 The other cold-to-the-bones, dismal, misty night, Mr. Fix-It said he was really, really, really wanting a dessert. We aren’t eating many desserts since the discovery of my thyroid issues. Of course, Mr. Skinny Fix-It can’t eat anything if I can’t eat anything, right?! So, with the wood stove finally blazing, to make the house toasty warm, dogs sacked out around it like stuffed animals tossed aside, I decided to be nice and make him something special – an Italian Cream Cake. Ever since Sir Flying Ace’s and Miss Amelia Air-Heart’s wedding, Mr. Fix-It has been wanting another Italian Cream Cake. Only, he wanted it the way their wedding cake was – no coconut. It does make a difference – especially for those who aren’t crazy about coconut!! Now, you know me. I had to find out the background on Italian Cream Cakes and so I researched and researched and guess what. There IS no background on Italian Cream Cakes. This is the best I could come up with from Answer.com and a recipe book: “While the Italian Cream Cake has its roots in renaissance Italy, the first written record of it is first seen in Canada in 1913. It is not until 1937 that the first recipe of Italian Creak Cake surfaces in the Plano News from Texas. Over the years the recipe has grown more complicated, though it is adored for its endless flavor combinations.” And “Not much is known about the origin of the Italian cream cake. The recipe apparently first appeared in the southern part of the United States and was the creation of an Italian baker who had moved to the U.S.” Evidently, we rednecks are more crazy about this cake than are Italians. That would make sense since it is all about butter and pecans! So here is my version of the Italian Cream Cake. And just a note, I use my own, homemade bourbon vanilla which I’ll show in an upcoming post. Preheat oven to 350º Ingredients: Icing:
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Archive for the ‘Desserts’ Category
Italian Cream Cake
Sunday, January 24th, 2016
Shout Out
Monday, June 29th, 2015
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Heh all! Well, because of all your help, we got the votes we needed and qualified to be considered for the Mission Main Street Grant! I can’t thank you enough for all your support! We got way more votes than we needed! Now, I am long past due giving a shout out to a really amazing lady who is helping people all over the internet with her cooking channel. Hands That Cook offers all kinds of recipes, tips and demonstrations that are easy to follow. She has a wonderful knowledge of cooking skills and a heart to share them with those who wish to learn. Though she likes to remain anonymous, the videos and voice are warm and inviting and I know that you will get a lot out of them. She has a diverse following who obviously love her to pieces. Hands That Cook ordered one of our Oklahoma Pastry Cloths™ and it was certainly a pleasure working with her. She liked our product so much that she did a show about a 100 year old pie crust recipe that she uses while offering a great review of the pastry cloth. You can enjoy it here: It is so wonderful to see how our products are making life easier and pleasant in kitchens across the country and even in other countries. That is our goal!! We tried Hands That Cook’s recipe for pie crust and it was wonderful.  And of course it had to be an apple pie. Yummy! Thanks to Hands That Cook for a great recipe and a wonderful testimonial. |
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Chocolate Scones
Tuesday, August 27th, 2013
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First order of business….I forgot to announce that we had a winner on the 17th of the month. We drew a name out of the hat for the Red Gold Tomato apron and Jalapeno Ketchup and reader, Jonni from Kentucky is our winner. She has been notified and responded with surprise and her address. Congratulations, Jonni!! Now, I have an admission to make. I’m on a diet. Yep, I am. I’ve been on one since March but when one has thyroid disease, a diet feels pretty much pointless. Your metabolism ceases to exist and a stalk of celery adds 10 pounds to the waistline!! Actually, LOOKING at a stalk of celery adds 10 pounds to the waistline. It’s just a little depressing. Having been one who has always loved to cook and to eat what I cook, it’s been a difficult journey over this past year and a half, but there IS a tunnel and I’m seeing a light at the end of it!! I’ve lost 17 pounds! I still have a ways to go, but that’s a real achievement for me!! And in that tunnel, there has actually been food – really good food! I have discovered that no matter what fad diet is out there – eating blue or red foods, Atkins, South Beach, HCG, low carb, high carb, low protein, high protein, juicing, you name it – the reality is that the secret to losing weight is this formula: Calories In minus Calories Out. That’s it. So the way that I track that is by a free website called SparkPeople.com. It is wonderful. It even gives me a pie chart to try to match my perfect amounts of fat, carbs and proteins per day. And I get to eat whatever I want. It is the Dave Ramsey course in calorie budgeting! I have my 1200-1300 calories to spend and it is my choice how I spend them. If I make up a recipe, I can enter the exact recipe and how many servings I get out of it. The site then figures up all of the nutritional info plus calories per serving. Then, I can put a serving into my daily budget easy as pie. Well, sorry, didn’t mean to be thinking about pie. So today, was my baking day. I always keep something sweet in the freezer for me and Mr. Fix-It to enjoy in the evening with a cup of one of our tasty teas. I usually bake some type of scone or cookie to be heated in the toaster oven. I leave 200 calories open for that possibility. This afternoon, I made my usual round of cranberry scones and still had 1/2 cup of heavy cream left. I thought, “Hmmm. I wonder what would happen if I added cocoa and chocolate chips to the basic scones recipe?” I guess you know that I had to try. I did. Yummy!! Chocolate scones. I have a feeling that High Tea in England does not include chocolate scones, but here in America, we believe in chocolate in everything!! So here is the recipe that I concocted. They are a true English scone – heavy and flaky – but have a little bit of the flavor of an American brownie. And they are 186 calories each! I stayed under my 200 calories and so I am one happy camper. So here you go. If you want detailed instructions on making scones, you can hop over to that post at English Scones. 
