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The Weekend Dish-Apple Butter

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Apples It began years ago; so many I don’t know the exact number. Nana, Granddad, this backyard sister and her youngest backyard girl gathering on a day in the fall to make apple butter.

After the apples have been purchased and cleaned, and the peeler/corer/slicers and jars, have been dug out of storage, we are ready to get to work.

Those peeler/corer/slicers are nifty little gadgets and save a lot of time. When all peeled,cored and sliced the apples are placed on the stove to cook.

apples cooking on stove Once they are soft enough, everyone’s favorite part begins: whirring with the hand-held blender.

Sometimes it is a solitary task, and other times a helping hand is lent.

Or, a little moral support . . .

The spices are adjusted after the first taste test.

When it’s just right, it is placed in jars and the backyard girl gets a little treat.

The backyard girl, with her excellent penmanship, always gets the job of labeling.

The day yields some delicious apple butter to be shared and enjoyed for the next few weeks, and also a fantastic bonus for this backyard sister and her daughter of time well spent catching up, reminiscing, telling tales, laughing, listening to music and dancing. We are grateful Nana and Granddad are so generous with their time and kitchen skills (utensils too!) and I, for one, always come away with not only a treasure trove of jars filled with yummy apple butter but also the precious gems of new, fond memories made from the stories told and delights of watching granddaughter and grandparents sharing with each other. That just doesn’t happen every day; but it will tomorrow. Oh, and I also come away with lots of fun photos.

Here’s the recipe in case you would like to try it and see what develops . . .

NANA’S APPLE BUTTER RECIPE

Note: This recipe is adjustable for desired quantity and flavor. Any type of apple may be used. We choose a mix of tart and sweet. Canning jars are available at most supermarkets. They need only a thorough washing and drying before use in this refrigerated canning method.

We use two pans of eight quarts each.

16 lbs. apples, peeled and cored, divided equally in the pans.

5 lbs.  Granny Smith

5 lbs.  Fuji

6 lbs.  Honey Crisp

Into each pan mix in:

3 level Tbs. Cinnamon

¾ tsp. ground cloves

1 1/4 cups of sugar

1 1/4 cups of Simply Apple brand apple juice.

Simmer each pan on stove covered for about 1 hour, stirring occasionally. Taste as you go. Adjust spices to your taste. When apples become soft mash them with a potato masher, a wand mixer or whatever tool you have to smooth them to an apple butter consistency.

Yield: 14 large (16 oz.) jars.

Refrigerate after cooling.

~ Sue

The Weekend Dish-Peaches and Cream Italiano

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“The Beautiful Month of September is here!”, our grandmother would exclaim in a sing-song voice on the first day of September. She had an affinity for September, it being her birthday month, also mine and my younger sister’s.  We have carried on the tradition and call each other to wish a Happy Beautiful Month of September on the first as well. September also is a time of changes and new beginnings. For school folk it marks the beginning of a new year. It is the time when the weather starts becoming a little cooler and the leaves begin to change colors. With a nod to a trend I see developing, lists of five things one can do, either in a week or a day, I am compiling my own list of five things to do this weekend to celebrate the beautiful month and what it brings.

1. Take some time to think about the things you are grateful for. They can be very simple: ice cream on a hot afternoon, the nudge of your dog’s nose against your leg in an attempt to elicit a pat from you, or greater: the love of your spouse or significant other, your health. If you want some inspiration check out photographer/film-maker Hailey Bartholomew’s gratitude project titled365 Grateful. She shares her tale of how finding and taking a picture of something she was grateful for every day for a year changed her life.

2. Go for a walk with an eye out for signs of the changing seasons; the different flowers which are beginning to bloom, perhaps the presence of new wildlife making a fall appearance in your area or the thinning crowds at the beach.

3. Tackle a project you have been putting off all summer; that closet that needs cleaning, the stack of paperwork which has been pushed aside too many times.

4. Launch a creative endeavor; begin a painting or drawing , a photography project, or writing the first page of your novel, a poem or even a letter. To read some fascinating letters written by notable authors ( actors, authors, politicians) visit the letters of note website.

