Food for Friday

Being Dead Is No Excuse – how is that for a book title?  First released in 2005, it has since been a constant favorite among book lovers and food lovers alike.  Combining Southern life and death with appropriate recipes, it’s an entertaining read on all levels!

Each chapter addresses a Southern ritual, such as dying tastefully and the competition between local churches, and includes several recipes to suit each happenstance.  From Chapter 5, Comfort Foods:  There Is a Balm in Campbell’s Soup, I’d recommend “Broccoli Squares,” and not just because the recipe only takes up one page ~ it sounds delicious, and I want to know where you buy square broccoli?  Whole Foods?

Broccoli Squares

Ingredients
2 c cooked broccoli, mashed
1 c Kraft mayonnaise
1 c evaporated milk
3 eggs, well beaten
1 T butter
1 t flour
1/2 t salt
Tabasco to taste

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.  Mix all ingredients together.  Pour into a lightly buttered 8-inch square pan.  Bake for 30 minutes.  Serves eight.

Easy and delicious – and the kind of recipe you just might take a notion to top with some crushed corn flakes and shredded cheddar-jack cheese….

Hope you find an excuse to cook up something easy and delicious for your living ones this weekend!

~Janet @ The Christmas Place

Oops, forgot to add C = cup; T = tablespoon; t = tablespoon.

Food for Friday

Hey, it’s the first day of spring here in the northern hemisphere, and we couldn’t be happier!  It’s been a lovely, sunny day – just a bit nippy, still, frost expected overnight – but we’ll take it!  Since we’re coming up on longer days, days when we’ll want to spend more hours out of doors, not hanging around a hot kitchen, I grabbed the Gooseberry Patch Fast Fix Meals cookbook this afternoon (ask for item 722025).

From the Speedy Sides section, here’s a really easy side dish from Keersten Jensen, Idaho Falls, ID.  Let me quote her introduction:

One day while I was in college, I tried this recipe because I didn’t have the ingredients to make fried rice.  When I took a taste, I couldn’t get enough of it!  I have been making this rice for over 20 years now.  It’s especially good with chicken…we like it hot or cold!

Good enough for me to share with you…

Colorful Rice Toss

2 C instant rice, uncooked
2 C boiling water
1 to 2 T butter
1 onion, chopped
8 oz bottle zesty Italian salad dressing
1 tomato, chopped

Stir rice into boiling water; cover and let stand for 5 minutes, or until water is absorbed.  Melt butter in a frying pan over medium heat; cook onion until translucent.  Add rice to pan; pour salad dressing over, stirring to coat.  Remove from heat and stir in tomato.  Serve warm or chilled.  Serves 4 to 6.
C = Cup, T = Tablespoon

When I was in college, I just had one of those single-eye heating units and an immersion heater to boil water in a cup for instant soup.  Keersten sure ate better than I did!

From the Christmas Place gardens

It was one of those March days when the sun shines hot and the wind blows cold; when it is summer in the light, and winter in the shade.           ~Charles Dickens

Happy First Day of Spring!

~Janet @ The Christmas Place

Food for Friday

What was the name of the restaurant chain that served those drop biscuits that were ever so slightly sweet- and corn-tasting?  I can’t remember the name, but I may have come across their recipe!  Browsing through the Tennessee Hometown Cookbook, I found this one ~ really easy to prepare, and, if they are the biscuits I remember, they are really tasty.

Tennessee Hometown Cookbook

Sweet Creamed Corn Spoonbread

2 C self-rising flour
1 can cream-style corn
1 T sugar or brown sugar
2 eggs
3/4 C milk

Preheat oven to 400 degrees; lightly grease a cookie sheet.  Mix flour, corn, and sugar together.  In a separate bowl, beat eggs, then add milk.  Mix well;  add to corn mixture.  Stir just until moistened.  Drop by tablespoons onto cookie sheet; bake until golden brown, about 15 minutes.

I think this would be a good one to practice with a child that’s learning to bake, it’s so easy.

I’m now going to share a friend’s recipe for a topping that might be good with these.  It will sound a little strange, but I have had this topping myself and it is ~ strangely delicious!

