Changing Times and a Hearty Recipe

Photo by James Wheeler on Pexels.com

Today is downright cold. “Sweater Weather,” my Mom called it. In Florida where I grew up Autumn announced its arrival with a delightfully cool breeze that offered blessed relief from Summer heat. We knew more of that was coming and we could not wait to greet the season.

Virginia is different. Things can and do change overnight. Winter’s warnings here are loud, clear and insistent. Last night the warning came with a breeze too cold to leave the windows open and a sudden need to cover up.

Yes, summer tops look strangely out of place in the closet now and shorts, bathing suit and sun hats are ready for wistful hibernation. I should have been prepared for this since the little market down the road has been showcasing mums and pumpkins for many days now. And the internet is featuring autumn decor and Halloween.

Even recipes emerge that I haven’t even thought of all Summer. I suddenly want to make more stews and hearty meals. I am famous for simple, easy, recipes that taste like they took alot of work. Here’s a good one for Old Fashioned Meatloaf with a great tangy twist.

DOR’S BARBECUED MEAT LOAF

1 ½ pounds ground beef

1 cup breadcrumbs

1 onion, finely chopped

1 egg, beaten

1 ½ teaspoons salt

¼ teaspoon pepper

1 15-16 oz. can of tomato sauce, divided

½ cup water

3 tablespoons vinegar

3 tablespoons brown sugar

3 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce

            Combine first 6 ingredients in a large mixer bowl; add ½ can of tomato sauce, mixing well.  Place mixture in a 10x6x1-inch baking dish, and shape into a loaf.  Combine remaining tomato sauce and remaining ingredients in a small mixing bowl and pour over loaf.  Bake at 350 degrees for 1 hour and 15 minutes or until done, basting often.  Yield: 8 servings.

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Egg on My Face, Etc.

 

It might be a funny story for future generation giggles.

It was not funny yesterday.

I decided to make hard boiled eggs.

I decided to try another way to make them.

• Step 1:

You bring them to a boil and

• Step 2:

Immediately remove them from the heat and allow to stand precisely 17 minutes.

Yup.  I did Step 1.  I am good at following directions.

And then I left.

I think I thought I had 17 minutes to write thank you notes.

The bad thing is I missed Step 2 – the 17 minute-part where you take the eggs off the stove and allow them to stand.

It must have been about 37 minutes later when I heard a funny noise.   Elsa-the-dog was pacing and trying to tell me something was amiss, but I ignored her and told her everything would be allright.

I was busy concentrating you know – writing lovely thank you notes.  It couldn’t be 17 minutes already.  Could it?

Then there came another noise.

Only this time it was a thunderous BANG!  Like a very loud GUNSHOT in the kitchen!

Was someone being murdered INSIDE my house?

It is still gun hunting season here.

Was there someone actually firing a gun in my house?

I ran/hobbled to the kitchen in time to see – YES – it was an explosion all right –

AN EXPLOSION OF EGGS!

Have you ever seen an egg explode?

It was a first for me too.

Oddly enough, I become very calm and deliberate in a crisis.  If you discount the way I talk to myself and even give myself vocal instructions, you would surely admire my bravery in quickly turning the burner off.  I also thought to put Elsa in the back room to keep her from eating exploded eggs.

Note: There were no more eggs in the pot.  I think most of them were on the ceiling and the pot was burned black.

There was definitely egg on the ceiling,

egg on the floor,

egg across the stove top,

egg under the vent hood,

eggs on the walls,

bits of egg into the next room,

egg EVERYWHERE!

Bill helped me clean up, especially in the upper reaches (like egg on top of the refrigerator).

I am still finding egg or egg shells in unusual places.

Finally my friend Amy came over and under her eagle eye and a tightrope walker’s balance, the last remnants of eggs on the ceiling are gone.

The only thing left is

“egg on my face.”

If you are not familiar with this expression, here is what it means.

From “The Dictionary of Cliches” by James Rogers (Ballatine Books, New York, 1985): “to have egg on your face – To be embarrassed or chagrined at something one has done or the way one did it; to do something ineptly. The expression originated in the United States some 25 years ago, probably from the fact that someone eating an egg sloppily is likely to wind up with some of it on his face and therefore not looking his best. 

 

 

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Peanuts! Get Your Roasted Peanuts Here!