5. Use the last of the season’s peaches to make this deliciously simple dessert.

Peaches and Cream Italiano

3 peaches, peeled, pitted and halved
1/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup water
1/4 cup marsala wine
Dissolve the sugar in the water and marsala and let the peaches macerate in the liquid for approximately one hour.
1/3 cup mascarpone cheese
2/3 cup whipped cream ( made by whipping: 1 cup cream, 2 Tbsp powdered sugar and 1/2 tsp vanilla until thickened)
Mix together cheese and whipping cream and splash of marsala wine and set aside until ready to use.
Dark chocolate for grating

Heat skillet over medium high heat and place peaches cut side down . Cook until beginning to brown and slightly caramelized. Place one half peach in a bowl with cut side up. Fill space where pit was with the whipped cream/cheese mixture and grate the chocolate over the top. Serve immediately. Serves 6

If you like the idea of lists of 5 things to do, and would like to be inspired every day, then you may want to see what David has compiled at 5thingstodotoday.com

Have a great weekend easing into the changing rhythms of September, the Backyard Sisters’ way.

~Sue

The Weekend Dish – Promenade Pasta

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What’s the best compliment you ever got in the kitchen?

One night J sat at the kitchen table watching me try to invent a pasta dish from the random pickings of a quick farmer’s market trip.  When I’m in creation mode he knows better than to ask how he can help, but he stays nearby in case I forget he’s home and starving.  I figured he must be wondering what he’d gotten himself into, marrying this oddball who doesn’t cook like normal people do by reading from a cookbook or recipe box.

My process is more, hmmm, shall we say, kinetic?  I open the pantry door, retrieve ingredients, stare, return a bag of dried cherries in exchange for a tin of pine nuts. Maybe my hand swirls in the air as I waft imaginary aromas toward my nose. I close my eyes and air chew, trying to imagine exactly what I want. I twirl to the refrigerator for a lemon maybe, or a vegetable. My hip bumps the fridge door closed as I pivot to the island countertop, hands full of spinach.

“You cook like you’re dancing,” he said and I melted. I pulled him up off the chair for a quick waltz around the table before returning to the skillet heating up on the stove.

I was pretty happy with how that night turned out, yes for the dancing, but also for the pasta.

The surprise of the dish is squash blossoms.

I’ve eaten squash blossoms in salads where I find them beautiful, but a little out of place. Squash blossoms overpower gentle lettuces like butter and get lost in hearty greens like kale.  But heat these babies up – and yes technically the stork doesn’t bring zucchini to your garden, it begins life as a seed and then a squash blossom – and something symphonic happens, sort of like how the drudgery of an ordinary weekday meal prep can turn into a kitchen waltz.

I call this dish Promenade Penne with a nod toward how the pasta pot and squash blossom skillet waltz together toward the grand finale of a meal culled from a stroll through the farmer’s market. Also, there’s a little sweet kiss of honey in it, and all good proms end with a kiss.

Promenade Penne
INGREDIENTS:
3 large sweet potatoes
One bunch fresh squash blossoms
olive oil
3 T pine nuts
3 T honey
1 lb. penne
4 C washed baby spinach leaves
Freshly ground parmesan and fresh ground pepper to taste

– Peel sweet potatoes and slice into 1/2 inch circles.
– Heat a large skillet over medium-high flame.  Add enough olive oil to coat skillet.  Let it warm up, then sauté pototoes until slightly browned and soft. Stir now and then to prevent burning.
– Meanwhile, in a separate pot, heat water for pasta. (This is a fine time to dance.)
– Right about the time the water begins to boil, the potatoes should be tender.  Toss pine nuts into skillet with potatoes and allow to brown just a bit.
– Add pasta to boiling water and cook according to package directions.
– Turn potatoes down to low. Add squash blossoms and stir.  If necessary, add a dash more olive oil.
– When the pasta is al dente, drizzle the honey over potatoes and squash blossoms.  Stir to coat and heat evenly.
– Drain pasta in a colander.  Place spinach in empty pasta pot and after pasta is finished draining add back to the pot so the pasta heat slightly wilts the spinach.  You may toss with a little more olive oil.
– Place pasta and spinach in a large bowl. Spoon sweet potato and squash blossoms on top. Garnish with fresh parmesan and pepper if you like.Light the candles.  Good night.

