Recipe Review: My Mom's Pumpkin Nut Bread

It's hard to get into the holiday spirit when it's pushing 90 degrees and smoggy. Those of you out there in Wisconsin or other snowy locales who watch the Rose Parade on tv every year and dream of sunny, warm Christmases, trust me on this: Endless days of sunshine can be just as depressing as rain, especially when it comes to this season when fuzzy sweaters, sipping warm cider in front of a fire, hot ovens filled with yummy things, and snuggling under blankets all contribute to engendering the ever-elusive Holiday Spirit. When you can't comfortably have or do any of those things without risking heat stroke, how are you supposed to get all cheery about the winter holidays? It's a challenge. But I've been trying. It helped tremendously that yesterday the fabulous Miss Kelly hosted her annual Turkey Party--an event that is fast becoming my all-time favorite holiday. But my attempt at holiday cheer first began a few weeks ago during a brief spell of cooler weather (highs in the 60s, woohoo!) when I baked a batch of my mom's pumpkin nut bread. The Best Ever.

Here's what you'll need:

• My mom's recipe (See it there all stained with years of repeat performances? It makes me happy just to see that worn-out old scrap of paper. You can't have it, but you can have the recipe.)
• 1 large can of prepared pumpkin
• 5 cups of flour
• 3/4 teaspoon baking powder
• 3 teaspoons baking soda
• 2 1/4 teaspoons salt
• 1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon
• 1 1/2 teaspoons nutmeg
• 1 cup shortening (Uhm, I never said this bread was healthy.)
• 4 cups granulated sugar (Yikes! I hope my whole-grain-loving mother-in-law isn't reading this...)
• 1 1/2 teaspoon vanilla
• 6 eggs (Oh, Lord, help me.)
• 1 cup water (There we go. Water is good for us.)
• 1 1/2 cup chopped walnuts or pecans

Preheat your oven to 350. (If you have a diabolical oven that hates you and lives to make your culinary life a living hell like mine does, then you should set it for 275-300 and pray that it eventually settles at around 350.) Cream the sugar and shortening together in a big bowl. Add the vanilla and eggs and blend well. (Ooooh, that looks like cake batter, doesn't it? Now I want cake. Sigh.) Sift all the dry ingredients and spices together. If you're like me and don't have a real one, you can use the poor girl's sifting method. It works just fine and is waaaaay easier to clean than my mom's old hand sifter that has little pebbles of dried flour stuck in it that have probably been there for 30 years. Add the sifted dry ingredients to the sugar and egg mixture. Add water, pumpkin, and the nuts and mix well. Pour the mixture into three greased bread pans (or a whole mess of mini bread pans or like a million muffin cups). Bake for 45 minutes or until an inserted toothpick comes out clean (I start checking it at 45 minutes, but it usually takes a lot longer than that to be done). When you're all finished, you'll have these gorgeous ladies smiling up at you from your counter. Yumminess! This makes a great gift and it also freezes well--we still have two loaves in there now waiting to be taken out and thawed for Thanksgiving with the fam.

Recipe Review: Smoky Chipotle-Chicken Corn Chowder with Salsa Salad

Here's another recipe from Rachael Ray's Express Lane Meals. This one I made on Sunday night, despite the fact that it was in the mid-80s and not exactly the ideal weather for soup. Also, for this one I definitely could not use the express lane, as I had to buy almost everything at the market. But some of you may keep a better-stocked kitchen than I....

5 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

1 large onion, chopped

3 large garlic cloves, chopped

1 chipotle chili in adobo, chopped

2 celery stalks, finely chopped

1 teaspoon ground coriander

1/2 teaspoon ground cumin

salt and black pepper

20-30 white or yellow corn chips, ground in food processor to yield 1 cup

1 quart chicken stock

3 boneless, skinless chicken breasts cut into small bite-size pieces

2 10-ounce boxes frozen corn kernels

juice of 1 lime

1 tablespoon Dijon mustard

2 ripe Hass avocados

1 pint grape tomatoes

2 tablespoons fresh cilantro leaves, chopped

1 small head romaine lettuce, coarsely chopped

1/2 small red onion, finely chopped

1/4 cup fresh Italian parsley, chopped

Chowder: Preheat a soup pot over medium-high heat with 2 tablespoons of EVOO. Add the onions, garlic, chipotle, celery, coriander, cumin, and a little salt and pepper. Cook for about 3 minutes or until the onions are slightly tender, stirring frequently. Add the ground chips to the onion; stir to combine. Add the chicken stock, bring it up to a bubble, then simmer for 8-10 minutes. Add the chicken pieces and frozen corn and continue to cook for 5 minutes or until the chicken is cooked through. To serve, sprinkle with a generous helping of the Italian parsley and garnish with tortilla chips.

