium heat. Whisk in the egg mixture and cook, whisking constantly, for 1 minute or until thick. Remove from heat and whisk in butter and mayonnaise. Cover and chill the dressing.

In a large bowl, combine broccoli, raisins, mushrooms, onion, and bacon [if using.]

Pour the dressing in and toss gently. Sprinkle with remaining 1/4 tsp salt and the pepper before serving. Makes about eight servings.

Eat Your Broccoli!

2009-01-25T09:56:00.000-08:00

One of my favourite ways to eat broccoli is in broccoli salad. If you're on the fence about this vegetable, don't decide you don't like it until you've tried it this way....

Broccoli Delight Salad---Fast, easy and delicious.

1 large bunch broccoli [about 5 cups cut up.]
1 cup raisins
1 cup sunflower seeds
1/4 red onion, finely diced
10-12 strips bacon,fried, drained and crumbled [I leave this out more often than I include it.]

Dressing:
3/4cup mayonnaise
2 Tbsp vinegar
5 Tbsp [scant-unless you want it very sweet!]sugar

Combine dressing ingredients. Whisk until creamy.

Put washed, well drained broccoli in a large bowl. I like to blanch the broccoli briefly [approx.3 mins.] so it's not quite so crunchy, but you don't have to. The important word is "briefly!" Nothing is less appetizing than over cooked, mushy broccoli....After the 2-3 minutes, remove the broccoli and plunge it into cold water [to stop the cooking.] Rinse, shake out excess water and proceed.

Add raisins, sunflower seeds and red onion.Puor dressing over this mixture and toss gently.

Refrigerate, covered, for at least 3 hours.

Even the OC, who is by no means crazy about broccoli, will eat this without complaint!

Corn Chowder

2009-01-24T12:31:00.000-08:00

The first time I had this soup was when I visited my oldest son after the birth of his [now] four year old son. Their neighbours brought a big pot of it over one evening and I thought, if there is a food that defines heaven, this is it!

Best Corn Chowder Ever!

8 ears [or more] fresh corn
8 cups of vegetable stock [can also use chicken stock if you prefer]
2 cloves of garlic, peeled and bruised
2 Tbsp unsalted butter
1 large Spanish onion, chopped
2 stalks of celery chopped
2 leeks or scallions or ramps [I must admit I have no idea what a "ramp" is, other than a way to exit the highway!]
2 red bell peppers, seeded and chopped
2 tsp dried thyme
2 bay leaves
2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
6 medium potatoes, peeled and cut in 1" cubes
1 or two zucchini halved lengthwise and sliced
1/2 cup heavy cream
1 tsp fresh garlic, minced
1 bunch of fresh chives sliced into 3/4" strips

Slice the kernels from the corn into a large bowl and set aside.

Simmer the cobs, vegetable stock and garlic in a large pot, partially covered, for 30 minutes.

Remove cobs and discard. Set the stock aside for now.

Melt butter in another large pot. Add onion, celery, leeks and red peppers and sweat for four minutes, until tender. Add thyme, bay leaves, salt and cayenne and stir to coat the vegetables.

Next add the corn kernels and potatoes and reserved stock and bring to a boil.

Reduce heat. Simmer 30 minutes.

Add zucchini and simmer 5 minutes more. Stir in heavy cream. [I've also seen recipes that add up to 2 cups of milk at this point instead of, or in addition to, cream.]

Remove bay leaves.

Puree about a quarter of the chowder in a blender or food processor [ use an immersion blender if you have one.] Return the puree to the pot and mix well. Remove from heat and stir in garlic. Ladle chowder into bowls and sprinkle with chives.

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The menfolk around here like to add Tabasco and more cayenne to spice it up, but I like to actually taste the vegetables! If I have day old French bread around I break it into the soup. Old habits die hard! Whenever my mother made soup we always broke chunks of bread into it.....

Apple Cake Pictures........

2008-11-11T09:54:00.000-08:00

This recipe was posted last week by Lily. I've been asleep at the wheel,[or made crazy by NaBloPoMo!]ever since.] This is, hands down, the most delicious apple cake ever! You just need to be sure it's cooked all the way through. You don't want mush, where scrumptious should be! So poke it with a skewer until it comes out clean....

Apple Cake

2008-11-05T21:07:00.000-08:00

Poor long-suffering Molly, typed this recipe up for us when she was visiting in October after our apple picking excursion left us with a bounty of apples which led us into all sorts of baking adventures.

Molly would dearly love for me to give you the details on the recipe. I got it from Beth Schultz in Nashville, TN, a lovely gal who hosted a lovely cooking themed wedding shower for me and with whom I am no longer in contact -- as happens over and over again because I am a BAD communicator. The recipe came with an angel food cake pan and I do think fondly of Beth each time I make it. Unfortunately, I don't make it often because I am the main consumer of baked goods in our house and I don't need to eat that much apple cake.

