Leftovers - Yummy Rice Dish

It's always a dilemma when you come to the last of the turkey. What to do with that last little bit. I've been waiting for the right opportunity to make this recipe, and I'm glad I did. This recipe was attributed to "Bob's Mother" - my sister's mother-in-law. It did live up to its name. Lori called it "comfort food." Must admit it was good. I didn't have cream of mushroom soup, so I used cream of chicken. And sadly I forgot to add the mushrooms. I love mushrooms, so I know that would have made it even better. And it calls for canned chicken, but leftover turkey works great!

YUMMY RICE DISH
2 tbsp. butter
2 cups diced celery
1 onion chopped
1/2 tsp. poultry seasoning
1 4-oz. can mushrooms with juice
Simmer till transparent. Add 1 can mushroom soup, 1 can chicken with rice soup, 3/4 cup uncooked rice, 1½ cup water. Mix together and put in dripper pan & cover & bake 1½ hrs. at 325°F. Twenty minutes before done add 1 can boned chicken or turkey & 1 cup cashews or almonds.

All Over but the Nap! - Feather Rolls / Aunt Frances's Rolls

Over too quick! All that work and it's over in a flash. Wow, we had a delicious meal, and four generations participated. We used many of Mother's recipes and I had wonderful helpers in my daughters, daughters-in-law, sons, and granddaughters. Here are the two roll recipes we used today. The Feather Rolls were the ones that Mother always made. Aunt Frances's recipe is the recipe that I have used for years because it's easy and makes delicious rolls.

FEATHER ROLLS
2 yeast cakes [5 tsp.]
1/2 cup warm water
1 tbsp. sugar
1 cup scalded milk
1/3 cup melted shortening
1/3 cup sugar
2 tsp. salt
2 eggs well beaten
4 or 5 cups flour unsifted
Mix yeast, warm water & sugar & let stand 20 min. Add to milk when cool & shortening, salt, eggs. Add flour. Dough will be sticky. Put in refrigerator over night. Two hours before serving take out & knead for 10 min. Lightly spread with butter. Cut like jelly roll 1" slices. Put in muffin tins. Let rise 2 hours. Bake 10 min. 425°F. Beulah says use water instead of milk and let dough rise once before refrigerating.

AUNT FRANCES'S ROLLS
1/2 cup warm water
2 tbsp. yeast
1 tsp. sugar
Add 1 can (large) milk and 1 can hot water
2 beaten eggs
1 tbsp. salt
3 tbsp. sugar
1/2 cup oil (butter)
Add flour to make soft dough. Knead 10 min. Let raise. Roll out and let raise again. Bake 10 min. @ 425°F.

Traditions Old and New - Green Bean Casserole / Yams and Apples / Creamed Onions / Cranberry Jello Salad

We always have Green Bean Casserole. Even now - and I remember it from my childhood, or at least teen-hood. My favorite part is the fried onions!

GREEN BEAN CASSEROLE
1 or 2 pkgs. French cut frozen green beans [these are always better]
Cook & drain. Add 1 can mushroom soup, undiluted. Put in casserole. Place canned onion rings (Fancifood) on top and bake 25 min. at 325°F.

We always called this Yams & Apples. I haven't made this recipe in years - not since Caryn got her yummy Sweet Potato Souffle recipe, which is more like dessert. But everyone seemed to really like this one. Here's one tradition that might be revived.

APPLE-YAM CASSEROLE
Slice alternately in a casserole dish 3 or 4 cooked yams and 2 or 3 raw apples, peeled.
Sauce:
1 cup sugar
4 tbsp. cornstarch
1 tsp. salt
1/2 square butter
Mix in 2 cups hot water
Boil together until thick and pour over casserole. (A small amount of lemon juice may be added to sauce.) Bake 1/2 hour at 350°F.

The Creamed Onions are one tradition that my family hasn't really embraced, but since Geralee was coming to dinner today I made them for her. This is one delicious cream sauce - so rich - and I accidentally used a cube of butter instead of a half cube. Mmmm.