“The relationship between peanuts and baseball goes all the way back to when a peanut company bought ad space on the back of scorecards in 1898.  The snack was a big hit in stadiums, and only a few years later, in 1908, the song, “Take Me Out to the Ball game” featured the line, “buy me some peanuts and Cracker Jacks”, which has forever united the two American traditions in the public mind.”   From WRAL.com

I can still hear the peanut man calling!

When I was a young girl my family went to evening baseball games at a local park.  There was always a man climbing the bleachers and calling out in a singsong voice.  He had a carrier full of warm delicious peanuts. The aroma alone was to swoon for.  And twenty-five cents would buy a little brown bag.

Years later I discovered I could roast my own peanuts and duplicate the flavor.

If you are a new guest at our house, you might mistake the peanuts for garden variety supermarket Ho- Hums, but if you politely taste one, guaranteed you will be asking questions.

Apologies if you are allergic though!

The recipe is simple but start with shelled, blanched, raw peanuts.  I get mine at a place called “The Cheese Shop” in Stuarts Draft, Virginia.  You have probably guessed they carry a lot more than cheese.   

And Bill and I are going there tomorrow to stock up!

Recipe for Dor’s Home Roasted Peanuts  Ingredients:  1-2 lbs shelled, raw, blanched peanuts; 1 tsp butter (or I use coconut oil); Salt to taste.

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. 
2. Spread all the peanuts in a rimmed pan (I use the bottom of my oven broiler pan).
3. Bake on middle rack for about 6 minutes and then stir everything around. 
4. Bake 6 minutes more and stir again. 
5. Repeat #4 two more times. 
6. Peanuts are done when they are a deep golden brown color. 
7. While still hot add the butter (don’t be tempted to add more than a teaspoon or they will be too greasy).  The purpose of the butter is to provide a coating the salt can stick to. 
8. Salt to taste. 
9. I freeze mine and bring them out in small quantities as needed. 

 

 

 

 

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Best Flour-less Chocolate Chip Cookies

Following in the noble footsteps of one of my favorite bloggers, MJ of Emjay and Them, I have embarked upon a wheatless, almost-grainless, eating program.  People like MJ are raving about the Wheat Belly weight loss theory and feeling good too.  I have been doing this now for about 5 weeks and have lost about 4 pounds – also feeling pretty good.

However, being skeptical of almost everything (as noted by the array of vitamins and minerals in my tried and never-true massive collection), I am only teetering on the edge of issuing a rave report about WHEAT BELLY.  Isn’t that the most awful title for a program about healthful eating?

Of course, things like cookies, cakes, muffins, bread and pancakes, etc. that have a flour base are no-no’s  and they naturally become delicacies  to be missed.

But I have a secret remedy!

It’s a tried and true recipe discovered even before reading the first two Wheat Belly books.

FLOUR-LESS Chocolate Chip Cookies

(But, if you are allergic to peanuts, please ignore this recipe.)

1 Egg

1 Cup brown sugar (I use coconut sugar – 1 cup = 1 cup)

1 tsp Vanilla

1 Cup chocolate chips (I use dark choc chips)

1 Cup chunky peanut butter

Mix all.  Drop by minimum Tablespoons onto a parchment sheet or Silpat

Bake at 350 degrees Farenheit for 10 to 12 minutes.

Note:  If I can only control how many of these to eat in a day, the Wheat Belly routine may just work!  I am averaging SEVEN now and still lost 5 pounds!  Working on decreasing to SIX (cookies that is).

 

 

 

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A Recipe for the Woes of Winter

Baked Fruit

My Dad used to proclaim, “This will stick to your ribs and put hair on your chest!” He called on those old sayings when he made something in the kitchen that was particularly hardy.

And I believed him about the hair thing until I discovered I grew up to be a girl.

Even so, when the weather turns icy and the birds puff up their feathers and look forlorn, I crave hardy stick-to-your-ribs stuff usually beginning with pork and accompanied by apples and cinnamon.

This is not a recipe for pork but for a complementary side dish.  It works for just about any hearty winter meal and may also be a perfectly fine dessert, makes a great leftover, and is ridiculously easy to prepare.  It is also guaranteed to impress the most discriminating guest.

Don’t you love the mouth watering scent of baking cinnamon?  Well, this combination of fruits and spices will sell your house if it is up for sale and tastes as good as it smells.  And it’s another Homeplace Recipe that’s easy-does-it, has very few ingredients, and takes less than 15 minutes to prepare. I make it over and over again because everybody loves it, especially in winter.

