Brie en Croute

I think I got this off the internet.  I think every great chef has made it once in their lives.  My idol, Ina Garten, can probably make it in her sleep.  And this is the thing:  It looks like a really intimidating exercise but it really is amazingly simple.  You could probably make it in your sleep.  Maybe you already have and that explains the drips of brie on your pajamas.

I made it for Christmas Eve at Elizabeth's house.  I learned a valuable lesson that night:  you shouldn't put too many rich items out.  We were on sensory overload that night.  So, here's a tip:  Save the recipe for a lunch or light dinner gathering where this cheese can be the star of the show.

I wasn't too fond of the sugary filling.  Maybe almonds and orange marmelade instead of the cinnamon and brown sugar.  Or maybe something savory--not sure what.  Check the internet.  But definitely try this:  it's a lot easier than it looks.

Brie in puff pastry

1 sheet frozen puff pastry, pre-packaged
1 tablespoon unsalted butter
1/2 cup walnuts
1/8 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 (8-ounce) wheel Brie
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 egg, beaten
Crackers

Directions

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.
 
Defrost puff pastry for approximately 15 to 20 minutes and unfold.
 
In a saucepan, melt the butter over medium heat. Saute the walnuts in the butter until golden brown, approximately 5 minutes. Add the cinnamon and stir until walnuts are coated well. Place the walnut mixture on top of the Brie and sprinkle the brown sugar over the mixture.

Lay the puff pastry out on a flat surface. Place the brie in the center of the pastry. Gather up the edges of the pastry, pressing around the brie and gather at the top. Gently squeeze together the excess dough.  Glue each fold with the egg wash so it doesn't come apart while cooking.

Brush the beaten egg over top and side of Brie. Place Brie on a cookie sheet and bake for 20 minutes until pastry is golden brown.
 
Serve with crackers.
 
To give a special look, cut extra pastry into heart or flower shapes and bake until golden.

Egg Nog

Everybody wants egg nog at Christmas.  One of the several things my daddy was proud of was that one of his patients was the man who personally was in charge of making the egg nog at Oak Farms Dairy in Oak Cliff in the 1950's.  And every Christmastime, even if he wasn't sick, Mr Laguard would stop by Daddy's office to bring him a carton of egg nog.  And every year Daddy would take enormous pride in the delivery of the egg nog as though  Shorty Laguard had made it just for him..

Beaven's daddy also made a killer egg nog.  Except George made his from ice cream and bourbon.  The ice cream gave it a smooth richness and the bourbon insured that it never reached a frozen state again.  George stored it in the freezer and it was about as cold as egg nog could be but never froze.  It had so much bourbon in it that I swear you could have set fire to it. One year when Emily was in middle school she and a friend visited George and Blanche with us, drank some egg nog and got their first buzz.  Slept all the way home.

Here is the recipe a friend posted.  Looks rich and creamy.  No bourbon.  Add your own. 

Mike Cole’s Egg Nog

1 1/3 cup sugar
8 egg yolks
8 egg whites
1 tsp salt
1 gallon whole milk
4 tsp vanilla
2 cups heavy whipping cream

Beat 1 1/3 cup sugar into egg yolks, add salt and stir in milk. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly until mixture “coats” a spoon. Chill.

Beat egg whites till foamy. Gradually add ¼ cup sugar, beating to soft peaks. Stir into the custard mixture and mix thoroughly. Add vanilla. Mix the whipped cream until fully whipped, add ¼ cup sugar as you are whipping. If you are saving for use, add the whipped cream and mix thoroughly. Chill and store. If you are using for a party, pour the custard mixture into a punch bowl and “dot” the mixture with islands of whipped cream. Sprinkle with nutmeg for effect and taste.

Sticky Buns

It's the morning after Thanksgiving and everybody is Turkey Comatose and you've cooked everything with any kind of Wow factor.  Try this.  It's Ina Garten's recipe.  Her stuff always works.

Of course, you don't have a package of puff pastry in your freezer.  You were looking for an excuse to go to Walmart on the day after Thanksgiving, weren't you? I'm sure there will be no one in the grocery department.

Whenever you make this, it is a surefire winner.  I've never known it to fail or fail to please.  Ina uses raisins in her recipe but I don't like raisins so I don't have them here.  If you want, use them in place or in addition to the pecans.

Notice the ingredients are two parts:  one step is putting stuff in the muffins tins and also putting filling on the pastry. This is a real sugar overload.