CREAMED ONIONS AMANDINE
3 cups small whole onions (about 24)
1/4 cup butter
1/4 cup flour
1/4 tsp. salt
1/8 tsp. black pepper
1 tsp. dry mustard
1 cup cream
1/2 cup finely shredded sharp Cheddar cheese
1/2 cup salted almond halves
Cover onions with boiling salted water and cook 10 to 15 minutes or until just tender; drain, reserving 1 cup onion liquid. Heat butter in a saucepan; blend in a mixture of the next four ingredients until bubbly. Remove from heat and gradually add 1 cup reserved onion liquid and cream, stirring constantly. Bring rapidly to boiling and cook 1 to 2 min. longer, stirring constantly. Remove from heat; add cheese and stir until melted and well blended. Pour sauce over onions and turn into a serving bowl. Top with the almond halves.

As soon as Geralee tasted the jello, she said, "Is this Mother's salad?" So apparently I did it right. It was delicious - I liked it much better than I remember liking it when I was young. Guess my taste buds matured or something. I spread whipped cream on top to serve.

CRANBERRY JELLO SALAD
1 lb. fresh cranberries
1½ cups sugar
1/2 cup orange juice
3 tbsp. orange rind
6 oz. cherry jello
2 cups hot water
1 cup shredded apple
Grind cranberries & mix with sugar, orange juice & orange rind. Let set 2-4 hours. Drain juice & save to use with jello. Measure juice from berries & water to make 1 cup. Dissolve jello, add ingredients & set.

Dessert First! Carrot Pudding / Lemon Pie / Pecan Pie / Fat-Boy Apple Pie

We always make pies first because they're easy to do the day before Thanksgiving. Here are some wonderful recipes my girls helped make yesterday, in addition to our favorite traditional pumpkin, jumbleberry, banana cream, and Chips-Ahoy Chocolate pie.

Mom's specialty was a delicious carrot pudding. This recipe was written in the back of the Household Searchlight cookbook, with the notation that it was her mother's recipe. Sad to admit it, but this was my first time making it. I think it turned out - we haven't tasted it yet, but it looks great. Many years go, cousin Kathi gave my sisters and I a steamer and she included some helpful tips for how to use it. Mom used to steam it in a shortening can or quart jar. In the recipe she says to use shortening or suet, with no amount given. I called Marian and she said maybe use 1/4 cup, so I used half a cube of butter. Mom made a Butter Rum sauce by melting rum-flavored Life Savers. You can't buy those any more, so I bought some rum flavoring. Haven't tried making the sauce yet, but I found a recipe for caramel sauce on SimplyRecipes.com which sounds exactly like the one Marian told me about on the phone from Arizona. Since I failed to write it down, I'm going to use this recipe and try adding a few drops of rum flavoring. Here's the recipe:

CARROT PUDDING
1 cup grated raw carrots
1 cup grated raw potatoes
1 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. nutmeg
1 cup sugar
1 tsp. soda
1 cup raisins
1 cup flour
3/4 tsp. salt
1/2 cup milk or 2 eggs
2 tbsp. boiling H2O
To carrots & potatoes add sugar, flour, salt, eggs, milk. Add shortening or suet. Dissolve soda in boiling water & add the raisins, nuts. Steam 3-4 hours.

Now for the pies - my favorite of all desserts. I remember the day when Mom cut this recipe out of the newspaper. It was SO much fun to find that actual clipping in Mom's files. Here it is:

FAT BOY APPLE PIE
PREPARE:
Your regular one-pie crust recipe. This will make two pies. Roll them out and flute the edges high in a couple of 9-inch pie pans.
PEEL AND CORE:
About 8 apples. Don't use bottles or canned - they ain't the same. Slice them up and then put them into the crusts and top with a little cinnamon and some lemon juice, and about a half cup of sugar for each pie.
PREPARE A TOPPING OF:
1½ cups flour
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
1 or 2 cups chopped pecans
1½ cups margarine (2 or 3 cubes)
COMBINE ALL INGREDIENTS:
Get your hands in there and mix it until it is a nice crumbly mixture.
PUT TOPPING ON PIE AND:
Make sure that none of the apples peek through the crumb topping, then bake at 425°F for 15 minutes, then reduce heat to 350 for another 45 minutes.
SERVE WITH:
Thinly sliced cheddar cheese. Apple pie without cheese is like a kiss without a squeeze.
NOTICE:
This pie lives up to its name - it's fattening, delightful, and will draw raves. Bake enough of these and maybe he'll get you that new wardrobe, even if you don't become a skinny old girl!
Thanks to Lori for peeling the apples!

