Happy Halloween

Night of the Living Teddy

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APPLE CRISP FOR TWO

Click on photo

I call this apple crisp for two, although I guess that is a bit of a misnomer. It actually makes 3 large desserts (like the above photo), so in my warped sense of proportions, it is apple crisp for two (and a little more for later) haha.  This can easily be doubled (just bake it a little longer).

I love a good fruit crisp. I like the topping slightly crunchy (but not HARD crunchy) and I like it to have lots of gooey filling. This is one of the best crisps we've tried in years.

2 large Granny Smith apples (see note)
¼ cup granulated sugar
¼ cup brown sugar
1 tablespoon all purpose flour
¼ teaspoon cinnamon
pinch of nutmeg (optional)

Peel, core and thinly slice the apples. Toss with the above ingredients and place in a greased baking dish (I use a 9" x 5" loaf pan). Sprinkle two tablespoons of water over the filling. NOTE: Don't mix the water into the above mixture, just sprinkle it evenly OVER the filling; trust me it works perfectly and makes the BEST sauce.

For the topping, mix
¼ cup quick oats
¼ cup all purpose flour
¼ cup brown sugar
1/8 teaspoon baking soda
1/8 teaspoon baking powder
2 tablespoons melted butter

Use a spoon and mix the topping ingredients until everything seems coated with butter. Evenly sprinkle it over the fruit filling. Bake in pre-heated 350 oven for 30-35 minutes or until apples are tender.  Let cool 15 minutes before serving (if you can wait that long).

NOTE: Make sure you use a good baking apple like Granny Smith. Regular eating apples don't work well in this kind of recipe (they get mushy).

NOTE: If you want to make dessert for 6, just double the recipe and cook for 45 minutes in an 8" x 8" pan.

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WEEKEND BREAKFAST PIZZA

I don't buy refrigerator ("whomp tube") biscuits very often, but I DO buy them for this recipe. My family absolutely loves this quick and easy breakfast. As a matter of fact, the first time I made this, I was told "this is gold!!"  Even Picky-picky Hubby gave double thumbs up which is rare!!

 

This weekend treat can easily be "tweaked" to suit your family. Here are the basic ingredients:

8 ounce Pillsbury refrigerated crescent rolls
1 pound (total) cooked breakfast meat (see  note)
1½ cups frozen shredded hash browns (thawed)
1½ cups shredded cheddar
4 eggs  (don't be tempted to add more)
¼ cup milk
¼ teaspoon black pepper
¼ cup Parmesan cheese

Open the refrigerator rolls and press into an ungreased 12" pizza pan, pinching all of the seams shut. Important: make sure you press some of the dough up onto the sides of the pan to create a "lip". DO NOT PRE-BAKE THE CRUST.

Cook (and completely drain) one pound of your favorite breakfast meat (NOTE: I used equal parts of crisp bacon, breakfast sausage and finely diced ham...but ANY combo will work well. Just make sure the total weight is about a pound).

Sprinkle the cooked breakfast meat, evenly, over the unbaked crescent dough. Next, evenly sprinkle the thawed hash browns and cheddar cheese over the cooked meat.

In small bowl, whisk the 4 eggs, black pepper and milk together. Drizzle evenly over everything.  NOTE: Don't be tempted to add more eggs. It is going to SEEM like it isn't enough, but trust me...it is perfect.

 

Lastly, sprinkle the Parmesan cheese over all.  Bake in a 375 pre-heated oven for 30 minutes (my oven took 28 minutes). Remove from oven and let sit for 5 minutes before you cut it.

 

Sauteed mushrooms, peppers, etc. would be wonderful in this breakfast pizza. Just add them the same time as the thawed hash browns. You might have to add a couple extra minutes to the total baking time if you add a LOT of extra veggies.

NOTE: You can also use one of those small boxes of JIFFY pizza crust mix instead of the crescent roll dough.

NOTE: If you use frozen hash browns, make sure they are thawed before using in this recipe.

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STRAWBERRY FROSTING

This quick and easy strawberry frosting is just delightful. I used fresh strawberries, but I see no reason why frozen (thawed) strawberries wouldn't work.  It has a light, fresh, fruity flavor and was a big hit at my house.