Ingredients: Glaze  Preheat oven to 400º. In a mixing bowl, add flour, cocoa and butter that has been cut into cubes. Either by hand with a pastry cutter, or with a mixer, cut butter into the flour mixture, until the mixture is like tiny crumbs. Add sugars, salt and baking powder. Mix. Add the chocolate chips and mix.  Add the cream, vanilla and egg white and mix until a very stiff dough pulls away from the sides of the bowl. Divide dough in half and put onto a floured surface – you need an Oklahoma Pastry Cloth™ here!! Pat out first half to about a 4″ circle. Cut into 8 triangles. Repeat with the second half. Place scones onto a baking sheet that has been lined with parchment paper. Mix leftover egg yolk with 2 tbsps. half and half and brush the tops of the scones with the mixture. Bake at 400º for 13 minutes or until done. While scones are baking, mix melted butter, powdered sugar and milk to make a glaze. Dip tops of scones into the glaze and place onto a cookie rack.  Serve the scones warm. I bet raspberry jam would be great with these!! This picture is of the two different scones that I made this afternoon. Oh! And the china is my grandmother’s Thomas Ivory Bavarian china, made by the Rosenthal company, that my grandfather bought in Germany during WWII – paid for with cigarettes!! |
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Flat Earth Travelers and Cooking With Children
Friday, May 3rd, 2013
  Ha! I bet you thought that I am going to educate you on people who refuse to accept the fact that this earth on which we live is a three dimensional sphere! Nope. I’m going to talk about travelers who are flat! Really, really flat. Well, yes…I know. I have been remiss in posting over the past few weeks. But we have been up to our elbows in soap…200 pounds of the stuff. We are preparing for the Central Oklahoma Lavender and Herb Festival at the farm of Country Cottage Primatives on June 1st. If you would like to have a lovely day of classes, vendors and lavender picking, set aside this day and make your way to this beautiful place. Look for our canopy and be sure to introduce yourselves!! Oh! And we did have our April drawing and Janet Black of Weatherford, Oklahoma was the winner of the canning tool set. Thank you for all of the entries. Stay tuned for the next give away. I have been working on this post for two days. That’s ridiculous. But I had it nearly finished yesterday, hit ‘save draft’ and instead of saving my draft, it got wiped out!! All of it!! There was some glitch that I have not figured out. It happened again this morning. I hit save again and it said, “You do not have permission to edit this document” and, “kerplooey!” everything was gone. I came very close to losing my normally pretty even temper with a shoe through the computer screen. But I didn’t and so third time is charm. But back to Flat People…Facebook is awesome. There were so many people about whom I have wondered over the years, having lost touch with them for as many as 45 years. Facebook has put me in touch with those wonderful people, letting me see what they look like, what they are doing, what accomplishments they’ve made, their families and it has given me a chance to rekindle old relationships. One of those people, a former high school friend and classmate, Carol, contacted me and told me about a geography project in which her 8 year old granddaughter, Ali, was participating. The students were sending a paper doll, drawn by each student, out to as many people as they could find to be photographed at locations that would introduce the students to new and wonderful places. The doll’s name is Flat Stacy. Mr. Fix-It and I volunteered to take Flat Stacy on our 2000 mile trip recently. It meant that we would stop along the way and take pictures of Flat Stacy in front of places of interest that we thought would be useful to the class. Now, there is nothing like watching the looks on people’s faces as a gray haired woman happily slaps a laminated, cut-out paper person that has been created by an 8 year old, up against some landmark to then step back and shoot pictures with a pretty nice camera. I figure that they wrote me off as some demented older person. But there WAS one place where a couple of young, college-age girls bounced up to ask, “That’s one of those flat people projects, isn’t it?! We did that when we were in school!” They hadn’t been out of school long enough to forget those kinds of things!! I do wonder, though, if they thought that I was somehow still in the third grade!! Mr. Fix-It joined into the project with gusto. Normally, ready to drive without stopping until bladders are screaming for mercy, he would see a sign and say, “Heh! That looks like a good place for a Flat Stacy picture!” and we would detour from our designated route to take in a site, complete with pictures to prove it. I just love that man. Anyhow, I thought that I would share with you just a few of the many places that we visited on Flat Stacy’s behalf. And Carol also sent me a recipe, to try, that her children, grandchildren and their friends brag about and can’t wait to eat when they are at her home. My granddaughter and I had a cooking day and tried these delicious treats so the recipe is posted below.  We stopped in Tupelo, Mississippi to visit the birthplace of Elvis Presley. Very impressive. Flat Stacy had her picture made with the “King” in front of the Tupelo City Hall.  Flat Stacy looked for the checkered flag at Talladega International Speedway in Alabama. I looked for Ricky Bobby.  In Newnan, Georgia, we found Flat Stacy’s store – or, at least it SAID it was her store! She was kinda dwarfed by the structure.  Outside of Wilmore, Kentucky, Flat Stacy had her picture made at Shaker Town, in front of a rock fence that was built before the Civil War.  