Lemon meringue pie is one I haven't mastered; in fact I might have made it only a couple of times. I've had requests for this recipe to show up here, though, so here it is. Luckily, Caryn makes this every Father's Day so she got the assignment to make it for us. Tyler helped with the lemon squeezing. It looks beautiful, and I'm sure will taste delicious.

REAL LEMON PIE FILLING
2 cups water
1/3 cup lemon juice (real)
1 tsp. grated lemon rind
Dash salt
Bring to boil & thicken with 2 tbsp. flour & 3 tbsp. cornstarch mixed with 1/2 cup sugar. Cook until clear & done - about 5 min. then mix another 1/2 cup sugar with 2 beaten egg yolks and add a little hot custard to them. Then add eggs mixture to lemon. Cook a few minutes. Pour HOT filling to baked HOT crust. Beat egg whites. Add 1/8 tsp. cream tarter. Beat stiff & add gradually 4 tbsp. sugar, 1 tsp. vanilla. Brown in medium oven.

One of my favorite pies is Pecan Pie. This recipe varies a bit from the one I've always made. It's from a newspaper clipping. Hope it's good!

PECAN PIE IMPERIAL
Unbaked pie shell, 10-in.
3 eggs
1 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
1/2 cup light corn syrup
1 tbsp. lemon juice
1 tsp. vanilla
1/2 tsp. salt
1 cup light cream or half and half
2 cups whole pecan halves
In large mixing bowl beat eggs; add sugar and beat until thick and smooth. Blend in corn syrup, lemon juice, vanilla and salt. Stir in cream. Fill pie shell with pecans. Pour custard over nuts. Bake in preheated 375°F oven for 1 hour or until set. Makes 8 servings.

Can't forget the pie crust. Camille made this crust for Cam's Jumbleberry Pie. It's a recipe from the collection that I usually make. The secret is using very cold water, and very minimal handling. Flaky crust every time!

PIE CRUST (2)
2½ cups flour
1 cup shortening
1 tbsp. vinegar
1/4 cup water
1 egg
1/2 tsp. salt
[Cut shortening into flour & salt.] Mix together water, vinegar & egg. Stir into other ingredients.

Today's Thanksgiving Day!

Anybody out there remember "My Picture Book of Songs"? That wonderful big yellow songbook from my childhood has a family favorite song that we sing every Thanksgiving:

"Today's Thanksgiving Day, and we have a treat

Because there are so many-y-y-y yummy things to eat!"

We've already sung it several times in anticipation of eating ourselves sick. Wait - we've already started doing that! I've been feeding about 20 people all week, besides getting all the wonderful things ready for the big event. I'll be able to check off about 10 recipes for today alone.

And for Dessert - Best Ever Apple Pudding

Here's another recipe that I used to make for special occasions. I doubled the recipe for a 9x13 pan, but I did not double the sauce - no need, it makes plenty.

BEST EVER APPLE PUDDING
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup soft butter
1 egg
2 large unpeeled apples, shredded (2 cups)
1 cup sifted flour
1 tsp. soda
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. nutmeg
1/4 tsp. salt
1/2 cup chopped walnuts
Gradually add sugar to butter, creaming well. Add egg & beat hard. Shred apples medium fine, add at once to creamed mixture. Stir in sifted dry ingredients, add walnuts. Bake in greased 8" or 9" square pan at 350°F (moderate) about 45 minutes. Cut in squares. Serve hot with Best Ever Pudding Sauce, whipped cream or caramel sauce. Makes 8 or 9 servings. (Good re-heated.)
Best Ever Pudding Sauce
1/2 cup butter
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup light cream
1½ tsp. vanilla
Dash nutmeg
Heat butter, sugar & cream together over very low heat 10 to 15 minutes, stirring occasionally until blended & slightly thickened. Don't let sauce boil. Add vanilla & nutmeg. Serve hot on hot pudding or plain cake. Makes 1½ cups.