1 cup UNSALTED butter at room temperature
4 cups powdered sugar (see note)
1 teaspoon vanilla
dash salt
5 tablespoons strawberry puree (see note)

Whip the butter, with electric mixer, until light and fluffy. Beat in powdered sugar, one cup at a time, scraping the sides of the bowl occasionally.

Add the strawberry puree (I just pureed fresh strawberries in my food processor), vanilla and salt. Beat till smooth.

NOTE: The liquid of the strawberries will vary for everyone. If your frosting seems too soft, just add extra powdered sugar (a little at a time) until you get the consistency you want.  If you are going to use this for piping trim, you'll have to add at least another cup to a cup and a half of powdered sugar.
NOTE: This recipe will easily frost 2½ dozen cupcakes if you are just frosting them with a knife.

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Eat, Drink And Be Merry In Maryland

I defy you find another cookbook that is dedicated to Oliver Wendell Holmes and features and introduction by Emily Post. That is, however, what you will find in Eat, Drink And Be Merry In Maryland by Frederick Philip Stieff. Stieff was the scion of a famous piano-making family and a well-known gastronome. Post was a rather famous Marylander who found the cookbook dredged up many a Maryland memory. Holmes once wrote, "Baltimore... is the gastronomic metropolis of the Union." Who knew!

This cookbook was published in 1932 and features over 100 illustrations by Edwin Tunis. Remember that the book was published in 1932, so some of the illustration are very politically incorrect. Some of the illustration offer up poems, jokes, and histories of Maryland. For instance in the "drink" section, this:

A Marylander and a Virginia were discussing the merits of their respective liquors, The Marylander poured the Virginia two drinks. On imbibing one the Virginian fainted. When he came to, he admitted defeat. "But, " said the Marylander, "you drank the chaser."

I am sure it was more amusing in 1932, but you get the gist.



The endpapers feature a gastronomic map of Maryland, featuring the bounty of the state. Stieff not only


cooked, but collected recipes from multiple sources: restaurants, hotels, bars, inns and people. He culled recipes from housewives and spinsters, to a recipe from Senator Millard Tydings for a rather interesting breakfast.

Since crab is one of the bounties that makes Maryland great, here is a recipe featuring the states finest.

CRAB MEAT DEWEY

Take one pound of crab meat, melt two ounces of butter and blend with two ounces of sifted flour, gradually add 2/3 cup of chicken stock and a pint of thin cream.
Bring to boil for about five minutes, season with salt and cayenne pepper. Stir in the yolks of three well-beaten eggs.
Pay attention that sauce is perfectly smooth, add one cup full of thin sliced cooked mushrooms and crab meat. Serve on toast in shallow casserole. Sprinkle very fine chopped parsley as garniture.—Maryland Yacht Club, Baltimore.

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CLASSIC BUTTER CAKE

A few days ago, my cooking buddy Katy, at Food For a Hungry Soul, posted a great classic cake recipe. It immediately caught my eye, not only because it looked so moist and delicious, but it looked quick, easy and used all standard pantry ingredients (my idea of a great recipe).

The recipe is all I hoped it would be. We had company for the weekend and the cake was a big hit. As a matter of fact, it was gone in about a day and a half (and it makes a nice big cake!!).  I hope you try it, it is delicious, thank you Katy!!

OLD FASHIONED BUTTER CAKE
2 cups all-purpose flour, sifted
1¼ cup sugar
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
½ cup butter, softened
1 cup milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract (I used 2)
2 eggs

Preheat oven to 350*F. Grease and flour two 8" x 2" baking pans and set aside. (see note)

In a large mixing bowl sift together the flour, sugar, baking powder and salt. Add butter, milk, and vanilla. Beat on high speed of an electric mixer for 2 minutes (scrape down the sides of the bowl once in a while). Add the eggs and beat two more minutes.

Pour batter into prepared pans, dividing equally between the pans. Bake 30 to 35 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Remove from oven.