Ingredients
12 tablespoons (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature.
1/3 cup light brown sugar, lightly packed
1/2 cup pecans, chopped in very large pieces

1 package (17.3-ounces/ 2-sheets) frozen puff pastry, defrosted

For the filling:
2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and cooled
2/3 cup light brown sugar, lightly packed
3 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 cup raisins …. Or not.....or chopped pecans!!!  :)

Directions
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Place a 12-cup standard muffin tin on a sheet pan lined with parchment paper.

In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, combine the 12 tablespoons butter and 1/3 cup brown sugar. Place 1 rounded tablespoon of the mixture in each of the 12 muffin cups. Distribute the pecans evenly among the 12 muffin cups on top of the butter and sugar mixture.

Lightly flour a wooden board or stone surface. Unfold 1 sheet of puff pastry with the folds going left to right. Brush the whole sheet with the melted butter. Leaving a 1-inch border on the puff pastry, sprinkle each sheet with 1/3 cup of the brown sugar, 1 1/2 teaspoons of the cinnamon, and 1/2 cup of the raisins. Starting with the end nearest you, roll the pastry up snugly like a jelly roll around the filling, finishing the roll with the seam side down. Trim the ends of the roll about 1/2-inch and discard. Slice the roll in 6 equal pieces, each about 1 1/2 inches wide. Place each piece, spiral side up, in 6 of the muffin cups. Repeat with the second sheet of puff pastry to make 12 sticky buns.

Bake for 30 minutes, until the sticky buns are golden to dark brown on top and firm to the touch. Be careful - they're hot! Allow to cool for 5 minutes only, invert the buns onto the parchment paper (ease the filling and pecans out onto the buns with a spoon) and cool completely.

Read more at: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/ina-garten/easy-sticky-buns-recipe/index.html?oc=linkback

Getting ready for the holidays

It’s time.  In the next five or six weeks you will be cooking your fool head off.  You will cook things you only cook on holidays and eat more than you eat any other time of the year.  Consequently, you will gain weight that you will marvel over and say, “I didn’t think I ate THAT much.”  And you will begin planning to do it all the following year, only better and more elaborate.

My mother-in-law was about the only one I’ve seen succeed at this game.  After extended deliberation she pared down the meal to the only things absolutely necessary to the meal and we had only turkey, dressing, gravy, rolls and I think maybe a salad, just to make it all healthy.  And we STILL rolled away from the table feeling much too full.

I have no answer on the healthy eating part.  You can tell that by looking at me.  I do, however, have lots to say about the getting ready part.

This is your magic weekend.  The calm before the storm, so to speak.  It would be a good time to clean out the fridge.  You could make a game out of it.  Wager someone how old the oldest expiration date will be.  I just threw out applesauce that expired in 2010.  You should also check your spices.  It’s cold and rainy today in Texas and I understand all through the rest of the country, as well.  It’s not like you have anything better to do.

You will need to buy new sage and/or poultry seasoning.  Definitely get a new box of baking powder. And yeast. These things all have expiration dates and if you only bake at the holidays your current supply is out of date.  Do this now before the store runs out of sage. I have seen it happen. There is nothing more pathetic than trying to find sage at the Seven Eleven the night before Thanksgiving. (clue: They don’t sell sage there. However, they probably DO sell beer and you’re gonna need a lot of it if you try to put dressing without sage on your table.)

I have noticed that cake mixes don’t yield as much cake as a few years ago.  I don’t know when they slipped in this change but I noticed a year ago that a two-layer cake isn’t as tall as it used to be. You could mix up two boxes and bake three layers.  You’ll get a slightly bigger cake than usual but it’s all a matter of whether you want to look limp and feeble or hale and hearty for the holidays.

The alternative is to make it from scratch.  I may try this but it has emerged that our family is a PIE family, not a cake family.  So, I may not even fool with it.

I have most of the classic recipes here on the blog index.  From How to Cook a Turkey to a new cranberry relish recipe I love.  I’m not sure if I put a sweet potato pie recipe here.  I got into BIG trouble one year trying to foist off Sweet Potato pie as a Pumpkin pie.  I think I permanently lost Elizabeth’s trust over that one. LET ME JUST SAY……..I Don’t think you can tell the difference and you’re not inviting Elizabeth over for dinner, anyway.

Remember my favorite tip:  In cold weather you can use your outside BBQ grill as a second refrigerator.  Just as long as it has a heavy cover, that is. And watch for the afternoon temperature…it might get higher than your ice box.

You can tell I’m old because I just used the word “ice box.”

 Have a GREAT Thanksgiving/Hanukah/Christmas!

Carrot cake

Yeah--just what I need: another dessert recipe.