Not - 12 Hour Butterhorn Rolls

It didn't reallly take take this long to make these rolls. I must admit that I was intimidated by the title. The advantage to this recipe, though, was that I could start it in the morning, go to church, and have hot rolls by dinner at 6. I used 5 cups of flour, and brushed the dough with melted butter before cutting into wedges. I think this roll has a nice flavor and consistency. For more roll recipes, see June (I think). I made four batches in one day!

12 HOUR BUTTERHORN ROLLS
1 yeast cake (2½ tsp.) dissolved in
1/4 cup water & 1 tbsp. sugar
1 cup sweet milk, scalded & cooled
Add:
3 well-beaten eggs
3 tbsp. butter, melted (or more)
1/2 cup sugar
1 tsp. salt
4 cups (or more) flour
Knead well. Let raise about 5 hours. Divide in half. Roll into 8 in. or 9 in. diameter and 1/8 in. thick. Cut into 16 pieces, wedges and roll (starting with wide end). Don't place too close. Rise 3 to 4 hours. Bake 11 to 13 min. in 400°F oven.

A Family Favorite - Baked Beans

Here's another recipe from my mother-in-law, Vera. We've made this recipe for years and love it. I made it in my crock pot rather than the oven. And who knows what a half bottle of catsup is? I just dumped. I have no idea how big the bottles were when Vera started making this recipe. I drain the bacon grease before cooking the onions and peppers so that I can rationalize that it's not that fattening.

BAKED BEANS
1 large can pork & beans
1/2 lb. bacon (cut in pieces & warm through - not crisp)
Take out bacon & add to beans. In bacon grease warm & soften 1 onion & 1/2 green pepper (chopped). Take out of grease & add to beans. 3 tsp. worcestershire sauce, 1/2 cup brown sugar, 1/2 bottle catsup. Bake at 250°F 3 hours.

Don't Need a Funeral to Love These - Potato Casserole Supreme and Scalloped Potatoes

I knew that one recipe wouldn't be enough for 20 of us, so I tried two different variations of what we lovingly call in Utah "funeral potatoes." These came by the nickname because they're frequently served at family luncheons after funerals. For both of these recipes, I used frozen grated hash browns. SO easy! The Potato Casserole Supreme is a recipe from my mother-in-law, Vera. The Scalloped Potatoes is I'm sure from Geralee, but it's not noted on the card. Be sure to add salt to this recipe.

POTATO CASSEROLE SUPREME
Boil 6-7 potatoes with jackets. Cool, peel, shred.Grease 9 x 13 pan.Heat 1/2 cup. Margarine, 2 cans cream of chicken soup, 1½ cups grated cheese, 1 pint sour cream, 1/3-1/2 cup grated onion.Mix above and pour over potatoes. Mix lightly with fork. Sprinkle with 1 cup crushed corn flakes with 2 tbsp. melted butter mixed in. Bake uncovered 350°F 45 min. Good.

SCALLOPED POTATOES
Use grated cooked potatoes. Use 9 x 13 pan. 5 or 6 potatoes. A little onion grated. Pour 1 pint whipping cream over. Dot with margarine. Top with grated cheese & bake.

Gearing Up for Thanksgiving - Cranberried Ham

Lots of happy noise at our house this week. Our whole family is coming home for Thanksgiving. What a great chance to try new recipes! I'm going to blog each recipe separately just for convenience sake, but this and the several following were all for Sunday dinner. It was quite a feast! This Cranberried Ham was from a magazine clipping, and I'm really glad Mom clipped it out. It was delicious - even non-ham-lovers liked it. I used a spiral cut ham and baked it in my roaster.

