Category Archives: In the Kitchen

Soft Ginger Cookies

05 Friday Feb 2010

Posted by in In the Kitchen, Life at Home

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I once thought of these as my cookies.

Not as in … all mine… but more as what comes out of youthful innocence…to keep one unaware of the likes and dislikes of others.  I don’t recall Mom making these as she did her Peanut Butter cookies.  So who knows but that perhaps it was my passion that fed my sibling’s desire for these cookies.

I became aware of our common feeling about this cookie only last summer, when my sister baked a batch for my brother’s birthday, then ended up keeping half the batch for herself.   Recalling the memory of her half and half methodology, I baked a batch of these cookies on her birthday a few days ago, with a plan to keep half —  and with a slight refinement of my sister’s formula — give the remaining half to my sister to share with my brother.

Sharing these cookies is something I’ve done for years.  In part because they are my favorite — but also because they sit pretty on a serving dish, they transport easily and stay fresh for days.  I’ve shared these cookies at church gatherings, work parties and even given them away as Christmas gifts.  I don’t know how many times I’ve given away the recipe.

It was one of the first I gathered from my mother, back when I began my collection in the early seventies.  The recipe was one Mom clipped from a local newspaper — now mustard brown with age, the clipping is pasted into Mom’s favorite cookbook, one of the few things of Mom’s that Christi has chosen to keep.

Like any good recipe, this one is splattered with forty years of  use.  But unlike most, this recipe has also survived a hit and run casualty from a collision with two canines, that began with Max’s foray on the kitchen counter top.

Pilfering food from the counter is one of Max’s favorite past-times that has netted him many tasty morsels.  Unfortunately for Max, the counter was bare that day but for the recipe card.  So when Max swept the counter clean with his huge paws, the card took flight and landed at Cosmo’s feet, who quickly nabbed the prize and ran like mad  for her hidey hole.  By sheer luck, I saw her running away from the scene of the crime and got to the card in time to save it from certain death.  Carefully, I pulled the card from Cosmo’s clenched jaws, extricating all but one small bite that she refused to part with.

Keeping a share of the recipe is obviously something Cosmo subscribes to also.  Or is it just something that comes natural to all dogs?

Try it and see.  From my life to yours.

Soft Ginger Cookies

1 cup sugar
3/4 cup shortening
1 egg
1/4 cup molasses
2 cups all purpose flour
2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. ginger
1/4 tsp. salt

Cream sugar & shortening; mix in egg and molasses. Beat well. Gradually add sifted dry ingredient to form a stiff dough. Refrigerate for two hours or over night. Form into small balls, roll in sugar and bake on a greased cookie sheet — 10 to 12 mins at 375 degrees. Makes four dozen.

Cranberry Orange Tea Bread

30 Saturday Jan 2010

Posted by in In the Kitchen

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Texas oranges and fresh cranberries and a cold winter’s day…

…all the inspiration I need for baking Cranberry Orange Tea Bread.  The mix of the sweet and tart on my tongue makes for a wonderful afternoon splurge with a cup of hot tea.  Wish I had company…

I once dreamed dreams of friends I would have when I moved back from Texas.  I imagined at least one good girlfriend in the neighborhood, maybe two doors down.  Most imaginary days, she’d drop by my house or the other way around — and we’d share lives over a cup of coffee or tea, with perhaps biscotti or tea bread to stoke our conversation.

But here I sit with three dogs.  And though the company is grand, my three friends aren’t the ones I envisioned having on my return to Soonerville.  Yet I have consolations, since I’ve made unexpected friends with my blog while hanging on to long cherished Texas friends and —  though neither live two doors down —  both the new and old do enrich my life.

My friend Ann lives two big dots down from me — the first dot is Dallas and the second is Houston and from there, it’s an hour to Ann.   As this tea bread of Ann’s was baking on Thursday, I sat down to write, with hope of putting into words what it was about Ann that made her such a good friend.  And with no intention to do so, I may have stumbled upon a pretty good recipe for friendship.

My friend’s a good listener.  And when she’s not listening, she tells a fine story.   I’ve kept every note or email she has ever sent me and sometimes I go back and read them just because.   She has a knack for expressing life with words — her words find my heart and even if they weren’t addressed to me, they would find my heart anyway.  She keeps life real, even when the real is pretty ugly.  She  inspires me to be more than I ever thought myself capable of.  She encourages but doesn’t push — she gives room to breathe, she let’s me say ‘no’, without trying to convince me of saying ‘yes.’   Distance nor time separate our friendship; months go by between visits, yet we easily pick up the threads that bind our lives in spite of skipping a few stitches.