Carrot Cake

Cake:

• 2 cups granulated sugar
• 1 cup vegetable oil
• 4 whole eggs
• 2 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for dusting
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 2 cups grated carrots
• Butter, for greasing
•  

Icing:

• 1 stick butter, softened
• 1 package (8 ounces) cream cheese, softened
• 1 pound powdered sugar
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1 cup pecans, chopped finely

·         Directions

·         For the cake: Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Mix together the granulated sugar, oil and eggs in a large bowl. In another bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon and salt. Add the flour mixture to the sugar mixture and combine. Then add the carrots and mix well. Pour the batter into a greased and floured Bundt pan and bake until done, about 50 minutes. Leave to cool completely.

·         Meanwhile, for the icing: In a larger bowl, cream the butter and cream cheese together. Add the powdered sugar and vanilla and blend. Then mix in the pecans. Spread the icing on the cooled carrot cake.

Corn Bread

I have to give credit to Paula Deen for this recipe.  I don't usually cook complicated recipes but this one isn't that bad and it's worth it. It calls for buttermilk and I don't usually keep that in my house.

(You can substitute by putting a tablespoon of vinegar in regular milk and nobody will notice.  It's really the acid in the milk that counts.)

Ingredients

6 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted, plus butter for baking dish
1 cup cornmeal
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 large eggs, lightly beaten
1 1/2 cups buttermilk

Directions

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F.

Melt the butter in an iron skillet in the oven. Take it out when the butter melts and pour the melted butter into a bowl to let it cool slightly.  Put the skillet back into the oven.  This will grease the skillet and heat it at the same time.

In a large bowl, mix together the cornmeal, flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.

In a separate bowl, mix together the eggs, buttermilk, and butter. Pour the buttermilk mixture into the cornmeal mixture and fold together until there are no dry spots (the batter will still be lumpy). Pour the batter into the skillet.

Bake until the top is golden brown and tester inserted into the middle of the corn bread comes out clean, about 20 to 25 minutes. Remove the cornbread from the oven and let it cool for 10 minutes before serving.

Now--if you want to make this in a dutch oven over a campfire, which I highly recommend--because this is one recipe I have done this with several times and had great success with-- here's how I do it:

Since you are outside and things are a little more rustic...….

• You will be using a dutch oven:  the cast iron skillet with (1) feet and (2) a cover that has sides to hold the coals.  It is easier to use charcoal because you can regulate the temperature by counting the charcoal but with experience and some abandonment you would just throw coals around trust it all to work out. Coal counting comes later in the recipe.
• You can just throw the whole stick of butter in the skillet and it won't really make any difference.
• Instead of a mixing bowl, you can mix everything together in a ziplock bag with your hands. Measure it all ahead of time back home and transport in the ziplock bag.
•  It's great to have one of those chimney charcoal starters.  They aren't that expensive and use newspaper to start the charcoal and really work.  Then you can put things on top of it like a little table to keep stuff out of the dirt. 
• Make sure you have good pot holders--at least two--thick ones.  And something to lift the lid.

Dutch Over Method:

1. Melt butter in hot skillet
2. Mix everything else in ziplock bag
3. Slowly add butter to mix
4. Add mix to skillet and cover
5. Put skillet on top of 16 red hot coals.  Put 20 hot coals on lid.
6. After about 15 minutes check inside.  Add coals or adjust as needed. 
7. Enjoy!

German Potato Salad

I got this recipe from a friend who grew up in an old-fashioned German family from Illinois like my grandmother. It's just as good cold as hot.

Also, note that the recipe calls for two teaspoons of salt, not two Tablespoons like I read it one horrible morning that I made it for a church potluck lunch.  It was a good thing I tasted it before it packed it up for church.  And it was a good thing I had enough time to run by the store and buy an emergency-back-up-salad.  Also, in God's gracious mercy someone else had also made German Potato Salad that day so it all worked out.

5 large potatoes
4 slices thick-sliced bacon
1 onion, diced
2 teaspoons salt
1/2 teaspoon celery seed
1/3 teaspoon dried (powdered) mustard

boil the potatoes.  Set aside and cool a bit

cut the bacon into pieces and cook in an iron skillet-- take out of skillet and set aside

pour out all but 2 Tablespoons of the bacon fat
add the onion and cook until soft 

add 1 Tablespoon flour to make a roux
when roux is cooked and smooth (as smooth as it can be with onion pieces in it)
add 1/2 cup cider vinegar
1/4 cup water
1/4 cup sugar
cook until thick gravy-like consistency

peel and slice the potatoes
add to the roux
add the reserved bacon pieces

You can eat this either hot or cold.