CRANBERRIED HAM
3 cups currant jelly
2 cups white corn syrup
3/4 tsp. ground ginger
1 9- to 12-pound boned, rolled, fully cooked ham
3 cups whole cranberries
About 2½ hours before serving: Start heating oven to 325°F. In large skillet mix currant jelly, corn syrup and ginger; cook over medium heat until syrupy. Place ham in foil-lined baking pan. Brush it all over with some of jelly mixture. Then bake it, allowing 10 minutes per pound, or about 2 hours, brushing frequently with jelly mixture. About 15 minutes before ham is done: Over medium heat, cook cranberries in rest of jelly mixture, uncovered, for about 7 minutes. When ham is done, place it on a large heated platter. With a large, sharp knife, slice it, partway through, into about 18 slices, being careful NOT to cut all the way through ham. Now, spoon some of cranberry mixture in between every 2 of the ham slices. Pour leftover cranberry mixture into a bowl. Serve ham roll hot, cutting each slice completely through, then in halves. Pass bowl of cranberry mixture. Makes 36 to 48 servings.

Salads for Sunday - Fruit Salad and Orange Salad

A lot of family for Sunday dinner - great chance to try some new recipes. Here are two salads they're getting tomorrow.

ORANGE SALAD
2 pkgs. Orange jello
2 cups boiling water
1 can frozen orange juice
1 can mandarin oranges
1 small can crushed pineapple & juice
1 cup cold water
Mix jello & boiling water, then add 1 can orange juice & stir well. Add mandarin oranges, crushed pineapple & water. Set in fridge till firm.
1/2 cup sugar
2 heaping tbsp. flour
1 can #2 pineapple juice
5 tbsp. butter
1 cup whipped cream
1 beaten egg
Chopped nuts
In the meantime cook sugar, flour, pineapple juice, egg & butter until thick. Cool, add whipped cream. Pour over jello mixture & sprinkle with nuts.
[I didn't use the nuts because I wanted this salad to get eaten!]

FRUIT SALAD
1 pkg. of lemon jello
Heat 1 cup pineapple juice and dissolve jello
1½ cups pineapple chunks
1 cup orange sections
24 maraschino cherries (I don't like this many)
16 Marshmallows cut fine.
When thickened whip 1 cup cream and fold in.
(Very Good)

For this salad, I used pineapple tidbits from the large can. It gave me exactly 1 cup of juice and 1 1/2 cups of pineapple. A regular size can of mandarin oranges is just about a cup. I used 12 maraschino cherries and cut them in half. And this recipe was obviously created before the days of miniature marshmallows. Believe it or not girls, I remember those days! So I estimated that about 8 minis makes a large - or about 2 cups.

Popcorn Poppin' - Caramel Corn and Popcorn Nut Crunch

It's Thanksgiving week and so I'm gearing up! What does popcorn have to do with Thanksgiving, you might ask. Well, you have to have caramel popcorn to munch on in the even while you play games. It's just tradition around here. I'm including two recipes here, with possibly more to follow. This first recipe calls for peanuts, which I didn't have. So I added cashews. Even better! This is a crunchy, dark popcorn. You have to work fast while stirring and spreading it out because the caramel hardens quickly.

CARAMEL CORN
2 quarts popped corn
1 lb. brown sugar
1/2 cup dark corn syrup
1/2 cup water
1/2 cup margarine or butter
1 tsp. salt
1 tbsp. vanilla
1 cup Planters peanuts
Keep popped corn in oven at warm. Combine all ingredients except vanilla, peanuts and popcorn. Cook over moderate heat to hard crack stage. Remove from heat, stir in vanilla, mix nuts and popcorn. Pour syrup over mixture in a fine stream. Work in quickly. Mix well until all kernels are coated. Spread on cookie sheet and break into pieces at once.

I also made Popcorn Nut Crunch. Yum! This seems a lot like Poppy Cock, a light coating with lots of nuts. I used slivered almonds, not shredded (whatever that is). I didn't use a candy thermometer on this one because I wanted to be true to the recipe. It took just about 10 minutes to start to turn light brown, so I gave it a minute or two more. You have to work fast with this one too - a lot of the nuts ended up at the bottom of the bowl.