Salad Dressing: In a small mixing bowl, combine the lime juice, mustard, and a little salt and pepper. In a slow, steady stream whisk in 3 tablespoons of EVOO.

Salad: Chop the flesh of the avocados into bite-sized pieces and place in salad bowl. Halve the tomatoes and add those along with the cilantro, chopped romaine, and chopped onion. Pour the dressing over the salad and toss to combine.

My Thoughts: Matt looooves soup. Me, not so much. But when there is a soup I like, 9 times out of 10 it's a chowder or a creamy, thick soup. So this one went over well for both of us. It was easy to make--nothing complicated or anything, although the kitchen was a disaster by the time I finished. While we did like it, I was a little surprised and disappointed that the flavor was so...uninspired. One-toned. Know what I mean? I expected to taste layers of flavor, but it was pretty straightforward and unexciting. We agreed that next time we'll try throwing in a can of diced green chiles for added color and maybe another flavor dimension. I also think that garnishing with an extra-sharp cheddar and sour cream would be really good.

My Proudest Moment: Successfully emulsifying the salad dressing, which was pretty tasty. Next time I'll add more salt, though. (Poor Matt, he doesn't like it that I keep posting photos of him....)

Recipe Review: Turkey Burgers with Horseradish and Cheddar Cheese

For the wedding someone gave us the Express Lane Meals cookbook by Rachael Ray, and for the first time Friday night I pulled it out and tried something from it. Now, like a lot of you, I can only handle so much of RR on tv. She's too bright, too excited, too toothy for me to watch for more than about 10 minutes, but usually whatever it is she's making sounds pretty good. The premise of this particular book is that if you keep your pantry, fridge, and freezer pretty well stocked with her list of "staples" presented in the front, then every recipe in the book can be completed by purchasing 10 or less items from the market, qualifying you to use the express lane. Hence the title, get it? Aaah, pretty clever.

This recipe for turkey burgers was pretty basic and simple, so I had most of the ingredients on hand and only had to get 2 items from the market. Yay me! So here it is:

1 package ground turkey

2 rounded tablespoons prepared horseradish

1/3 pound sharp white cheddar cheese, diced or crumbled

2 green onions, finely chopped

1 rounded palmful of grill seasonings (such as McCormick's Montreal Steak seasoning)

extra virgin olive oil

spicy brown mustard

4 poppyseed Kaiser rolls

1 tub or can of good quality whole-berry cranberry sauce

Romaine lettuce

Heat a nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. In a medium bowl, mix together meat, horseradish, cheddar pieces, scallions, and grill seasoning. Form 4 patties and drizzle them with EVOO. Cook the burgers for 5 to 6 minutes each side. Spread mustard on bun bottoms and cranberry sauce on bun tops. Place the burgers on the buns with lettuce leaves. Serve fancy/gourmet chips alongside.

My Thoughts: I'm a big fan of turkey burgers, Matt loves horseradish, and who doesn't want to marry cheese? This sandwich didn't disappoint, and the leftover patties were even better the next day reheated for lunch. I made one change and that is that I didn't use the cranberry sauce. I know some people are into weird stuff on their sandwiches like that, but I'm not. Matt said he would have liked it, though, so maybe next time I'll get it just for him. Next time, too, I might use a tad less cheese, or at the very least crumble it up into much smaller pieces. My chunks were kind of big, and all of the ones that were exposed to the pan pretty much melted away. But overall this recipe was great--super easy, fast, and tasty.

UPDATE (dated August 5, 2007): I recently made these for the second time, and it's official: They're now one of our favorite foods. But this time I mixed things up a tiny bit, and I think it improved it: 1) I used a little bit less horseradish, like maybe 1 3/4 tablespoons instead of 2 tablespoons. 2) Instead of white cheddar (which was hard to break into small pieces and therefore melted away into the pan), I used a 6-oz package of crumbled gorgonzola. Not only did this not melt away since the pieces were smaller and better distributed, but we thought the flavor was better than the cheddar. 3) While I don't care for cranberry sauce (especially not on a sandwich), Matt expressed interest in trying it. He loved it, so if you're into that sort of weird mix of fruit on your sandwich, more power to ya. If you're not, I put brown mustard on the bottom bun and just a little bit of mayo on the top bun.

Stir Fry Monday!

Tonight we tried out our electric wok for the first time--something we've been anticipating with great eagerness. First, Matthew carefully studied the manual:

While I chopped up some veggies...