Jezebel Topping

15 oz apple jelly
15 oz apricot preserves
1 oz can dry mustard
1 jar horse radish, anything but the creamy style – look in the refrigerator section at the market
1 t coarse ground pepper

Mix well.  Spread on something edible.

It’s got that whole sweet-salty thing going on, and I have mad love for that sort of taste.

As I look through the Tennessee Hometown Cookbook, I am impressed with how easy and tasty all the recipes seem to be.  There might be several ingredients, but the instructions are usually no more than 5 or 6 lines long.  Also, the editors have included recipes and photographs from every corner of the state, Memphis to Chattanooga and all points inbetween. 

C = Cup
T = Tablespoon
t = teaspoon

The 9th Annual Saddle Up! Celebration and the 4th Annual Western Jamboree: Cowboys & Indians are happening this weekend here in Pigeon Forge ~ I’ll bet a cowboy has cooked biscuits very similar to these on the trail at one time or another.

Enjoy your weekend! 

~Janet @ The Christmas Place

Food for Friday

Here’s a recipe from a book that we carry here in the store titled Homemade Christmas.  This book is filled with not only recipes but also gift and decorating tips to help you make the most of the holidays.  Browsing through the recipe section I came across one that I’ve always wanted to try.

Doesn’t everyone at a party pounce on those co0kies that have the Hershey’s Kisses in the middle?  Try your hand at making a batch!

Peanut Kisses

1 stick butter, softened
1/2 C sugar
1/2 C brown sugar
1/2 C peanut butter
1 egg
2 T milk
1 t vanilla
1-3/4 C flour
1 t soda
1/2 t salt
Sugar for dusting
36 chocolate kisses

Cream butter, sugars, and peanut butter together.  Add egg, milk, and vanilla; beat well.  Sift flour, soda, and salt together; combine with peanut butter mixture, and shape into 36 balls using about 1 teaspoonful.  Roll in sugar and bake on an ungreased cookie sheet at 375 degrees for 8 minutes.  Remove and quickly press a chocolate kiss on each ball until the ball is flattened.  Bake 3 to 4 minutes longer.

See, I would have thought you flattened the cookies before baking, but now I get how these work!  Yum!

C = Cup; T = Tablespoon; t = teaspoon.

Have a tasty weekend!

~Janet @ The Christmas Place

Food for Friday

Let’s take a tour of some of the cookbooks we have for sale here in the store and on line.  I picked up this beautiful volume, Dining in the Smoky Mountain Mist, published by the Junior League of Knoxville.  It is filled with clear, easy-to-follow recipes and includes lovely photos from the East Tennessee area.  There are also recipe selections from popular local restaurants and area celebrities!

This being the South, how about a recipe for Coca-Cola Cake.

2 C Flour
2 C Sugar
1 C Butter
3 T Baking cocoa
1 C Coca-Cola
1/2 C Buttermilk
2 Eggs, beaten
1 t Baking soda
1 t Vanilla extract
1-1/2 (to 2-1/2) C Miniature marshmallows
Coca-Cola Icing (below)

Combine the flour and sugar in a mixing bowl; mix well.  Heat the butter, baking cocoa, and Coca-Cola to boiling point in a saucepan, stirring constantly.  Pour into the flour mixture; beat well.  Add the buttermilk, eggs, baking soda and vanilla; beat well.  Stir in the marshmallows.  Spoon into a greased and floured 9×11 inch cake pan.

Bake at 350 degrees for 30 to 40 minutes or until the cake test done.

Ice with Coca-Cola icing.

Coca-Cola Icing

1/2 C Butter
3 T Baking cocoa
6 T Coca-Cola
1 lb. Confectioner’s sugar
1 C Chopped pecans

Combine the butter, baking cocoa, and Coca-Cola in a saucepan.  Bring to a boil, stirring constantly.  Pour over the confectioner’s sugar in a mixing bowl; beat well.  Fold in pecans.

C = Cup; T = Tablespoon; t = teaspoon

Now you see where the sweet comes from in the South!

Life is good, and it’s cold here in the mountains today.  Have a great weekend!

~Janet @ The Christmas Place