POPCORN NUT CRUNCH
2 quarts popcorn
1-1/3 cup pecans
1 cup shredded almonds
1-1/3 cup sugar
1 cup margarine
1/2 cup white Karo
1 tsp. vanilla
Mix popcorn & nuts on a cookie sheet. Combine margarine, sugar & syrup in saucepan. Bring to boil 10 to 15 minutes. Stirring often until mixture turns a light brown. Remove from heat. Stir in vanilla. Pour over popped corn & nuts & mix to coat well. Spread out to dry & break apart. Store in tightly covered container.

Apples Galore! - Apple Dessert

My friend Chris gave me a big sack of apples, so I've been perusing through the collection for some good uses. I hesitate to make too many things knowing that I'll be the one eating up the leftovers (which I did tonight). Last night I made the Apple Dessert. It's really good served warm with ice cream. This recipe makes about four servings, and was attributed to Aunt Ruby (my grandfather's second wife).

APPLE DESSERT

1 egg well beaten
3/4 cup sugar
3 tbsp. flour
1 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. vanilla
Pinch of salt
1 cup grated apple (1 large apple)
1/2 cup chopped walnuts
Mix and pour into buttered Pyrex dish. Bake 30 min. at 350°F. Raisins or chopped dates may be added. Serve with whipped cream, just cream or any sauce. It raises nice, then falls as it browns.

Company for Dinner - Cherry Salad and Apple Walnut Crisp

It's great to have company come for dinner because I have guinea pigs! This Cherry Salad recipe somewhat resembles the version of the salad that I actually made. I decided that it was already sweet enough and didn't need a can of sweetened condensed milk. So that was eliminated. Then I had bought bananas because for some reason I thought I needed them for the salad I was going to make. Well, this recipe didn't call for bananas, but they got used anyway because I had no other use for them. And they added nicely to the salad. I actually only made a half recipe and froze the cherries and pineapple (together, and labeled for future use). Oh, and I left out the nuts for Coray's sake. Would have been better with them, but I wanted the salad to get eaten.

CHERRY SALAD
13 oz. Cool Whip
1 can sweetened condensed milk
1 medium can pie cherry filling
1 medium crushed pineapple
Crushed nuts
2 cups small marshmallows

For dessert, I made the Apple Walnut Crisp - and I did include the walnuts!

APPLE WALNUT CRISP
4-5 apples, pared, cored, and sliced to measure 4 cups
1 tbsp. lemon juice
1/2 cup flour
1/2 cup brown sugar, firmly packed
1/4 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. nutmeg
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1/4 cup butter or margarine
1/2 cup walnuts
Arrange apples in 8x8x2 inch greased pan (or shallow casserole) and sprinkle with lemon juice. Combine flour, sugar, salt, nutmeg, and cinnamon. Work in butter until crumbly; add walnuts. Evenly sprinkle mixture over apples. Bake at 375°F, about 35-45 minutes until topping is brown and apples are tender. Serve warm with whipped cream, plain cream, or ice cream. Makes 6 servings.

Halloween Requires Pumpkin - Cookies!

Here's another recipe that I had to make twice, just to be sure I got it right. The first time I made it, I was sure that I didn't bake them long enough (which was probably right). The cookies seemed to rise nice and round like you would expect pumpkin cookies to do, but then they cooled flat and chewey. I had more pumpkin, so I decided to try them again. This time I baked them about 14 minutes (instead of 10). The cookies still cooked flat and chewy, but less doughy. It's a good cookie, just not and puffy, cake-like pumpkin cookie that you see in the store bakeries. Oh, and I didn't bother with the raisins and nuts called for in the recipe. Just used a full package of chocolate chips.

PUMPKIN COOKIES
1/2 cup shortening
1½ cups sugar
1 egg
1 cup pumpkin
1 tsp. vanilla
Mix together, then add:
2½ cups flour
1 tsp. soda
1 tsp. salt
1 tsp. cinnamon
1 cup chocolate chips
1/2 cup raisins
1/2 cup nuts
Mix well. Spoon on greased cookie sheet. Bake 375°F for 10 min. Frost with orange frosting. Use orange juice with powdered & food coloring.