COUNTRY SPICED FRUIT

A HOMEPLACE RECIPE

1 – 16 oz. can apple pie filling

1 – 16 oz. can chunk pineapple (in own juice)

1 – 16 oz. can tart cherries

1 large can (or 2 – 16 oz. cans) sliced peaches 

Drain all but pie filling. 

Place all fruit in a baking dish with 1 tsp cinnamon and ½ tsp nutmeg. 

Sprinkle ½ cup of brown sugar on top.

Bake at 325 degrees for 1 hour.

Enjoy!

 

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Spinach Strawberry Salad

A  HOMEPLACE  RECIPE

This lovely, elegant, colorful salad will wow your guests every time!  Well, at least it wows my guests every time.

It’s a true country recipe learned leaning over the shoulders of two lovely, elegant, colorful friends.

Believe it or not, we-the-elegant were in a ladies’ poker group and took turns providing dinners.  We were known to spend more time talking about shopping, recipes and local gossip than playing cards until one of our ladies (Viola) would holler, “Are we going to PLAY or NOT?”

This salad appeared at one of our  poker night dinners at a  farmhouse way out there in Fairfield, and the salad was a colossal hit!

SPINACH STRAWBERRY SALAD

Dressing:

¼ cup sugar

2 TBS Sesame seeds

1 TBS Poppy Seeds

1 TBS finely chopped onion

¼ TSP Worcestershire sauce

¼ TSP paprika

½ to 1 cup of olive oil (1/2 is usually enough)

¼ cup apple cider vinegar

Blend all of the above in a food processor.   Do not refrigerate.

Toss with spinach just before serving.

Garnish top of salad with sliced strawberries and

 slivered almonds to  taste.

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Honeymoon Salad

My husband, Bill, remembers the strangest things.  He knows the lyrics to old songs I never heard of, or all the words to songs I have long forgotten.  He also recalls rhymes, jokes, and one-liners from waaaay back in time and from eras before he was even born.

We can be driving along or drifting through life in serious contemplation when all of a sudden, off he will go, and he never fails to surprise me.

Yesterday was a quiet, lazy day and we were deciding whether to eat out or stay in for dinner.  We both preferred to stay home but I announced I had run out of ingredients for a proper salad.  Note:  We have salad with practically every meal.

“What do you mean we are out of ingredients? Bill asked.

“Well, I have no tomatoes, no peppers, no carrots, and no dressing. I’m out of everything except lettuce.” I answered.

“Oh well,” said Bill, “We will have a Honeymoon Salad.”

“What?”

“You know – a Honeymoon Salad.”

“And what may I ask is that?

“Lettuce Alone.”

I am fairly thick about things as obvious as getting it, so this took a minute for registration.  And then I began a round of hysterical laughter.  Let Us Alone!  Honeymoon Salad!  Aha!  I get it!  And then I could not stop laughing.  I was still laughing today when I got to the grocery store for the other ingredients.

I don’t know how Bill remembers such things, but the oddest rhymes, ditties, tunes, and one-liners are lurking in his usually serious engineering mind.  It is almost as if he has lived another lifetime in another era with another wife.

You never heard of a Honeymoon Salad?  Me neither.  Well, I looked it up and it is, indeed, an old old joke.  In fact, in 1856, the London humor magazine, Punch, wrote that “Salad for the Solitary is lettuce alone.”

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Cold Soup for Hot Weather

ANOTHER HOME PLACE RECIPE

One summer, we harvested so much zucchini from Bill’s garden, that I had to leave the extras at my neighbors’ doorsteps.  I would drop a basket, knock on the door and run!

Seriously, we did have a lot of zucchini that season and I was constantly looking for recipes to use it up.  In perusing my favorite local cookbook called “Lexington Cooks,” I found one for Cold Zucchini Soup.

O.K. – sounds pretty gruesome.  I’m not much for cold soup to begin with, and zucchini?  Ughhh.

However, in desperation, I decided to go ahead and try it.

Verdict: DELICIOUS!

I can’t get enough of the stuff, and now my neighbors are making it too, so I can knock on their doors and I’m even invited in.

