The Christmas Tie

Many years ago my father's step-mother sent him a tie as a Christmas gift. As ties go, and as they went in the 60's, it was pretty darned ugly. It was a pinkish big-flowered thing as I recall. But, it's the thought that counts, right? And this woman thought my dad looked like a big-flowered pink tie wearing guy. Now, Dad was a curmudgeon and a really good one at that. He held up the tie with one finger and we all had a good chuckle. Sweet, well intentioned Emily had sent that thing for our Dad to wear? Never gonna happen.

Fast forward a Christmas. My oldest brother Jay, in the midst of his present opening orgy, comes upon...you got it...a big-flowered pink tie. Gifted to him by our dear old dad. Thus began the legend of the Christmas tie. Year after year the tie was exchanged between Dad and Jay. As the years went on the gifting became more and more clever in an effort to surprise the giftee. As I recall one year the tie was rolled up tight and presented in a jam jar. Think you're getting strawberry jam or some apple butter? Sucker!! You're now the ?proud? owner of The Christmas Tie.

After the opening the tie would be placed unceremoniously on the mantelpiece in either the living room or the dining room. There it would collect dust until about the beginning of December the following year. At that point it would disappear and we knew something was afoot and that it was assuming a very un-tie like form in anticipation of being surprised upon its next giftee. Sadly, the tie met its demise at the hands of my brother's less than sane at the time first wife. The Christmas Tie was no more.

Fast forward to this Christmas. Regretfully, my dad and my brother are both gone. Dad died in 1994 and Jay died in 2010. I have just become the recipient of Jay's ashes which I am taking to my mother today so he and Dad can hang out on the mantelpiece in the living room together. Not content with taking him down in just a plain white box, this funny guy with a great sense of humor. No that would not do for Jay. So I went down to the Goodwill and picked up not one, but two really ugly ties and I have wrapped up his boring white box with these and will present him to mom later today. I'm guessing she's going to laugh. 'Cause that's the way this family rolls.

Mrs. Eisenhower's Fudge

As far as I'm concerned this should be called, Beth Williams' fudge because that's who taught me to make it. Beth, my mother-in-law, made spectacular fudge. She gave me the instructions many moons ago. I got up my nerve to give it a try sometime in the mid-80's. My first attempt was spectacularly bad. So bad, in fact, that even the residents at the hospital wouldn't eat it and they eat ANYTHING! So, I ended up tossing that in the trash and swearing off fudge making. Fast forward a couple of decades and I decide to take on the monumental task yet again. Lo and behold either I got smarter or the recipe got easier because I FINALLY succeeded in making edible fudge. I generally make a batch around Christmas, although I don't do it every year. Here is this year's attempt, complete with recipe in case you have a hankering to try your hand at it.:

Ingredients:
3 1/2 cups of sugar
1/4 tsp salt
2 TB butter
1 can evaporated milk
12 oz chocolate chips
12 oz German's chocolate
1 pt. marshmallow creme
1/2 c nuts (optional)

Put sugar, salt, butter and milk in a large saucepan; bring to a boil and boil for 6 minutes. Place chocolate pieces, German's chocolate, marshmallow creme and nuts (if desired) in a bowl; pour hot mixture over. Beat until the chocolate is melted. Pour into a large telly roll pan or two 9 X 13 inch dishes. Cool and cut. Can be stored in the refrigerator or freezer.

Here are some visual aides:

The fixin's: chocolates, sugar, evaporated milk, butter, salt, & marshmallow creme.

This pot of glop is the sugar, salt, evaporated milk and the butter

Chocolate chips and German's chocolate broken into chunks.

The final product waiting to go into the freezer.

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas everyone! 

Hope you have a wonderful holiday.

~ Short Stuff

Feta Chicken...it's what's for dinner

Wanted to make a nice dinner for my sweetie tonight, it being our anniversary and all. So, I dragged out this old recipe that I think I cut out of a magazine many years ago. I've made it a few times and it's quite tasty. Plus it uses feta and I love that salty bit of cheesy goodness.

Broiled (or baked) Feta Chicken

Ingredients:
1 cup plain low-fat yogurt (I used regular Greek yogurt because that's what I had on hand.)
1 clove of garlic, finely chopped
1/2 teaspoon leaf rosemary, crumbled
1/4 tsp black pepper
4 skinless, boned chicken breast halves (about 5 oz ea)
1/2 c crumbled feta cheese (2 oz)





I elected to use fresh Rosemary from my yard, so I had to chop it first.




 

Next combine yogurt, garlic, rosemary and pepper.

 

Wash your chicken breasts. I only had three in my package instead of the 4 the recipe called for, so I just used what I had.