With heels kicked up,
~ Catherine

 

The Weekend Dish – Fresh-Tomato Dishes

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I have a bit of a problem. Though many, myself included, might say it is a good problem. We all should be so lucky to have “problems” like this. It has its roots in the spring. In April, when it began warming up here in southern California, the eco-warrior turned his thoughts to planting the vegetable garden. The past few years or so, he decided to focus on tomatoes. We love tomatoes and the ones sold in supermarkets just don’t hold a candle to homegrown ones. The entire garden is dedicated to tomatoes. First, he came home with about 30 plants, then, a few days later, about 20 more. For a while there, it seemed like every time I turned around he would be walking across the yard carrying a six or eight pack of tomato plants. Our garden is fairly large, but it was filling up fast.

I inquired if all these plants would fit and was constantly reassured there would be room and we would be so glad in the summer. The first tomatoes began ripening in mid-June and since then, we have had a patio table full of tomatoes and a few more on the counter in the kitchen. 

We have shared with family and friends and scoured cookbooks and the internet for recipes as well as trying to create a few of my own. We have been eating so many  tomatoes every day, I’m surprised we aren’t turning red!  It has been a never ending cycle of using the ripest and then, just as the table top is starting to be visible again, it fills up from another harvest. Like I said, we love tomatoes and  I do enjoy the challenge of trying to incorporate them in as many dishes as possible and creating some new ones as well, but I feel guilty if we fall behind and some get overripe. These tomatoes are delicious, sweet and flavorful. However, I feel like I am bailing the Titanic with a pail. I recently came across this article on some of the surprising benefits of tomatoes and felt  re-invigorated by the thoughts of all those vitamins and “good for me” nutrients just waiting to be devoured in our backyard.  One of our favorite ways to use the tomatoes is in a salsa fresca.

Salsa Fresca

15 tomatoes
½ sweet onion
1 clove garlic
½ bunch of cilantro
1 jalapeno seeds and membrane removed
juice of 2 limes
½-1 tsp salt

Chop the tomatoes and onion and add to a large bowl. Finely mince the garlic,cilantro and jalapeno and add to bowl. Add the lime juice and salt. Stir, then taste. Ingredients can be adjusted to taste preference. Add more or less jalapeno for spiciness preference, etc. Serve with tortilla chips or put in tacos, burritos, refried beans or anywhere you want a little spicy tomato sauce.
Makes enough for a party!

For breakfast, I have been making Salsa Fresca Poached Eggs. Add a splash of olive oil to a pan, heat over medium high heat, then add about 2 cups of salsa. I let that simmer and thicken for about 10-15 minutes, sometimes shorter,  (depending on how hungry I am). Then, add 3 or 4 eggs put a lid on the pan and let them poach for about 4-5 minutes; time can be adjusted to how done you like your eggs.  I serve it with warm corn tortillas.

For the Italian version of the above dish, Tomato Italiano Poached Eggs: add chopped sweet onion and a clove of chopped garlic to the pan with the olive oil and cook until softened then add about 1 tsp sage and 1/2 tsp rosemary, this can also be adjusted to your taste preference. Next, add  6-8 tomatoes chopped and simmer until thickened a bit 10-15 minutes. Salt and pepper to your taste, then add about 6 oil-cured olives, halved, and 3-4 eggs. Put the lid on the pan and cook 4-5 minutes, or to your liking. Serve with a good Italian bread toasted.

I think next year I will suggest staggering our plantings but for this year,  here’s to lycopene, and salsa, and bruschetta, and oven-roasted garlic and basil tomatoes, and …

I know I’ll miss you in the winter.

~Sue

The Weekend Dish – Scones

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Well, it has finally arrived. The opening day of the Summer Olympics is today.

Buckingham Palace

In honor of the host city, London, I felt scones would be a proper food tribute. 

The scone is a simple but delicious quick bread. It is traditionally served with clotted cream and jam. The basic recipe is versatile and can be modified by adding nuts, chocolate chips, zests, and fresh or dried fruits. My favorite addition is dried tart cherries.

They can be served with tea or they are also an excellent accompaniment to coffee. A few years ago, I found this recipe while trying to have a full-fledged tea party with my youngest daughter and since then our family has enjoyed them many times. This time I used our grandmothers’ dishes as an extra special place setting, figuring they don’t get out of the china hutch enough.

Recipe for Cream Scones

If you want to make them lighter you can use half and half or milk.

Preheat oven to 375° F (190° C) and place rack in middle of oven. Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper.