Cool in the pans for 10 minutes and then turn cakes out onto a cooling rack to cool completely.

Katy frosted her butter cake with a delicious looking chocolate frosting, which I planned on repeating until I discovered I didn’t have enough powdered sugar, so I opted for a cooked frosting that uses granulated sugar, you can find my recipe here.

NOTE: The first time, I made this cake, I made the mistake of not measuring  the depth of my 8” cake pans. Katy’s directions said 8” x 2” and I found out (all too late) that my pans were 8” by 1½”. The cake baked beautifully, but got so tall that it came over the top and flowed over the edges (and down the sides) of the pan (thank goodness I had them on a cookie sheet!!) The next time I made the cake, I used a 9” x 2” pan and it worked beautifully (baked in 30 minutes).

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Cosmopolitan Cookery In an English Kitchen

Theodora Fitzgibbon wrote over 30 books, most of them cookery books. Much of her writing dealt with her native Ireland and its surrounding area, but she was also well versed in food from an international perspective. For 15 years she worked on The Food of the Western World: An Encyclopedia of Food from North America and Europe a compendium of... well, it is exactly what the title says it is: an encyclopedia of food from North America and Europe.


As a kind of precursor to this monumental work, Fitzgibbon wrote Cosmopolitan Cookery In an English Kitchen. The book is a collection of Recipes Fitzgibbon adapted from her many travels. IT was an attempt to move the English cook away from mutton and boiled carrots. Published in 1953, it recalls a time when England was still dealing with the ravages of rationing. On 4 July 1954, food rationing in England came to an end with meat being the last of the rationed foodstuffs. After so much hardship, it was often hard for the home cook to let go and explore new options, as simply putting "food" on the table had been so hard.

Fitzgibbon offers this advice to those reading her book:

"I have found that many a good cook tends to spoil a meal by serving the wrong things together. A dinner consisting of the following was given to me some time ago: a leek and potato soup with cram, followed by chicken and onions in a bechamel sauce, followed in turn by mousse covered in cream. All delicious separately and all practically tasteless together, to say nothing of the appearance three times of a great gery-white splodge. (For the colour and consistency of food is important too.)"

I find "splodge" to be my new favorite word. Technically an irregular milky spot or drip, but with a recently more sexualized connotation. But I digress...

I have never been fond of veal, but I do love a good cooked cucumber and this dish offers the option of lamb and frankly, I think chicken would work too.

Sliced Veal or Lamb and Cucumbers

1/2 lb veal
1 1/2 dessertspoons of water
1 tablespoon soy sauce
2 oz mushrooms and/or Chinese fungus
1 teaspoon cornflour
1 cucumber
1 oz cooking fat

Slice the veal into thin strips, and mix with the cornflour paste made from the teaspoon of cornflour and the water, Peel the cucumber, cut into cubes, and fry for a few minutes with the slice mushrooms or fungus in the cooking fat Add the meat and cornflour mixture and fry together for 10 minutes. Add soy sauce, stir well and cook gently for 5 minutes, This dish can be made with pork and celery.

Or, I think, chicken!

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Not A Cookbook -- Mamie Eisenhower's Fudge

Mamie Geneva Doud Eisenhower, 1959 by Thomas Edgar Stephens

Having a boatload of cookbooks means that I often get requests to find recipes. I was asked recently for an old fudge recipe, that someone remembered and I dare say, Mamie Eisenhower's Million Dollar Fudge may well be the most famous fudge recipe, if not the most famous recipe in American history.


Not only has it been reprinted in numerous newspapers and books, but it seems that everyone's mother or grandmother has a recipe card with this fudge recipe tucked in a box.