 Place chicken in a shallow pan or a marinade container (as shown). Coat with the yogurt mixture.
Refrigerate 1 - 3 hours.
Remove from refrigerator and let come to room temperature for not more than 30 minutes.
Remove chicken from marinade; reserve any remaining marinade in dish.






 Preheat broiler. Line broiler pan with aluminum foil. Arrange breasts, smooth side down, on foil.





Broil 4 to 7 minutes. Turn over. Spoon any  remaining marinade over chicken. Crumble feta over top. Broil just until cooked through and lightly browned, 4 to 6 minutes longer.

Since I have an overactive smoke alarm and a not very good broiler I elected to bake these instead. I put them in a preheated 350 degree oven and baked about 15 minutes on one side. I flipped them, added the feta and baked another 15 minutes, increasing the temperature to 400 degrees for the last few minutes to brown the feta a bit.

 Voila! The finished product. Served with French green beans. The recipe notes that the feta chicken is good cold or at room temperature, so leftovers don't go to waste. kali oreksi!

Chocolate Chip Cookies

I was in a baking mood on Sunday. I made an oldie but goodie: easy no-knead whole wheat bread which instructions I posted just the other day. While I was in the mood I asked my dear husband what kind of cookies he might like if I were to make some. He said there is only one answer to that: chocolate chip cookies. These are his favorite. He will down just about any kind of cookie. He used to be quite fond of my shortbread cookies with hot tea on a winter's night. He will chow down on my three-ingredient peanut butter cookies and has been known to consume a significant number of oatmeal raisin (MY personal favorite). But given his druthers he'd take chocolate chip every time.

I got this recipe back in the early 80's. Found it in a consumer reports magazine of all places. They had done a taste test on varying recipes for chocolate chip cookies and this one came out as the staff favorite. I taught this recipe to our daughter very early. I think she was 8 or 9. She very quickly turned into the family baker. He prefers her cookies to mine, but mine will do in a pinch. She lives 1 1/2 hours away and won't come home every weekend to make them for the old guy so he has to resort to whatever I'm able to pull out of the oven. He still seems to like them well enough. He's tall and thin so can go through his evening ritual of filling a dinner plate with cookies and sticking them in the microwave for a few seconds to heat them up and make the chocolate all melty again. That plate and a glass of milk and I have a very happy camper on my hands. He also doesn't seem to gain an ounce...unlike the cook. Sigh.

The Practically Perfect Chocolate Chip Cookie...from Consumer Reports
2 1/4 c flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
3/4 white sugar
3/4 dark brown sugar, packed
2 sticks (1/2 lb) sweet butter at room temperature (Use butter. Don't use margarine in cookies.)
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 large eggs
1-12 oz pkg semisweet chocolate chips

 

I like to gather all my ingredients at the beginning. Then I put them away as I use them.

Preheat oven to 375.

 Mix the flour, baking soda and salt in a bowl and set aside.

Measure out the two sugars. Use a stand-type electric mixer to mix the 2 sugars briefly at low speed.

Make sure your brown sugar is packed.

Both sugars briefly mixed together.

 Next up: Butter and vanilla extract.

Add small gobbets of butter at a time.

 Add the butter in small gobbets, mixing first at low speed, then high. Continue until all butter is incorporated. Beat the mixture until it is pale, light and fluffy. Then add the vanilla extract at the lowest speed, then beat at high speed for a few seconds.

Add the tsp of vanilla extract.

  

 Next add the eggs, again at low then high for a few seconds. The eggs should be well beaten in and the mixture should look creamed, not curdled.

Dry mixture ready to be added.

Add in the flour, baking soda and salt mixture, 1/2 cup at a time, mixing at low speed for about 1 minutes, then at high speed for a few seconds.

 Scrape down sides with a spatula.









Pour bag of chocolate chips into batter.

Fold in chocolate chips

Fold chocolate chips into batter by hand. Don't use beaters.

                    







Bake on ungreased cookie sheet until pale golden brown.

Takes about 9 minutes in an electric oven and 10 - 11 minutes in a gas oven. Cool on a rack.

Enjoy!

Easy No-Knead Whole Wheat Bread

My dad was a newspaper man. Journalist, editor and curmudgeon-at-large he was a man dedicated to the written word. Being a newspaperman he often kept odd schedules and had odd days off. The life of a newspaperman is not a Monday through Friday 9 to 5 kind of job. More often than not he left for work during the day while we were in school and didn't return home until after midnight. Some weeks he had Thursdays and Sundays off. Other weeks he had the occasional Friday off. On those weeks we were treated to some of Dad's cooking.