Our little, long-haired dachshund, Ellie, was Flat Stacy’s traveling companion. Unfortunately, Ellie wasn’t feeling very good on this trip and when we got back and her to the vet, we were sad to find out that she is suffering from congestive heart failure. She is too young for that – just 8 years old. We are treating her with natural remedies and prescription medication to help her quality of life. We want to keep her around for a long time because she is such a joy in our life!  Near Mitchellville, Tennessee, Mr. Fix-It spotted these flat people who were just like Flat Stacy! In doing the research to find out about this sculpture, I found that the state of Tennessee has commissioned artists to do sculptures for each of the welcome stations. It just so happens that this one of the flat people was done by my former drawing professor at MTSU, Phillip Vanderweg! Small world.  Of course, we had to get a picture of Flat Stacy in Oklahoma and what better place than in front of the only working oil well in the United States that is located on the grounds of a capitol building. Our beautiful capitol building in Oklahoma City is in the background. Those are just a few of the pictures that we took. What a fun way to make a trip! And according to Carol, Flat Stacy went as far as Afghanistan for Ali! Here is Carol’s great cookie recipe for you to try. They are light, crisp and buttery. 1 cup butter 1 cup oil (I used coconut oil) 1 cup powdered sugar 1 cup granulated sugar 2 eggs, well beaten 4-5 cups flour 1 tsp. salt 1 tsp. soda 1 tsp. cream of tartar 1 tsp. vanilla  Now would be a good time to introduce our newest product: Bakewell Cream. I was actually introduced to Bakewell Cream way back in the 70’s in Maine but had not used it since because it is not available around here. Now I can have it!! Yay. It is the most wonderful baking Cream of Tartar that makes the most incredible biscuits. I have tossed baking powder and use the Bakewell Cream with soda and oh my….You can find it at our shopping page.  My granddaughter, Miss Peachy Pie, got her first cooking lesson, complete with her own “Li’l Cook” apron.” Typically, the batter wound up in her hair. Directions: Cream butter and oil with sugar and eggs. Sift flour, salt, soda and cream of tartar. Stir into creamed mixture, add vanilla and mix well.  My granddaughter “helped” put the dough balls on the baking sheet. If you are wondering why I cut faces in pictures – after the photo of my mother got stolen and used for unsavory purposes, I have ceased to show the faces that can be photoshopped and misused! Place small balls of dough on cookie sheet. Flatten each with a small flat bottom glass dipped in sugar. Bake at 350 degrees for 10 minutes. (Do not grease pan!)  Yep, they are TAAASTY! Miss Peachy Pie loved them.  |
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Yogurt In A Jam
Tuesday, March 19th, 2013
Ingredients: 1/3 cup butter 3 large eggs 1 cup live culture yogurt 1 tsp soda 1 tsp ground allspice 1 tsp ground cloves 1 tsp ground cinnamon 1 tsp ground ginger 1 cup of your favorite berry jam (I used strawberry) 1 cup chopped pecans 1 Duncan Hines Moist Deluxe white cake mix Lemon Curd from Recipe (Best if made ahead of time and chilled) Icing: 1-8oz pkg cream cheese 1 stick of butter (cream together) Beat in 1 lb box of powdered sugar 1 tsp vanilla  Cream the butter with a mixer and add eggs. Beat until smooth.  Add spices and blend well  Add jam and continue to beat  Add yogurt. Cream together with other ingredients  Add box of cake mix and beat well until smooth. Stir in nuts. Pour batter into cupcake papers that are supported in muffin tins or pour into a greased and floured 9 x 13 sheet cake pan. Bake at 350º for 20 – 25 minutes or until a knife or toothpick comes out clean.  While the cupcakes are warm, using a scoop or apple corer, core out a hole in the middle of each cupcake  Fill each hole with lemon curd that has been made from the linked recipe. Place in the refrigerator or a cool, dry place. Make Butter Cream Cheese Icing
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Random Thoughts: Reunions and Things
Thursday, August 30th, 2012
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It’s been rather crazy around here. Much, much traveling with back-to-back trips. One trip was to Georgia so that Mr. Fix-It could do some training while I got to spend time with my precious Aunt Lois and Uncle Ed and see the new cottage that they are building. It is next to what will be their daughter’s home. They are in a retirement home right now and all I can say is that I am THRILLED that they are getting out of there and into their own place. I am not lying. I felt 90 years old when I left that retirement home. No smiles. No laughter. No sound. No nothing. Very dismal. It is so gratifying to see how my cousins are willing to give their parents the support, encouragement and help that honors the sacrifices that my aunt and uncle made for their children over the years.  Of course, if one is in Georgia during peach season, one MUST buy peaches and that is exactly what Mr. Fix-It and I did at the most enormous peach orchard I’d ever seen. There was no end to the peach trees and it just made me tired to think of all the work that goes into dealing with that many peaches. This family-owned orchard also supplies homemade peach ice cream to perspiring customers who brave the heat and humidity to purchase baskets of huge fruit. And what fruit it was! “Like candy,” comes to mind.      