Supposedly, it made its first appearance in a cookbook entitled, Who Says We Can’t Cook, published in 1955 by the Women's National Press Club. Here is the recipe:

Mamie’s Million Dollar Fudge

4-1/2 cups of Sugar
2 Tablespoons of Butter
1 pinch of Salt
1 tall can of Evaporated Milk
12 ounces of Semi-sweet Chocolate Bits
12 ounces of German Sweet Chocolate
1 pint of Marshmallow Cream
2 cups of chopped Nutmeats

Heat the sugar, butter, salt and evaporated milk over low heat, stirring until the sugar dissolves. Bring to a boil, and boil for six minutes. Put the chocolate bits, German chocolate, marshmallow cream and nutmeats into a heat resistant bowl. Pour the mixture you've been boiling over the ingredients you've just placed in the bowl. Beat until the chocolate has melted, and then pour it all into a pan. Let it stand for a few hours before cutting it into fudge sized pieces. Remember, it is even better the second day. Store in a tin box

When not tucked in a recipe box, it can be seen as a bookmark,

holding a place in a rather obscure Vladimir Nabokov novel.


Several days before Dwight Eisenhower was elected President, Mamie Eisenhower sent a letter to Mrs. Robert W. Macauley. She included a recipe for "Uncooked Fudge," and sent her best wishes for the success of the Cathedral's Women's Auxiliary Fall Festival. Whether this was the same fudge as her Million Dollar Fudge is unknown to me.

The Food Network "updated" the recipe for Eisenhower's fudge. The update seems to be changing "nutmeats" to "pecans" and moving the nuts to a higher position in the recipe. Here is their update:

Mamie Eisenhower's Fudge

4 1/2 cups sugar
Pinch salt
2 tablespoons butter
1 (12-ounce) can evaporated milk
2 cups coarsely chopped pecans
1 pint (1 jar) marshmallow cream
12 ounces semisweet chocolate
12 ounces German's sweet chocolate

Directions

In a heavy saucepan over medium heat, bring the sugar, salt, butter and evaporated milk to a boil. Boil for 6 minutes.

Meanwhile, place the pecans, marshmallow fluff and chocolate in a large bowl. Pour the boiled syrup over the chocolate mixture. Beat until chocolate is all melted.

Spray a 15 1/2 by 10 1/2 by 1-inch jelly-roll pan with a nonstick cooking spray and pour fudge into pan. Let harden at room temperature before cutting into 1-inch squares (can be placed in the refrigerator or freezer to speed hardening process).

All the updating in the world will not change the fact that this recipe is still a family favorite.




Check out things people leave in books at Forgotten Bookmarks.

For old recipes check out Gram's Recipe Box.

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RASBERRY SHORTBREAD BARS

Everyone loves these raspberry bars, they have an ultra-buttery shortbread crust topped with cooked raspberries and a streusel topping.They are very sweet, buttery, tender AND they cut nicely...perfect for gift giving (these will definitely be in my cookie gift boxes this Christmas). Yes, you heard me correctly...it is never too early to start planning your holiday baking!!.

Raspberries grow well in Alaska, so if you are lucky enough to have some in the freezer, this is a wonderful recipe for them; I'm not so lucky, so I used a 12 ounce bag of frozen raspberries.

Put the berries (no need to thaw) in a heavy saucepan with ¼ cup of water and one cup of white sugar. Bring to a boil over high heat, then reduce the heat to medium high and simmer the berries until they thick (I turned mine down to a medium low heat and simmered them for about 15 minutes). Set aside to cool (they will thicken even more as they cool).

SHORTBREAD CRUST

21 tablespoons of butter, melted and cooled to room temp.

This seems like a lot of butter, but it makes an upper and lower crust

¾ cup of white sugar

2 large egg yolks

3 cups + 3 tablespoons all purpose flour

No need to use an electric mixer, I did it all with a wooden spoon. Mix the sugar into the melted butter and whisk in the egg yolks. Stir in the flour to make a very stiff dough. Remove two cups of this dough and pat evenly into a foil lined 9 x 13 pan. Prick the dough all over with a fork and refrigerate for 30 minutes (or put in freezer for 7 minutes). Set the rest of the dough aside.

Bake the 9 x 13 chilled pan of dough, on the middle rack of your oven, for 20 minutes at 325.

After 20 minutes, the dough will still be very pale in color and will not have any golden color on the edges. Remove it from the oven and spread the cooled raspberry filling evenly over it.

To the reserved shortbread dough that you set aside, add ¼ cup of granulated sugar and use a fork to break up the dough into crumbs (I use my pastry cutter).