Dad was a decent cook. I recall fondly the teriyaki chicken he used to make back in the early 60's when ethnic cooking at home was virtually unheard of. Regretfully I never was able to get that recipe and so it is lost to family memory as far as I know. He also was quite the bread baker. I can recall Friday nights when he would bake up a loaf or two and we would have a nice thick slice generously buttered late Friday while waiting for Shock Theater to come on. Being the youngest of the five of us kids I was, quite frankly, far too chicken to watch the scary movies that were shown. However, I was also far more afraid of going to bed upstairs all by my lonesome. So, I would put on a brave front and watch the very beginning of the movie and then, belly full of warm, buttered home-baked bread, would fall sound asleep before the scary creatures made their presence known on our old black-and-white Zenith.

Bread making became a family tradition. Not only did Dad and Mom bake bread, but once we kids were old enough we learned to bake as well. During the 70's we transitioned from plain white bread to whole wheat bread. I confess I am a little heavy handed when it comes to bread baking. I have a tendency to use too much flour and end up with loaves just shy of door-stop consistency. Fortunately I had a friend who shared this no-knead recipe with me and it comes out light and airy. No doubt because ham-fisted bakers like me can't ruin it with over-handling and an excess of flour.


Easy No-Knead Whole Wheat Bread

Makes 1 - 2 loaves depending on the size of your pan.
Preheat oven to 375 (350 for glass pans).
Using solid shortening, generously grease one 9 X 5 or 2-8X4 in loaf pans.

Ingredients
1 1/2 c whole wheat flour
2 1/2 - 3 c unbleached or all purpose flour
1/4 c sugar (may sub 1/4 c honey)
1 TB salt
2 pkg active dry yeast
1 c water
1 c milk
1/4 c cooking oil
1 egg

Instructions:
Combine in a large mixer bowl:

1 1/2 c whole wheat flour

2 Pkg active dry yeast

1 TB salt

If you're using sugar instead of honey, include the sugar with the other dry ingredients.
Combine liquids in a saucepan on the stove. Make sure to use a thermometer and heat the liquids slowly. You don't want the liquids warmer than about 130 degrees. If you do get the mixture hotter than that make sure to cool it down to 130 before you add it to the dry mixture. Excess heat can kill the yeast and then you really will end up with a doorstop.

Saucepan with 1 c water in it. Add 1 c milk

Add the 1/4 c oil and the honey

 

Heat to no more than 130 degrees

Pour the warm liquid into the mixing bowl with the dry ingredients. Blend at low speed until moistened; beat 3 minutes at medium speed. Add the egg to the mixture and make certain it's well incorporated.

WW flour and liquid mixture

 At this point you want to use your bread hook. If you don't have a bread hook for your mixer then do the next step by hand.

+2 1/2 c flour. Ready to rise

Add 2 1/2 to 3 c unbleached or all purpose flour to form a stiff batter. (Batter will follow spoon).

Batter covered with moist towel

Cover batter with a moistened towel. Let it rise in a warm place (about 80 - 85 degrees F) until it's light and doubled. Takes about 50 minutes.








While waiting for the batter to rise prepare your pans. Use a pastry brush to add a layer of margarine/butter so the bread will not stick to the pan.

 

Stirred down and ready to split between pans.

 Stir down batter; spoon into greased pan. This batter doesn't rise a second time before baking.

In the pan ready to go into oven

Immediately place in oven. Bake 9 X 5 pan at 375 for 45 to 50 minutes and the 8 X 4 pans for 30 - 35 minutes. Loaf should sound hollow when lightly tapped.  Remove from pans immediately to prevent it from over-cooking. Cool on a rack. Brush top of loaf with melted butter if desired.

Ta-da...the finished product.

Uncle...enough already.

I am soooo tired of this political season I could spit. I knew who I was going to vote for months ago. The "debates" are not clarifying as much as they are annoying. Now, for the first time they've been turned into a shout-fest. No doubt the"brilliance" of Karl Rove at work. Jeeeez Louise can we have a little decorum returned to the forum?
I am sick of political ads. I don't look at any of them for either side.
I am sick of the junk mail painting all the opponents as devils with or without a blue dress.
JUST END THIS MESS!

At the risk of being repetitive I will post here the poem I wrote last election season. It still seems fitting. Just imagine it's November 1 and we have a few short days to go:

Wednesday

I can’t wait for Wednesday and the silence of the phone.
No incessant ringing and the politicians’ drone.
I’ll be unencumbered by the shrieking of the ads
That play on t.v. and on radio; they’re driving me quite mad.
I will treasure all the silence; I will revel in the quiet
I can’t wait for the non-ringing, yes I really want to try it.
I will thank the stars above for bringing to an end
Yet another endless cycle of the politicians ginned-
Up promises of votes they’ll make on issues big and small
That they tell us will improve the lives of not just one but all.
So bring on the silent Wednesday, and give my ears a rest.
Then take the promises that each has voiced and put them to the test. 

We need some serious revamping of our political system. Anyone else for term limits and limited contributions and a shortened political season? Who's with me? Anyone? Bueller??

Sigh....