Mr. Fix-It and I came home to an even hotter Oklahoma of 110º – 114º days with no rain. We watched as grasses dried to a crunchy carpet of brown and trees slowly died, even though Mr. Fix-It diligently watered everything as best he could. Fires raged in nearby areas and the thought of leaving again was not really an option. But I had a high school class reunion to attend and I am sure that y’all can imagine that Mr. Fix-It was chomping at the bit to attend it with me!! This reunion, I am willing to admit, was my 40th year shindig. Yep. My classmates are all old. I’m not old, but they are! Fortunately, we Okies got about an inch of rain to alleviate any fears of leaving home to the fires and so Mr. Fix-It got his wish to be dragged, kicking and screaming, to a party where he was to converse with people he’d never met, didn’t know and who played absolutely no part in his world. As for my part, I agonized over what to wear. You know: “What outfit will make me look like I stepped out of Vogue even though, I don’t know what Vogue is or how one steps out of it? What jewelry will give the appearance that the Queen of England felt obliged to give me the crown jewels? Sandals or dress shoes? Heels or flats? Teeth whitening or ventriloquize through closed lips?” And my Thyroid Eye Disease tends to make me look like I’m either drunk or shocked at the sight of everything – wide, red, watery and exaggerated – how was I going to downplay that? Let me tell you, if you make it to your 40th reunion, you no longer care what the guys think. You simply want the girls…er..women..er…mature females…to look at you and gush, “Oh MY! You haven’t changed a bit! Why, you are just as cute as a bug’s ear and pretty as a peach,” while thinking, “Oh my gosh. I’d have never known her without a name tag. Her hair is platinum (remember?! We don’t say gray!) and I thought she used to be thin! I’m thinkin’ she’s eaten one buttermilk pie short of a bakery!!” And so I chose my wardrobe carefully to reflect only half a bakery and settled for a raid on James Avery for jewelry. There was nothing to be done about my eyes, except to keep them closed – along with my lips. The trip was uneventful – 15 hours of driving through drought-stricken Oklahoma and Arkansas and a stop at Trader Joe’s in Nashville, Tennessee. Trader Joe’s is my favorite. I’ve begged them to come to Oklahoma but was told by a number of their young, geographical geniuses that it isn’t possible to get over the Oklahoma mountains. What part of “wind comes sweepin’ down the PLAINS” do they not get?? We rolled into Knoxville to the home of our dear friends, Clyde and Mary, and settled in for the evening. It was then, that my vanity reared its ugly head. (Yes, admitting one’s flaws is a direct road to continuing them without embarrassment.) I had taken my wedding rings off. I wanted to wear these beautiful gifts from Mr. Fix-It the next day, to prove to my classmates that I had really talked somebody into sharing his paycheck with me on a regular basis, but my ring finger knuckle had swollen twenty times its normal size. Not to be deterred, at 11:30 that night, with Mr. Fix-It and our host and hostess already in bed, I decided to make sure that I could wear the rings. I don’t know why. Don’t even ask me. All I know is that I was determined. I slathered a ton of hand cream all over my hand and finger and got the rings to the knuckle and then, with tongue stuck out between my unwhitened teeth, I forced them the rest of the way into place. There!! They were on. And as I happily looked at them, my finger began to swell more. Oh no. I knew that my finger was going to turn blue. I tip-toed in to Mr. Fix-It, at midnight, and woke him up to inform him that my rings were stuck. You can imagine the sense of compassion and urgency he felt. He said, “I really wish you hadn’t done that. It’s midnight.” Long story short, he watched as I walked around the room with my hand over my head, stuck my hand in the freezer, ran cold water over my finger and tried another round of lotion to no avail. Clyde and Mary, stayed asleep, I think. By 12:30 am, the swelling had at least stopped and since my finger had not fallen off, Mr. Fix-It chose sleep over panic and I slept on the couch with my hand on the back cushions to keep it elevated. About 2 am, Mr. Fix-It came in to check on me, scared me to death and said, “I really wish you hadn’t done that. It’s 2 in the morning.” The next morning, finger still immensely swollen, our friends recommended their family jeweler, Lamon Jewelers, for rescue and I was driven to a very painful experience of getting my rings cut off of my sausage finger. It hurt!!!! And when my precious jewelry had finally been removed, it lay in a bent and twisted heap of metal and jewels that looked nothing like a set of wedding rings. I didn’t cry, but I wanted to. However, this afternoon, I signed for a FedEx package that contained my repaired and glistening rings, shipped all the way from Tennessee and they look just like new. Thank goodness for skilled craftsmen!!! The day of the reunion was full of fun, including a luncheon with a group of my former girlfriends and an afternoon spent with my friend, Robyn, traipsing through old neighborhoods to find the homes in which we had grown up. We found them and shot pictures of ourselves in front of the structures and even met the people who currently live in them. I found out that my old home is haunted – yep – that’s what they tried to tell me – and Robyn traded email addresses with the lovely woman who now calls her place “home” in order to send photos of the house from 50 years ago. The reunion was grand and I so enjoyed seeing the gang that I ran around with in high school, some of whom read this blog and were eager to meet Mr. Fix-It to verify that he is truly the wonderful man portrayed! They were in agreement. The trip back to Oklahoma the next day was also uneventful except for the moment that I came out of a restroom stop and calmly entered the car, wondering where Mr. Fix-It had gone, only to see him sitting in another car nearby. I was in the wrong car. He was laughing his head off. 1900 miles in four days is a bit rough, but it was worth it and I will treasure the memories of seeing so many people from my past. I thought that I would show those of you who haven’t ever made a peach pie before, how I do mine if I am not using my homemade peach pie filling. That was the case with the peaches from Georgia. I froze them in slices and thawed a gallon to make a pie, but I also use fresh. I figure that I’ll be ready for the next reunion where they can say that I only look like I’ve been eating one peach pie short of an orchard. Much healthier, I think. 