Sprinkle the crumbs evenly over the raspberry layer. Bake on the TOP rack of a 350 oven for 25 minutes (mine took 32 minutes). Watch the crumbles towards the end of the baking time so they don't get dark. 

Cool baked bars on a wire rack for at least an hour or until completely firm. You can speed set them in the fridge. When the bottom of the pan is completely cool, lift the bars out of the pan by pulling on the flap ends of the foil. Cut into 2" bars. These will keep at room temperature for a week.

 NOTE: The butter measurement of 21 tablespoons is not a typing error

NOTE: Line  your 9" x 13" baking pan with foil and leave the ends of the foil a little long, so you can use them as handles to lift the cooled bars out of the pan. You don't have to grease the bottom of the pan because there's so much butter in the shortbread, but DO spray the sides of the pan/foil with cooking spray so the jam doesn't stick to the sides.

NOTE: Pay attention to baking temperatures. The first crust pre-bake is on the middle rack at 325. The final bake is on the TOP rack at 350. The recipe says it is baked on the top rack so that the bottom of the crust doesn't get too dark.

NOTE: If you want to take a shortcut, I am fairly certain you can just use raspberry jam instead of cooking the berries. I have not tried it this way, but I don't know why it wouldn't work (although I'm fairly certain that the cooked berries taste "brighter".

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Gridiron Cookery

Are you ready for some football? I am sorry we are no longer allowed to use that phrase due to some some dumbass who should have known better. Oh well, every state has one, or two. However, the answer is... we are.

This evening Alabama is playing Vanderbilt for Homecoming because Agnes Scott doesn't have a football team.

In Alabama, Paul "Bear" Bryant is still the driving force in football. Hundreds of students, who weren't even born when Bear was alive, will file into the stadium wearing his famous houndstooth hat.




I will admit to being alive when "Bear" coached and to give you some idea of just how powerful Coach Bryant's influence was and is in Alabama, I can tell you that every time I hear about an event "marking 9/11, " I always ask myself, "Why are they celebrating "Bear" Bryant's birthday?"

In 1960, Frances Daugherty and Aileen Brothers published a collection of recipes from the wives of football coaches around the county. Gridiron Cookery boasts that these resourceful hostesses are:

"skilled at taming (and feeding) victory-mad mobs -- or reviving a few low-spirited losers."

One such hostess was Mrs. Paul Bryant. Here is a recipe she picked up when "Bear" was the coach at Texas A & M.

Cheese Biscuits

1/2 pound of butter
4 cups grated cheese (half New York and half American)
2 1/2 -2 2/3 cups flour
1 teaspoon cayenne pepper
stuffed olives, cut in half

Cream butter and cheese; add flour and cayenne pepper. Press through cooky press in long strips. Place cut olives on the strips and roll like a jelly roll into small biscuits. Place on a cooky sheet, and bake at 300F until slightly browned.

There is time to make up a big batch of these before kick off. (Provided you own a "cooky" press.)

I know if was 1960 but it is now 2011. Mrs. Paul Bryant was Mary Harmon Black Bryant.

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The Beekman 1802 Heirloom Cookbook

Well, we think the Fabulous Beekman Boys, Dr. Brent Ridge and Josh Kilmer-Purcell, are famous and just getting more famous and fabulous as the days march on. (Though we are not sure they could get any more fabulous.) We would like to take some credit for their success and why shouldn't we. We were in their camp and encouraging everyone to buy their book and take a gander at their television show before it ever aired and long before they graced made the pages of Food & Wine.




Since our blog, Cookbook Of The Day, is simply enamored of cookbooks we were beside ourselves when we found out that a Beekman Boys cookbook was in the works. It went immediately on our pre-order list and it arrived last week. Let me tell you that it was worth the wait. For those of you who watched every episode of the Fabulous Beekman Boys, you know there was controversy over the title of the cookbook which was resolved in Dr. Brent's favor. You will also remember the preliminary photo shoot for the cookbook. If you saw that, you know that ever detail was meticulously thought out and shot and re-shot until it had the Beekman stamp of approval. Needless to say, the picture of the food by Paulette Tavormina are works of art.