And marinated strips of chicken in San-J Thai Peanut sauce.*

Then we cooked the chicken in small batches, and later added the veggies--the heartier ones (like carrots and broccoli) first:

At last, we had our plates filled with yummy chicken stir fry...

...and so we ate it all up (Matt, apparently, did so with gusto).

*This was our first time using the San-J Thai Peanut stir fry sauce. It got an "Eh" rating--definitely not bad, but nothing to get excited about. Next time we'll doctor the sauce up with some chili powder and red pepper flakes, and we'll throw some peanuts in with the veggies.

Recipe Review: Baked Apple Dumpling Pie with Vanilla Custard Sauce

This recipe is from Ken Haedrich's fantastic cookbook, Apple Pie Perfect, which contains "100 delicious and decidedly different recipes for America's favorite pie" (thanks to Carol for turning me on to this book). This is the 4th of his pies I've made, and every one has been phenomenal. I'd planned to make this for Easter dessert, but we all gorged ourselves on malted milk balls, jelly beans, cheese, and veggies before dinner was even ready, so we decided to nix dessert. So last Tuesday I made it for just Matt and me, and we're still happily snacking on it. Here's the recipe followed by my notes:

Raisin Walnut Mixture
1/2 cup raisins
1/2 cup walnut pieces
1/4 cup firmly-packed light brown sugar
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Filling
3 tablespoons unsalted butter
1/4 cup firmly-packed light brown sugar
3 tablespoons raspberry preserves
4 golden delicious apples

Glaze
light cream or milk
granulated sugar

1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Combine all the raisin walnut mixture ingredients in a food processor. Pulse repeatedly until it's finely ground, then set aside.

2. In an ovenproof skillet or saute pan that measures 9 inches across the bottom and about 11-12 inches across the top, melt the butter and then stir in the brown sugar and preserves. When it's bubbling evenly (about 30 seconds or so) remove from heat.

3. Halve and core the apples, but don't peel them. Spoon the raisin walnut mixture into the cored centers of 7 of the apple halves, packing it firmly.

4. Lay the apples, cut-side down, into the skillet on top of the raspberry mixture. You should be able to fit 6 around the edges and one in the center. Finely dice the 8th one and scatter the pieces between the apples along with the remaining raisin walnut mixture.

5. Lay a 12-inch pastry dough over the top of the apple mounds. Rather than cutting the edges, tuck the excess dough straight down along the inside of the pan. Cut several large vent holes in the dough, then lightly brush with milk or cream and sprinkle with granulated sugar.

6. Place on center rack and bake for 20 minutes. Then reduce the oven heat to 375 degrees and bake for about another 25 minutes or until the crust is golden brown. Transfer to a cooling rack and let cool for at least 20 minutes before serving. Instead of cutting into traditional pie slices, serve by scooping out the little apple mounds along with the pan drippings.

Vanilla Custard Sauce
6 large egg yolks
1/2 cup sugar
2 cups light cream or half-and-half
3/4 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

1. Whisk the yolks and sugar together in a bowl.

2. Bring the cream to a simmer in a medium-sized saucepan. Once it's hot, gradually whisk it (about 1/3 cup at a time) into the yolk and sugar mixture. Once all the cream has been incorporated, transfer the mixture back into the saucepan.

3. Stir over medium-low heat (DO NOT BOIL) until it thickens enough to leave a path on the back of a wooden spoon when you draw a finger across it--about 5 minutes or so.

4. Strain the custard through a fine-mesh strainer into a small bowl and then stir in the vanilla. Let cool to room temperature and then chill until cold. This will keep for 2-3 days.

So now my input. This was a really great pie. Not our favorite from this book, but a good solid 4 out of 5 stars. It's unique, which we both like, but I think it would be most appropriate for a more casual dinner or event--like a barbecue or something. The custard sauce, however, really ups the classy factor. It is GOOD, and I'm not even a fan of custards. It's smooth and creamy and not too rich, and would taste amazing over fruit at breakfast. I was a little nervous about making it because I don't really trust my judgment when a recipe says to be careful not to over-cook or, in this case, until it has a certain consistency. I prefer facts and strict rules that will guarantee my success: "cook for exactly 5 minutes, stirring counter-clockwise at a rate of 50 stirs per minute" etc.... But I just kept the heat really low, stirred it gently non-stop, and it turned out fine. We had it in the fridge for a couple of hours before we ate the pie, and it was definitely tasty. But it was noticeably better the next morning (when we ate leftover pie for breakfast!). So when I make it again I'll prepare the custard sauce the night before. So there's my first recipe review. If you decide to make it, please do let me know how it goes!