1 gallon sliced peaches 1/2 cup flour 1/2 cup sugar 1/2 tsp cinnamon 1/4 tsp nutmeg 1 double pie shell 2 pats butter cinnamon sugar Make your pie crust. My recipe for multiple pie crusts is great for a quick pie.  Put peach slices into a large bowl with flour, sugar, cinnamon and nutmeg and toss until pieces are coated.  Pour coated peaches into an unbaked pie shell  Wet the edges of the bottom crust with ice water and lay top crust on top.  Roll bottom and top crust edges together to form a coil around the edge of the pie.  Flute the edges by using a floured knife end and pushing the pie dough into the pinched fingers of your opposite hand  Cut slits in the top of the pie dough to vent the pie  Sprinkle cinnamon/sugar over the top of the pie crust and dot with butter. Bake in a preheated 400º oven for one hour or until golden brown and filling is bubbling. Remove from the oven and allow to cool on a rack for an hour before cutting.  |
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Buttermilk Pie
Tuesday, August 21st, 2012
 (Don’t forget to comment to enter our newest giveaway for this heavy, heavy, marble and wooden rolling pin and package of a Made In Oklahoma mix to roll out! Winner will be announced Labor Day weekend.) Those of you who have been reading this blog over the past four years – yes, y’all! Four years! – know that I am a little crazy. Well, not certifiable, just nutty. Sometimes, I wonder if God wired my brain differently from other people so that it operates just a tad off-the-wall. It just seems that I look at my situations, circumstances and just plain life with the oddest revelations. I can’t just say, “Oh! Look! Fresh corn is on sale!” No. I have to ponder the price, calculate how many ears it will take to fill 50 wide-mouthed pint jars, and, though it’s June, immediately plan who I will be inviting to Thanksgiving dinner in order to determine if 50 wide-mouthed jars of corn can meet the yellow vegetable requirement on the menu! And a simple act of compassion in nature of taking in an orphaned raccoon to bottle feed until it is old enough to make it in the wild on its own, turns into an emergency room visit with a leg broken in five places and a doctor who doesn’t believe I wasn’t up in a tree with the raccoon. OK. So who does that anyway? So, this past weekend, I made Mr. Fix-It a pretty, darned good buttermilk pie, if I do say so myself. And the kitchen smelled heavenly. If you haven’t ever had a Buttermilk Pie, you HAVE to try it! According to Wikipedia, it was originally a British desert that became a standard here in the deep south. Evidently, it offered a sweet alternative to fruit pies when fruit was out of season. However, Wikipedia also said that you just don’t hear about these pies anymore. I don’t know what they are talking about, because Buttermilk Pie is served in restaurants around here, and Texans claim that, of course, their’s is the best there is! There is a drastic difference between a Buttermilk Pie and a Chess Pie as there is no corn syrup or corn meal in a Buttermilk Pie, and individual cooks like to add their own touches of extra nutmeg and cinnamon, or cloves, lemon extract and rind, or other various flavorings to this versatile custard pie. Anyway, I’m guessing you won’t be surprised that as I made my pie, rolling out the pastry, beating the eggs and such, even though I had no clue that this was a British confection, my brain had a 1960’s British Invasion, and I couldn’t stop singing the Beatles’ Uncle Albert song. You know – “so I had a cup of tea and a butter pie (you have to pronounce it ‘buttah’); the butter wouldn’t melt so I put it in the pie”. And I’m STILL singing it. ~Sigh~ Parts of the tune are hauntingly beautiful and the lyrics are harmless enough, although those boys must have had way too much pie as they came up with that song – or maybe something else. Here, you can click on the song so that it will rattle around in YOUR head for a week. Here is my recipe for Buttermilk Pie. It’s a pretty ancient one. I sure hope you enjoy it as much as Mr. Fix-It. And as you munch on it, just contemplate what a special man he is to patiently endure my crazier side!! Ingredients: 2 cups sugar 1/2 cup butter, softened (1 stick) 3 tablespoons all-purpose flour 3 eggs beaten 1 cup buttermilk 1 teaspoon vanilla extract 1/8 teaspoon nutmeg 1 9″ pie unbaked pie shell variations: Add 1 tsp cinnamon and 1/4 tsp ground cloves or Add 1 tablespoon lemon extract and 1 tsp lemon zest  You can use any pie crust recipe. Of course, I use my recipe! I like my recipe because it has butter in it instead of just shortening. Flaky and buttery! Roll out your crust and place it in a 9″ pie tin. Of course, you CAN use a store bought pie crust..cough..cough.  Cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add the flour and mix further.  In a separate bowl, lightly beat the eggs.  Add the beaten eggs to the creamed butter and sugar mixture  Add the buttermilk and vanilla  Add the nutmeg. If you want to add cinnamon, cloves, more nutmeg or any other flavorings, you would do that here. Mix until well incorporated and creamy.  Pour the creamy custard into the pie shell. Dust the top of the custard with cinnamon. Bake in a 425º oven for 15 minutes and turn down to 350º to continue baking for 30-40 more minutes or until top is golden brown and center is firm, not liquid. It will jiggle a bit but won’t be sloshy. The center will solidify as it cools. Chill and serve cold, but some people like it at room temperature.  Serve with whipped cream and unhook your belt!! Singing! |
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Homemade Ice Cream Like No Other!