2 cups (280g) all-purpose flour
1/3 cup (66g) granulated white sugar
2 tsp (10g) baking powder
1/8 tsp salt
1/3 cup (76g) chilled, unsalted butter
1 large egg, lightly beaten
1 tsp (5g) pure vanilla extract
1/2 cup (125ml) heavy whipping cream
Egg mixture for brushing tops: (brushing the tops with mixture helps with browning the tops)
1 large egg, lightly beaten
1 Tbsp heavy cream

In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, sugar, baking powder and salt. Cut the butter into small pieces and blend into the flour mixture with a pastry blender or two knives. The mixture should look like coarse crumbs. In a small bowl combine the egg, vanilla and whipping cream. Add this mixture to the flour mixture stirring until just combined. Do not over mix this mixture. Knead dough gently on a lightly floured surface. Roll or pat the dough into a circle that is 7 inches (18cm) round and about 1 1/2 inches (3.75cm) thick. Cut this circle into 8 triangular sections. Alternatively, you can cut the the dough into rounds with a cookie cutter. Place on prepared cookie sheet. Brush the tops with the egg mixture.

Bake for 15 minutes or until lightly browned. Transfer to a wire rack to cool.

Variations:

-Add 1/3 cup dried tart cherries
-Add 1/3 cup miniature chocolate chips
-Add 2 tsp lemon zest and 1 Tbsp poppy seeds
-Add 1 Tbsp poppy seeds and use 1 tsp almond extract instead of vanilla extract and       sprinkle top of scones with sliced almonds after brushing with egg mixture.

I must say the only variation I have tried is the cherries and we love it so much that I haven’t tried the others.

I hope you enjoy these as much as we do and if you would like to follow the Olympics here is the official website. Perhaps while nibbling a fresh from the oven scone . . .

~Sue

Recipe courtesy of  joyofbaking.com

The Weekend Dish – Creeping Crust Cobbler

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… A Creeping Crust Cobbler Recipe and story

Apricots, like most good things, require patience.  The tree stands barren through winter’s chill while you are left to remember and dream, to wait and hope the small fruit arrives by the buckets come summer.

There are many things like an apricot.

Crystal Cove, CA

 A California sunset, for example.  Or, as Deborah Slicer writes in her poem, “Apricot,” “The weight of a small child’s fist, / a girl…”

Apricot Girl with her Nana who made the family’s first Creeping Crust Cobbler.

In our family it was a girl who inspired Nana, the Backyard Sisters’ mom and grandmother to 10, to turn a bumper crop of apricots into Creeping Crust Cobbler, now a summer dessert staple in all the sisters’ homes.

It was the blazing hot summer of 1987 and Nana had come to stay with Catherine who had just given birth to a son.  Nana made a tradition of spending a week with her daughters whenever a new baby was born. One of the joys of this time was getting an extended visit with the older children in the house, and one of the Apricot Girl’s favorite things was picking up fallen fruit from the ground.

Apricots were one of Nana’s favorite fruits and she knew there was something better to be done with this backyard gift than throwing them for Max the Golden Retriever to catch.  “Let’s turn this into something delicious for dessert.”

When Nana asked what sort of cookbooks I had, I pulled out one that her own mother, Gammy to us sisters, had given me as a wedding shower gift.  A Collection of the VERY FINEST RECIPES ever assembled into one Cookbook was exactly the kind of book to find a homey recipe for apricots.

Gammy loved buying cookbooks from church groups or school PTAs and this book was a compilation of a fund-raising cookbook publishers best recipes.  It perfectly captured the sort of mid-western American fare she made most frequently.  Turns out, I put the right tool in the good cook’s hand. On page 189, Nana found a recipe for Creeping Crust Cobbler.  We’ve tweaked it a little over the years.  But there’s one thing that’s never changed; I always remember the summer Nana and the Apricot Girl discovered one of the favorite desserts in the entire Backyard Sister family.

CREEPING CRUST COBBLER
Heat oven to 350.

1/2 C butter
1 C flour
1 C sugar
1 t baking powder
1 t salt
1/2 C milk

1 C, or less, sugar.
2 C fruit  We’ve successfully made this with apricots, peaches, plums, and blueberries, or any combination of them all.  You can use the fruit solo or mix together. I usually don’t peel the fruit, but you can if you like.

– Heat fruit with sugar in medium saucepan over medium heat until sugar melts and thickens a little.

– Melt butter in 10-inch baking dish by setting dish with butter in it in heating oven.