Here is the recipe:

COLD ZUCCHINI SOUP

2 large zucchini, sliced               1 tablespoon parsley, chopped

1 green pepper, chopped             1 teaspoon fresh dill or ¼  teaspoon

½ cup chopped onion                       dried dill

3 cups chicken broth                   Salt and pepper to taste

1 cup sour cream 

 

     Place zucchini in saucepan, reserving 4 slices for garnish.  Add green

Pepper, onion, and chicken broth.  Simmer covered for 20 minutes.  Strain

Vegetables, reserving stock.

 

     Place sour cream, parsley, and dill in food processor or

blender.  Add cooked vegetables and blend.  Add stock and blend.  Season 

To taste with salt and pepper.  Chill.  Add raw, chopped zucchini for crunch.

  Makes 6 servings.

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Making a Splash with Salmon

Photo from WineX Magazine

I was at a party last week and the hostess served the best salmon ever!

I was telling my friend, Myra about it and said, “Wow, that was so delicious.  I wonder how she made it.”

“Probably in the dishwasher!” said Myra.

“Huh?”

“Yep.  Haven’t you heard about steaming salmon in a dishwasher?”

“Huh?”

Needless to say, I  went to the font of all knowledge as soon as I got home.  That used to be Mom or the encyclopedia.  Now it’s the internet of course.  And sure enough, if you look up Dishwasher Salmon, you are bound to find a recipe!

I may even try it just for effect or to break any ice that needs breaking.

I can just picture my friends all standing around the dishwasher instead of the Hors D’oeuvres.

Click here for a story if not THE story, and a serious Dishwasher Salmon recipe!

 “Poaching fish in the dishwasher is a virtually foolproof way to shock your friends, prepare a succulent meal and do the dishes – all at the same time.” ~Bob Blumer, WineX Magazine

“Run salmon through the entire wash-and-dry cycle — approximately 50 minutes for most models.” ~ Bob Blumer 

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Riddle: When is a Cookie not a Cookie?

VIRTUAL COOKIES

There are all kinds of cookies of course – the delicious kind and the computer kind. I suppose you could call the latter, virtual cookies.

Computer Cookies are bits of personal information stored on your computer’s web browser. Some cookies are helpful, such as those that store your passwords or user names with your permission. Others are useful because they allow your favorite sites to tailor certain website data to your preferences. Other cookies can track the sites you visit on your computer, which some feel invades privacy. You can view the types of cookies stored on your computer and change your browser’s settings, if you choose. ~Tielle Webb, eHow Contributor

HOLIDAY COOKIES – THE REAL THINGS!

Yes, cookies are all different and the diversification is never more evident than in the weeks before the holidays.  I have begun my yearly Battle of the Bulge by baking and then trying to ignore the aromas in the kitchen and the grumblings in my gut.  Determined to exercise the ultimate will power, I continue making macaroons and ginger snaps and chocolate chip delights, and put them all up in lovely tins for my lovely family and friends.

“Just one taste,” I think – “to make sure they are all right.”  And that leads to two or more tastes and then at least two or more whole cookies guiltily devoured.

“This one broke so it would be a shame to throw it away. Boy, those are good.  One more won’t hurt!”  Do you know the drill?

THE UN-COOKIE SOLUTION

I will now let you in on a monumental secret.  It’s a cookie minus a key ingredient – an ingredient shunned and banned by beleaguered dieticians and health food experts.  This deadly ingredient in most other cookies is guaranteed to vastly increase the caloric value of a holiday treat and especially guaranteed to generate guilt in the holiday chef who is accustomed to “tasting.”

What is it you ask?

FLOUR!

A “real-time”cookie WITHOUT FLOUR!  Imagine? AND it’s one of my traditional Homeplace easy-breezy, no hassle recipes too!

FLOURLESS PEANUTBUTTER-CHOCOLATE CHIP DELIGHTS

1 Egg

1 Cup Brown Sugar Firmly Packed

1 tsp Baking Soda

1 tsp Vanilla

1 Cup Chocolate Chips

1 Cup Chunky Peanut Butter

Beat eggs.  

Mix everything together and drop by tablespoons full onto parchment paper.

Bake at 350 degrees for 10 to 12 minutes.

Credit: This was a recipe reported to me as found in Southern Living Magazine.

I wonder how they would turn out with fake sugar instead of the real thing.  Then I could enjoy the whole tin!

HAPPY TASTING!  HAPPY BAKING!  HAPPY HOLIDAYS TO YOU TOO!

Luv from Your Shamelss Chef, Dor

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