Thursday, July 5th, 2012
 Happy July 4th week. We had such a special day. We got to spend it with the oldest daughter, her husband and their little girl – yep – that grandbaby again!! We ate and talked and ate and watched old home movies and ate and shot off fireworks (since we live way out in the country) and then stopped eating. The grill got fired up for bratwurst, hot dogs and luscious hamburgers infused with olive oil, liquid smoke, garlic powder, salt and worchestershire sauce. Dinner was good. But dessert was better! Now, I have to interject here that I have never – and I seriously mean never – made a decent batch of homemade ice cream. In fact, I can truthfully say that I’ve never EATEN a decent batch of homemade ice cream. I grew up on the stuff and, I suppose I need to apologize to family, but I always hated it. Just hasn’t ever been my cup of tea – well – bowl of ice cream. It was always so fragile that it turned into soupy stuff too fast, was grainy with ice crystals and was just too, too sweet. Putting chocolate syrup on top of that made it sickly sweet. And then, when leftovers were frozen, the result was a brick the shape of the container that no jackhammer could chip! Just a big waste of ice, salt and electricity to me!  Last Father’s Day, we got Mr. Fix-It a fancy, schmancy wooden ice cream freezer that can either be used with a hand crank, or made so much easier with an electric crank. Sadly, the gift had never left its box and so on the 4th, Mr. Fix-It announced that he wanted homemade peach ice cream, made with peaches from our trees. I was bound and determined to find a recipe that would knock his socks off. AllRecipes.com came to my rescue!! In order to make this recipe, you have to plan ahead because the base needs to chill in the frig overnight. That is very important. I made the base at about 9 in the evening on July 3rd, poured it into a bowl and allowed it to cool for 20 minutes, putting it in the refrigerator to cool thoroughly all night and even about half of the next day. When we poured the custard mixture into the hopper of the ice cream freezer, Mr. Fix-It was a little nervous at the amount. It looked like there was very little in the barrel. However, as it churned, that amount doubled and then tripled and believe me, we had plenty of ice cream! When the ice cream freezer stopped, we packed the canister in ice for two hours before serving. I was amazed at the result. It was the creamiest, most solid, not too sweet confection I’ve ever tasted. I was ecstatic. My daughter and son-in-law had two helpings each and oohed and ahhed over its creamy texture. However, Mr. Fix-It was not a happy camper. I had not made the fragile, soupy, ice crystal laden, ice milk with which we had all grown up. He was so disappointed. He was visably disappointed. But tasting that creamy peachiness, I just couldn’t feel bad. I was so excited over my results that I just couldn’t feel bad. However, I guess that next time, I’m will get two machines going: one with junket-style, old-fashioned, ice milk style stuff and the other with this new recipe!! I can tell you ahead of time which one will disappear first! Mr. Fix-It will be happy to have one ice cream freezer all to himself! So, try this out on your next hot weekend and let me know what you think. Thanks, AllRecipes.com!!  1 cup heavy cream 3 cups half-and-half cream 8 egg yolks 1 cup white sugar 1/8 teaspoon salt 1 tbsp vanilla (I added 2 tsps Mexican vanilla because it is so strong) Optional: 1 cup pureed fruit like peaches, apricots, strawberries, raspberries, bananas, etc. or 1/2 cup cocoa can be added to the egg mixture in the second step for flavored ice cream. Instructions: 1. Pour the heavy cream and half-and-half cream into a heavy saucepan, place over medium-low heat, and heat until barely simmering, stirring frequently. Turn the heat down to low. 2. In the meantime, whisk together the egg yolks, sugar, and salt in a large bowl until thoroughly combined. (Make any additions here) 3. Slowly pour about 1/2 cup of hot cream mixture into the egg yolk mixture, whisking constantly. Repeat three times more, for a total of 2 cups cream added, whisking thoroughly before adding each additional 1/2 cup of hot cream to the egg yolk mixture. Pour the egg yolk mixture back into the saucepan with the remaining hot cream, and whisk constantly over medium-low heat until the mixture thickens and will coat the back of a spoon, 5 to 8 minutes. Do not let mixture boil. 4. Pour the ice cream base into a bowl and allow to cool for about 20 minutes; place in refrigerator and chill overnight. The next day, pour into an ice cream maker, and freeze according to the manufacturer’s directions. Remove the ice cream, pack into a covered container, and freeze for 2 hours or overnight before serving. At this point, I removed the paddle and packed the canister in ice instead of removing the ice cream to another container. I only put the leftovers into a plastic container to store in the freezer.  Even after freezing overnight and the next day, it is still just as creamy as can be. |
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Cooking from the 1930’s IV
Monday, April 16th, 2012
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First order of business: It’s time for another Giveaway, don’t you think? Mother’s Day is coming soon and I’m thinkin’ some mother should get a tea package to celebrate her special day!! And so, starting today and through May 4th, leave a comment and your name will be thrown into the hat for a drawing on May 5th. The winner will receive the package pictured below: A Tea-For-Two teapot, a cute tin of one of our signature teas with tea infuser and a package of our wonderful Victorian House Scones. Sound good? Great! Start commenting on posts and enter early and often.   Second order of business: Patrice Lewis over at the Rural Revolution, who has so kindly linked to this blog, has produced a series of E-books on canning and country living that are handy indeed. Since they are only $1.50 each, they are so affordable and since they are around 20 pages each, are easy to print off to keep at your fingertips. You can order Patrice’s booklets here. OK, so for a past number of posts, I have been sharing handwritten recipes, from my grandmother, that are recorded in a 1931 edition of the Rumford Cookbook which was put out by the Rumford Baking Powder company. This week, I tried another one of those recipes and Mr. Fix-It gave a big thumbs up. As usual, my grandmother only wrote down the ingredients with a few mixing instructions, but this time she did give a baking time and the instructions to use a “moderate” oven. I figured that would be around 350º. My figuring was correct!  