So, please, enjoy a slice for me when you make it.

Apple Cake

Before you start preheat the oven to 350 degrees F and grease an angel food or bundt cake pan.

3 large or medium apples,peeled, cored and thinly sliced

2 tsp cinnamon and 5 Ttbsp sugar---mix together and set aside.

Combine:

3 cups flour [unsifted]

2 cups sugar

3 tsp baking powder

4 eggs

2 1/2 tsp vanilla

i cup of vegetable oil

1/4 cup orange juice

Beat together until smooth.

Pour half the batter into the greased pan.

Arrange half of the apple slices on top, and sprinkle with some of the cinnamon/sugar mixture.

Cover with layers of remaining batter, apples and cinnamon mixture.

Bake for one hour and fifteen minutes, or until done.

Apple Torte

2008-10-31T18:32:00.000-07:00

While visiting Lily, in Ohio, we went apple picking, which led to apple baking, so when I came home, with the heavenly aromas still in my nostrils, I did it all over again, here, for the OC and the Bean. Apple Torte is easy and delicious. I can't remember where I got the recipe, but it's on a newspaper clipping taped inside the cover of my favourite, bulging recipe book, with a note to myself to slice the apples thinly.

Apple Torte

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F

For Crust:
1 cup all purpose flour
1/3 cup sugar
1/2 tsp. vanilla
1/2 cup of well chilled butter, cut into pieces

Combine flour, sugar and vanilla in medium bowl. Cut in the butter with a pastry blender [or two knives]until mixture resembles coarse meal.
Press into bottom and sides of a 10" springform pan.
Bake until golden, about 5 mins. Cool to room temperature.

Increase oven temperature to 450 degrees F

For Filling:
2 8 oz. pkgs. cream cheese at room temperature
1/2 cup sugar
1 tsp. vanilla
2 eggs

Beat cream cheese, sugar and vanilla with electric mixer until smooth. Beat in eggs, one at a time. Spoon into crust.

For Topping:
2 large green apples, peeled, cored and thinly sliced
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp vanilla
1/3 cup coarsely chopped nuts

Mix apples, sugar, cinnamon and vanilla. Spoon over cream cheese layer, spreading evenly. Sprinkle with nuts.

Bake 15 minutes.

Reduce oven temperature to 350 degrees F. Continue baking about 45 minutes, or until tester comes out clean. Cool torte completely in pan on a rack. Refrigerate.

Let stand 30 minutes before serving.

"Give Us This Day Our Daily Bread....."

2008-10-22T20:25:00.000-07:00

We ate a lot of Irish soda bread when I was growing up. Breakfast, all through the winter, consisted of big bowls of porridge with milk and sugar, and thick slices of home made soda bread, washed down with gallons of strong hot tea.

My father started the porridge in the evening in the double boiler. There was no "quick" or "instant" in those days. Just as there was no mind-boggling array of sugar-coated dry cereals. Oh, they existed alright, just not at our house, much as we might have longed for them. My mother had fixed ideas about what was good for growing children. Sugary, dry cereals did not feature on her list. And in matters of nutrition, she was the boss, just as she was in the realm of shoe selection! You ate your porridge or you went to school hungry; you wore your brown, sensible [B.O.R.I.N.G ]lace up shoes or you went barefoot. Needless to say, I never went to school hungry or barefoot. Rebellion never entered my mind.....

Fortunately, we didn't only have porridge. When you had choked down a big bowl of the stuff, you could have as many slices of brown bread as you wanted. No holds barred on how much butter or marmalade you slathered on! The weather was damp and chilly in Winter, and often in Spring and Autumn too. My mother believed a big breakfast got us off to a healthy start. It was a given that we'd learn better on a full stomach. She would have scoffed to hear about all the time and money that is wasted on surveys and studies these days to find out what common sense told her.

Back then, brown bread was just part of the landscape. But now it's one of my favourite foods. The Lads [the OC and the Bean] can take it or leave it, but for me it's comfort food; conjures up memories of coming in from school on a chilly winter day to find the kitchen filled with the heavenly smell of baking bread. And it's so easy to make.........

It would sound romantic to say this recipe was handed down to me from my mother. But I was far from her when I became interested in baking bread myself. Many's the loaf of Irish bread I've baked along the way that could have been used to prop the door open, or to sink the body before the cops arrived....And then I found this recipe in the Minneapolis Star Tribune, one year, on St.Patrick's Day. Of all the Irish bread recipes I've tried, it's my favourite.