– Sift together flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt in medium bowl.
– Add milk and mix.
– Spoon batter in large glops over the melted butter. (Is there anything better than a recipe that uses the word “glops?”)
– Pour fruit and sugar mixture over dough.
– Bake in 350 oven about 30 minutes, until crust is golden brown. (Sometimes this bubbles over into your oven so you might want to place the pie pan on a cookie sheet.)
-Crust will rise to the top.  Serve warm or cold.

Superb with a dollop of ice cream. Excellent for breakfast.

With sweetness,
~ Catherine, Sue, Gammy, Nana, and the Apricot Girl

p.s. You can read Deborah Slicer‘s poem, “Apricot,” in its entirety on the Orion magazine website here. Orion is a treasure for anyone interested in nature meets literature meets culture.

The Weekend Dish – Big Puffy Baby Cake

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Big Puffy Baby Cake

It begins with the scent of butter, slightly burning.

Early one Thursday evening in July, 1986, my husband Jim and I, along with Erin our 20-month-old daughter asleep in a stroller, arrived at a café au lait brown home in a suburb of Vancouver.  We’d found this place, a home-stay arrangement during Expo 86, the last World’s Fair to be held in North America, through an acquaintance which came by way of something like a business associate’s friend’s nephew’s mother-in-law.  We were here as part of a parenting plan that I can only look back at with fond compassion for my earnest intentions; I wanted to launch my daughter into a life of international travel. Yes, I’ll pause while you laugh and no, she remembers nothing of the experience.

Backyard Sister and daughter, circa 1986

Anyway, a small man with thick spectacles responded to our knock on the door.  He pointed down a dark staircase which lead to a basement and advised us that breakfast would be served at 7 a.m. the next morning. We didn’t want to wake Erin; ours was one of several rooms, separated by temporarily curtained walls, so we settled her in the middle of the queen-size bed between us, dined on apples and Cheez-Its, and looked forward to a meal I imagined to be delicious based on the rich buttery scent which had greeted us at the front door.

I’ll never know what was cooking upstairs because our downstairs breakfast consisted of Fruit Loops, canned peaches, and white bread that was impossible to toast without setting off the fire alarm.  We probably would have given this place more of a chance if it hadn’t been for the giant Rottweiler which freely roamed the house and scared me to death as his gleaming teeth were eye level with my child.

“I don’t expect silver and a tablecloth and fresh scones,” I told Jim when he listened to my plea to relocate.  “But I wouldn’t mind a fresh-cooked breakfast, a room with a window, and preferably no pets.”  I really don’t remember what made us decide to hop on the ferry to Victoria and walk into a Visitor’s Bureau asking for an accommodation recommendation, but by some stroke of luck we were directed to a beautiful cornflower blue Victorian home, painted with bright red and yellow fretwork, surrounded by a garden in full rose bloom.

“Breakfast will be served any time between 8 and 10. What will work best for you and your baby?”

In the morning, we awoke to the scent of butter, slightly burning.  Following our noses, we tiptoed down a wood floor hallway and discovered a large lace-covered dining table set with silver and fresh roses.  Karen, the soft-spoken woman of the house, served up a pie-pan of the most decadently satisfying combination of butter, eggs, flour, and powdered sugar.  When I had my first bite of what Karen called a Dutch Baby I had no idea that this recipe, which Karen later hand scrawled on a real estate agent’s note pad for me, would become ingrained in my memory from frequent use.

And while Erin remembers nothing of her World’s Fair visit, she loves the story of how her favorite breakfast joined family lore.  This is our go-to breakfast for occasions like birthdays, homecomings, and a welcome to our own out-of-town guests.

I first met this as a Dutch Baby, but some people call this Big Puffy Pancake.  Here’s Karen’s original recipe, tweaked throughout the years and renamed to encompass all its history in our family.

Big Puffy Baby Cake

4 T butter (and no, a butter substitute really doesn’t work)
4 eggs
1 C milk
2 T vanilla
1/2 tsp. salt
1 C flour

Set oven to 425.

Slice butter into a 10 inch pie pan and place in oven as it is heating. Let butter melt, until almost brown and bubbly.

Meanwhile beat together eggs, milk, and vanilla.  Sift flour with salt, and then add to egg mixture.  Stir well.  Pour batter into pan over melted butter.

Bake 20-25 minutes until pancake has puffed up over the sides of the pan. Serve immediately. It will deflate slightly. We like it sprinkled with powdered sugar.

Serves 8 moderate eaters, or 4 ravenous ones.