I have also been including some exerpts from a book that my father wrote, called Sailing Down The River Of Memories which is about his growing up years in the 1930’s and 1940’s. The following exerpt, I thought, would be fun for those of you with children. It seems that in today’s fast-paced, technology-permeated world, we’ve forgotten some of the simple games of the last century. And I will say that some of those games were pretty rough! “Flying Dutchman – Players held hands in a circle while one couple who was IT walked counterclockwise outside the circle. When they hit the joined hands of two players, both IT an the other couple then ran in opposite directions around the circle trying to be the first back to the opening in the circle. The losers became IT. When I was about seven, Treva Scott, who was older than I, and I were tagged. She got ahead of me as we ran and the heel of her shoe hit me in the mouth, knocking four front teeth loose. Fortunately, they were baby teeth. I’ve heard of a person “putting his foot in his mouth” but never of someone else doing it. Mumble Peg – A knife with a long and a short blade opened on one end was needed. The knife was opened with the short blade out straight and the long blade at a 90-degree angle. The player put the long blade touching the ground and fipped the knife into the air. The game was played two ways. In one, points were given when the short blade stuck into the ground, the long blade stuck or both blades stuck. In the other, the winner had to stick the knife all three ways – long blade into the ground, long and short blade into the ground and the short blade in with the base of the knife resting on the ground making a triangle. Sometimes, we flipped the knife off of our wrist or hand. Leap Frog-One boy leaned over with his hands on his knees while a second boy ran up and putting his hands on the bent back, vaulted over him. Sometimes several boys would line up about three feet apart and the jumper tried to jump all without stopping or breaking rhythm. The real challenge was to vault over two or three boys who leaned over one another. Indoor Games-We played many indoor party games such as “poor pussy”, “heavy, heavy hangs over your head,” “odd or even,” “I see something you don’t see” and “hot or cold”… Dropping Clothes Pins into the Milk Bottle-Milk came in long-necked quart milk bottles with the opening about one inch in diameter. We took three straight clothes pins, stood above the milk bottle and tried to drop the pins into the bottle. Just like Me-This game was popular with adults who liked to pull it on a young child. Interesting enough, some children liked to play it over and over again. Leader: You have to say, “Just like me” after anything I say. Ready? I went upstairs. Child: Just like me Leader: I walked down the hall Child: Just like me Leader: I came to a door Child: Just like me Leader: I went in the room Child: Just like me Leader: I looked in the mirror Child: Just like me Leader: I saw a monkey Child: Just like me No adults needed-I guess one thing that made our play “ours” was that it was something WE did. No adult was needed. We made a lot of the things we played with such as kites, boats, stilts, balls. When we wanted to play baseball, we got enough boys together, found a ball and bat and played. We didn’t need a coach to teach us how to hit or pitch. We learned by playing. No adult stood on the sideline shouting at us for making an error or for not hitting a home run. Playing with friends was the main thing. ” Update:I have to add a note that was sent to me from my cousin – daughter of my father’s sister. It was just too neat not to share: “I’ve enjoyed reading your take on Grandmother’s cookbook. I remember the recipe on back of the letter, but I never even thought of trying it-or the red devil’s food, even though I know Mom made it bunches of times. She said she started making it at age 12 and that became her specialty for Hightower family gatherings. Last night she said sometimes she would make it and a white cake, then marble the two batters in a tube pan. She said it was always a hit when she did that and that it made a very large cake! Your mention of the letter with the recipe on the back reminds me Mom said that when Granddad was self-employed or looking for employment, Grandmother would type his letters. She taught herself to type with an instruction book like Mom used in high school that she got from Aunt Helen. She always kept a dictionary handy because she was so concerned that she would misspell something. Our grandmother was a hard worker! I don’t know how old she was when the was cashier at Aunt Ruth’s store in Pittsburg but I know she wasn’t young. Mom said Grandmother worked wherever they moved. I do remember her working in a candy store in Indianapolis. That would be the one I would remember!! Also from your dad’s writing, the Just Like Me rhyme reminds me of her. I can still hear us laughing when she did it with me. Just last week, I was reading a nursery rhyme book to Ben and that was in there. So I played it with him the way our grandparents did with us, and we laughed ourselves silly. He wanted to do it over and over.” So, on to making cookies that would have satisfied that crew of busy boys! Grandmother T. only has “Refrigerator Cookies” written in the corner of the paper on which she recorded this recipe. The fun part is that it is on the back of a letter that my grandfather had written to some company, applying for a construction foreman’s postition. Back then, a resume was just a list of past postitions in a one page letter! I think that you will like these cookies and the only addition I can see making is chocolate chips! I know. With me, it’s always chocolate! But they really would be good in the cookies. 1 cup shortening (I used 1/2 cup shortening and 1/2 cup butter 1 cup brown sugar 1 cup granulated sugar 2 well-beaten eggs 1 teaspoon vanilla 1 1/2 cup flour 1 teaspoon salt 1 teaspoon soda 3 cus quick cooking oatmeal 1/2 cup choped nuts  Add shortening or shortening and butter to a large mixing bowl.  Add brown sugar  And the granulated sugar  Thoroughly cream shortening and sugars. Add beaten eggs.  And vanilla and mix well  Add flour and mix  Add oatmeal. We roll our own oats so I used that even though it calls for “quick cooking” oats. It worked great.  Add nuts. Of course, I had to use my grandmother’s nut chopper from her vintage kitchen!  Shape the dough into rolls. I made the dough into two rolls, but I suggest making three. The cookies were really, really big with the two rolls.  Wrap the rolls in wax paper and chill thoroughly or overnight.  Slice cookies about 1/4″ thick and place on an ungreased cookie sheet. Bake at 350º for 10 minutes.  Just a note: Leave LOTS of space between your cookies. Otherwise, you get a sheet of cookies!!  The second batch worked much better!! I used parchment paper on my cookie sheet and put plenty of space between the cookies. They came out perfect. Yummy! I’ll be adding the chocolate chips next time! |