O'Brien Irish Bread

1 1/2 cups stone-ground whole wheat flour

1 cup all-purpose flour [I use 3/4 a.p. flour and 1/4 cup of wheat germ]

1/4 cup dry oat bran hot cereal

1/4 cup regular rolled oats

2 tbsp sugar

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

2 tbsp soft butter

1 1/2 cups buttermilk, divided

3 tbsp melted butter

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Dust a baking sheey with flour.
In a large bowl combine both flours, dry cereal, oats, sugar, baking soda, baking powder and salt. Stir with a whisk to blend well.

Cut in the soft butter.

Stir in 1 1/4 cups buttermilk. Gradually add remaining 1/4 cup buttermilk, kneading in the bowl as little as possible until dough is moist.

Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface and roll into a 7" round loaf. Place loaf on the floured baking sheet. With a sharp knife cut an "x" into the surface

Bake bread for 40-45 minutes,until it is golden brown and sounds hollow when tapped with a knife.

Remove bread from the oven and place on a wire rack. Brush loaf with melted butter and allow to cool at least one hour before slicing.

This bread is delicious with butter and marmalade for breakfast. Or maybe you have to be Irish to think so!

Welcome!

2008-10-11T18:02:00.000-07:00

Lily and I have been basking in sunshine, this past week, here in Ohio. We've spread a blanket at the park, and soaked up the last rays of summer, while the puppies played, and ran and tumbled around us. We talked of family and children; friends and enemies; statesmanlike candidates and pit bulls with lipstick; quilting and knitting; Wall street horrors and Halloween costumes; Florida vs. Ohio [she keeps pointing out houses for sale in her neighbourhood!] And recipes.

Ah yes! Recipes! Jess at Daysgoby tagged me a while back to do a meme: Eight things You Want To Do before You Die. One of them would be to tame the Recipe Monster. When I got married I couldn't boil an egg, to the horror and consternation of Maria, my mother-in-law. She thought her darling Sonny Boy was going to starve to death. Thirty eight years later, not only has he not starved to death, he could lose a few pounds and not miss them! I'm not Julia Child [though I used to do a fairly good imitation---the voice, not the cooking!] but I'm a pretty good cook.

My own mother was a wonderful cook, but she had her hands full with my brother, and wasn't inclined to encourage people to be dollacawling and making a mess in her kitchen.

When I went away to college, in Dublin, I lived in a hostel run by the holy nuns [there was no getting away from them!] who fed us three meals a day whether we wanted them or not. Mostly we wanted them---we were young and burning calories at a great rate.

After college I went to a teaching job in the North of Ireland. Another teacher I'd befriended, and I, rented rooms from a sweet widow lady, Mrs. Keenan. Mrs. Keenan was tiny and very prim, and had never rented rooms before, to anyone, and had her doubts about the whole venture. But we were desperate for digs, and so she agreed to give it a try. The arrangement worked out well for both parties. I think she'd been very lonely. Miriam and I became almost like her adopted daughters. She fed us a hearty breakfast before we walked down the hill to school every day. We walked back up the hill at noon, to a big dinner, and she fed us supper in the evenings. Mrs. K made the best steak and kidney pie I've ever tasted!

So, you can see, I was spoiled rotten for the first twenty two years of my life. Didn't have any need to know how to boil an egg.

And then I said "I do", and found myself in charge of the care and feeding of a red-blooded American male, whose mother would have made Julia look like a scrubber!
And then Lily was born, and following the lead of a friend, I opted not to feed her baby food from jars, but haunted the library instead, in search of guidance on feeding babies natural, home-made food. Over the years, Lily acquired four siblings, and I was spending most of my life in the kitchen. The recipes started accumulating. More were added as we moved around every three or four years.

You know you've got a problem when it takes you twice as long to find the recipe as to make it!

So. Lily and I did not solve any of the pressing problems of the worlds' financial markets, as we sat on our blanket at the park; we didn't come up with an iron-clad plan to organize her vast collection of irresistible wools, or my vast stash of irresistible fabrics; we did not make any family problems evaporate.

But when we folded up our blanket, and called the puppies to heel, we were both smiling, extremely pleased with ourselves. Because we had a cunning plan. A plan to gain control of the Recipe Monster.

We would start a joint blog, just for recipes!

There will be recipes, lots of them. All our favourites. The OC will be smiling his "I-told-you-so" smile when he gets wind of this! He told me years ago, when I hadn't a clue about computers [even less than I do now!]that the best way to organize my recipes would be to put them in files on the computer! "Files" sounded so dry. But a blog! Now that's a different story. In a blog you can write down the recipes, but you can also write about the history, and the background of each one, and all the interesting stories behind them. That's my kind of file! There won't be this much rawmaysh* with each one, but there will be a little. I can't let all that Blarney Stone-kissing go to waste!

So, come on over! Visit Lily and me in the kitchen. After all, it's the warmest, friendliest place in the house!

*A phonetic rendering of the Irish word for "mindless blather!"