The recipes are bright and homey. There is a good mix of things you have heard of, like fried green tomatoes and roast leg of lamb and interesting twists. The Harvest Beef Chili not only has beans but nice big chinks of pumpkin, which we find to terribly underused. We are big fans of augmenting the plain mashed potato and this recipe is a fine way to do just that.

Sorrel Mashed Potatoes

1 1/2 pounds of baking potatoes, peeled and sliced
4 tablespoons (1/2 stick) unsalted butter
3 bunches of sorrel(about 2 ounces each), tough ends trimmed, leaves torn
3/4 cup milk
3/4 teaspoon salt

In a medium saucepan, combine the potatoes with salt water to cover. Bring to a boil, reduce and simmer, and cook until the potatoes are fork tender. Drain and return to the pan.

Meanwhile, in a medium skillet, melt 2 tablespoons of the butter over low heat. Add the sorrel and cook, stirring occasionally, until it is very tender and soft, about 4 minutes.

With a potato masher or a handheld mixer, mash the potatoes with the milk, salt, and remaining two tablespoons of butter, Stir in the melted sorrel and serve.

While The Beekman Boys might live way up there in New York, their cookbook has a gentle Southern vibe mixing rustic fare with recipes that offer a nice addition to Sunday Dinner.

If there was an element we were not overly enamoured of, it would be the keepsake addition of removable cards allowing the reader to make the cookbook, "their own." Seriously, Dr.Brent, you know that people will scribbling notes in their ratty old handwriting and stuffing in articles and before you know it that nice The Beekman 1802 Heirloom Cookbook is going to be a mess. But then...

...they could always buy another copy.

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MAPLE PEANUT BUTTER FUDGE (MICROWAVE)

I found this recipe on one of my favorite recipe pages: The Domestic Mama and; The Village Cook. I have found some great recipes over there, and I highly recommend their recipe blog.

This quick and easy microwave fudge is totally addicting. I made it the other day and our company went nuts for it (I have to admit that Picky-Picky Hubby and I ate our share as well). The unlikely maple-peanut butter combo is fantastic; not quite peanut butter, not quite maple, hint of butterscotch maybe?

 

8 ounces salted butter
1 cup creamy peanut butter
1 pound of powdered sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 teaspoons maple extract
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Line an 8" x 8" buttered pan with parchment paper so that the parchment overhangs enough to fold over, once the pan is filled (I didn't butter the pan).

Place the butter and peanut butter in a large (microwave safe) bowl; cover with plastic wrap. Microwave on high for 2 minutes (cut the butter into cubes and mix it into the peanut butter so that it all melts evenly).

Remove the bowl from the microwave (carefully, it is hot), and stir. Re-cover and microwave for (an additional) 2 minutes. Remove from microwave (careful, it is really hot) (watch for hot steam when you remove plastic).

Add the extracts and powdered sugar and stir with wooden spoon (I used my stand mixer). Press into prepared pan and press down until flat and compact. Cover the top of the fudge with extra parchment paper. Place in fridge for 2 to 4 hours.  Bring to room temperature before you try to slice this fudge. I didn't butter the pan, so I had to run a thin knife around the edges before I lifted the fudge out of the pan by using the parchment paper "handles".

Store in air tight container at room temperature. I didn't put mine in an air tight container, I just left it in a bowl with loose fitting lid.

NOTE: If the fudge seems "crumbly" while it is still hot, don't worry about it. Just press it tightly into the prepared pan and when it chills, it will look just like the photo. Eight ounces of butter seems like a lot, but I can guarantee you the fudge does NOT taste greasy at all, it is excellent.

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The Mushroom Cook Book

Cookbooks like to offer up a count on the recipes held with in. It would seem that the two favorite measurements in cookbook girth are "101" and "365." The 365 recipe book is an easy one to understand as there are 365 days in the year and these cookbooks offer up a recipe for each day of the year. One might assume that the 101 variety are just one better than an even hundred. one will often find the phrase, "over 100 recipes," used quite often in cookbook descriptions. So we were rather amused by Garibaldi Lapolla's The Mushroom Cook Book as it offers up 111 Successful Easy Recipes. Why? Well, your guess is as good as mine. Perhaps 111 recipes were the sum total of all of his mushroom recipes.