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Cooking in the 1930’s Part III
Tuesday, April 10th, 2012
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I’ve been posting some hand-written recipes in my grandmother’s 1931 issue of the Rumford Cookbook as I am trying them out, myself. It is just too neat to see my grandmother’s penmanship on favorite recipes and to know that I am mixing what she used to mix up for her family, including my dad and my Aunt Lois. In my last post, I gave you a little tidbit of my father’s memories as recorded in his book, Sailing Down The River Of Memories. I thought that I would post a few more of those memories here, that I thought you might enjoy: “We churned our own butter. Lois and Dad liked the buttermilk, but I never developed the taste for it. We never used Oleo margarine (called Oleo) although we sold it in the store. During the thirties, oleo came in a clear sack and looked like white shortening because the butter industry had a law passed to keep it from being colored yellow and looking like butter. A small package of yellow food dye was included in the package. The oleo had to be kneaded with the dye until it turned yellow. Sometimes a person didn’t do a good job kneading it because there would be reddish-yellow streaks throughout the oleo. Some mothers didn’t take the time to color it so it looked as if they were serving lard. As I said, we had butter to go with Mom’s jellies and jams as well as wild honey. I don’t remember anyone in the community with a bee hive, but Dad or some farmer might find a bee tree down by the river that they cut down and then divided the honey among friends. Wild honey was dark, strong and delicious on hot biscuits… Mom was a woman ahead of her time. During the summer of 1940, she got the idea of freezing strawberries so she wrapped a couple of quarts in waxed butcher paper and put them in the ice cream freezer [at the store]. Then, she served them for Christmas. Why was this ahead of her time? Because frozen food didn’t come to the rest of the country until 1945 when frozen orange juice and Swanson and Sons frozen chicken and turkey came to market. People really thought she was smart. Oh yes, one winter we put some snow balls in the freezer and had a snow ball fight the next summer. Unfortunately, they got icy and never thawed out, so they sort of hurt when we got hit… Eating in a restaurant was a big event because we didn’t do it very often, but when we did, we went to family types, not the more expensive ones. Dad and I ate at the stockyards where we took cows and hogs. We ate at the ‘dime store’ such as Woolworth or Kresses or Newberry when Mom took us to Joplin. My favorite was the ‘blue plate special’. It was sliced roast beef on a slice of bread with mashed potatoes covered with gravy, slaw and a coke. A real special was a three-decker club sandwich at the Crown Drugstore. Man, was that good. Down at Pawhuska we went to a pig stand for pork bar-b-que and limeaid or coke…The first fast food place I remember was in Joplin out on Seventh and Maiden Lane during the late 1930’s. It was called “Chicken in the Rough” and had a logo of a rooster with a golf club. We got a paper plate with fried chicken, shoe string potatoes, a dish of honey and hot rolls. We sat in the car and ate it with our fingers which is why it was called “in the rough”. The Checkerboard Cafe’ with the outside walls painted red and black like a checkerboard was noted for coney islands. We sometimes ate at Chili King who served the best chili but he would not serve milk to drink because according to him, it would make a person sick. Oh yes, we did not drink milk when we had fish either. Why? Because. That was explanation enough!” There are 362 pages of memories, geneologies and photographs for us to cherish! And as I posted last time, one of the recipes that my father mentions as a favorite, was my grandmother’s Red Devil Food Cake. I found it in the tattered pages of the Rumford Cookbook, written quickly and precisely. However, there are no baking instructions at all! I had to elaborate on my own. In looking in our family cookbook, I saw that my Aunt Lois also included this recipe and with the note, “(The cake I learned to bake as a child and it was served often at family get togethers)…Note: There are no baking instructions included in my recipe” So here is the recipe and my decision to bake the cake layers at 350º for 20-25 minutes. 1/2 cup sour cream, lard or butter 2 cups flour 1 egg 1 1/2 cups sugar 1 tsp soda 4 Tbsp Cocoa 1 tsp vanilla extract 1/2 cup buttermilk or sour milk 1/2 cup boiling water chopped pecans (optional) Sift together flour and soda and set aside.  Place sour cream, butter or lard into a mixing bowl. I decided to try sour cream. Next time I am going to try butter.  Add sugar  Cream until smooth  In a mixing cup, place cocoa and whisk as 1/2 cup boiling water is slowly added to dissolve. When the mixture is nice and smooth, add to the creamed mixture.  Add flour/soda mixture and stir and then add buttermilk or sour milk. You can sour milk by adding 1 tbsp vinegar into a mixing cup and then pour 3/4 cup milk into the vinegar. Allow to stand for 20 minutes and it will curdle. Pour out 1/2 of the thickest curds.  Add one egg and mix until batter is smooth and uniform  Add vanilla and mix. Unlike the batter in the last cake recipe, this batter is runny. My dad and his family also referred to it as “gravy cake”.  Divide the batter between two greased and floured cake pans. Bake at 350º for 20 – 25 minutes. Use a toothpick to check for doneness at 20 minutes to make sure you do not over bake. Invert pans onto cooling racks and allow to cool completely. Ice with recipe in the last post or use your own. Sprinkle with chopped pecans.  Here’s something neat. I am keeping the cake in my Grandmother T’s cake keeper in which she used to house the same confection! And generations of cooks continue on! |
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