Lapolla believes that almost all cookbooks feature at least one or two recipes for mushrooms but he laments the fact that no cookbook in existence has, "made a special fuss over them." For Lapolla it is because the mushroom is neither meat nor vegetable and it smells funny, or as he would say, "pronounced." this book was written in the early 1950's at a time when, perhaps, mushrooms had a pronounced smell, but most of the mushrooms we find in today's supermarkets would be hard to find even with a bloodhound on the case.

I will say that Lapolla makes a valiant effort at making the mushroom the star of the recipe as opposed to merely sticking it in a tomato sauce. To that end, he is very fond of stuffing things into mushrooms.

I have a steadfast rule in my kitchen -- no nuts in my food. It is a personal thing and while I have been known to make an exception, the rule stands. So I was as surprised as anyone when I kept coming back to this recipe. There is a distinct possibility I might just make an exception here. But don't count on it.

Sautéed Mushrooms with Nuts

3 tablespoons of olive oil r melted butter
1 onion, minced fine
1 pound of small mushrooms, whole, or large ones, quartered
1/2 pound of unsalted nuts -- almonds, Brazil, filberts, or pignuole
Salt and pepper
Pinch of nutmeg

In a skillet, melt butter and add onion, Do not brown, Add mushrooms and saute over fairly high flame, uncovered, for 15 minutes until golden in color. (Mushrooms need watching and stirring to avoid burning.) Add nuts and seasonings and heat thoroughly.

Aside from a 111 easy mushroom recipes, we were drawn to this cookbook when we saw the author's photo.


It would seem that Mr. Lapolla is cooking on a Garland range much like one we posse in Lucindaville. And we do love our stoves.

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APPLE CAKE with CARAMEL SAUCE

My Facebook friends are "torturing" me with tales of inexpensive produce this time of year...bushels of tomatoes equaling 14 quarts of fresh salsa...bushels of apples and peaches (I am so envious). The other day (here in Alaska) I paid $2.29 a pound for apples!! Whew!!!

I found this recipe for apple cake on Recipe Shoebox, it is the ultimate as far as flavor and moistness. It is one of those gem-recipes that is even more moist on the second day. Served alone it is sensational, but served slightly warm with ice cream, it is ridiculously delicious.

 

 

 

5 large Granny Smith apples
½ cup butter (room temperature)
2 cups granulated sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 cups all purpose flour
1½ teaspoons ground cinnamon
½ teaspoon ground nutmeg
½ teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda

Peel, core and dice the apples (about pea size...I use the food processor), set aside. With an electric mixer, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.  Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each egg; beat in vanilla.

Add flour, spices, salt and baking soda to the butter mixture. The batter will be very thick (almost like a cookie batter). Stir in the apples (the moisture from the apples will loosen up the batter).

Spread the batter into a greased 9" x 13" baking dish (I like to use glass) and bake at 350 for 40 to 45 minutes or until the top is golden brown and springs back when lightly touched (my electric oven takes 45 minutes).

Lara's original recipe just said to serve the sauce (recipe below) with the cake, however, I decided to do it a little differently: I removed the cake from oven and let it cool for 15 minutes, then I poked small holes, about every 2", over the entire cake  (make sure the holes go deep enough to touch the bottom of the cake pan). NOTE: I used my skinniest meat thermometer to make the small holes.  Pour the hot caramel topping over the surface of the cake (it will disappear down into the holes).

EASY CARAMEL TOPPING (Lara called it butterscotch, but it is more of a caramel taste).
In a sauce pan with a heavy bottom, mix ¼ cup butter and ½ cup brown sugar. Cook over medium heat until the butter is melted completely. Slowly add ½ cup heavy cream (careful it will splatter at first) whisking while you add it.  Bring this mixture to a LOW boil.  Boil and stir for 3 minutes. Pour hot topping over warm cake. Let cake cool before serving.

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