My friend Ann is a gracious host.  I’ve never been to her house without her offering a cup of hot tea and a seat on her couch.  One time she served this tea bread, though I no longer recall the circumstances.  But I know when I asked about her recipe, she shared it with me and gave her daughter Vicky the credit.  And as I reflect upon it, that’s Ann to a “T” — she possesses such a strong sense of self that she has no need to borrow or pretend to own what is not rightly hers.  She is who she is, a broken cup full of  integrity that pours out love and truth.

Sometimes I dream of introducing one of my blog friends to Ann; these women live in each others Texas back yards, they are both sixty-something, both write beautiful words and both are long-time subscribers to The New Yorker magazine.  And as if that weren’t  enough to cement a friendship, they both like Dairy Bar…. a nice spot for breaking bread — to borrow an Ann-ism — even without a cup of tea.

It’s tricky to make introductions, sitting 2 dots and two clicks of a mouse away.  But maybe someday, I’ll click together the heels of a pair of ruby slippers, close my eyes and wake up to find myself sitting between these two friends in a booth at the Bar.  But while I’m dreaming of how best to connect two dots and two clicks, feel free to share this bread…. and your life with a special friend of yours.

From my life to yours…just a few clicks across the internet away.

Cranberry Orange Bread

2 cups all-purpose flour
2 cup sugar
1 tsp salt
1 1/2 tsps baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
2 Tbsp shortening
1 Tbsp grated orange peel
7/8 cup of orange juice
1 egg, well beaten
1 1/2 cups coarsely chopped cranberries
1/2 cup chopped nuts (I prefer walnuts)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

In a large bowl, mix together dry ingredients.  Cut in shortening with pastry blender and then add juice, peel and egg.  Mix until well blended.  Sir in cranberries and nuts.  Turn ino a greased 9×5 loaf pan.  Bake 50 to 55 minutes, until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean.

Cool on rack for 15 minutes, then remove from pan.

Chocolate Sheet Cake

27 Wednesday Jan 2010

Posted by in Far Away Places, In the Kitchen, Life at Home

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On the Irish Ruins of The Quiet Man set

Buying my father a Christmas gift has never been easy.

Just ask my brother Jon  —  he’ll tell you all about the time he learned too late that  Dad was not a Willie Nelson fan — at Christmas or any other time.  But one year, about sixteen years after that Willie Nelson Christmas, I thought I had finally come up with the perfect gift for Dad, when I offered to take him to Greece, to see the land of his father’s birth.

It should come as no surprise to learn that Greece was not on Dad’s radar.  Instead, my father wanted to go to Ireland.  And not just any old place in Ireland — Dad wanted to make a pilgrimage to a city I had never heard of where a movie I had never heard of had been filmed.  In other words, Daddy had his heart set on a visit to Cong where the movie The Quiet Man had been filmed.

Being the gracious gift-givers that we were, we exchanged Greece for the Irish vacation of Daddy’s dreams.  And before travel plans were finalized, the trip grew to include three days each in Paris and London.   All this horsetrading of countries taught me that my beloved father — the quietest man I had thought to ever know — could be quite vocal when it suited his purpose.

In the end, it didn’t matter where Daddy wanted to go.  To his three traveling companions, it was all good.   The days and nights were a blur of memorable sights and sounds, that collided and bumped into each other like fast-moving scenes from the roller coaster ride my sixty-eight year old father rode at Disneyland Paris.

There were the soaring spaces of Paris — Notre Dame, the Louvre, the Eiffel Tour and the Arc de Triomphe — the green rain and gorgeous plump flowers of the Irish countryside, along with lazy sheep crossings on the way to an intrepid picnic on Dingle Bay shared with sea gulls — a ‘mind the gap’ tour of London tubes and seeing history come to life with visits to the Tower of London and walking in the footsteps of Jack the Ripper.

And then there are all those special memories I will always hold dear, like when Daddy, wearing his new tweed jacket and cap, was mistaken for an Irishman by tourists.  And then there’s the photograph of Dad above, standing near the ruins of the “White-O-Mornin” cottage featured in The Quiet Man.  Daddy took in all fifteen days with wide-eyed wonder.  All the memories are precious, especially as I think of how quiet Dad has really grown over the last year, so that he can no longer string two words together.

Amidst all the changing scenery and countries was the constancy of my sister’s chosen dessert of chocolate cake.  It is because of this shared trip with Daddy, that I can no longer see a slice of chocolate cake without thinking ‘Christi.’   And the sweet irony of the association is that I don’t even think chocolate cake is my sister’s favorite dessert — on her birthday, she always asks for a light lemony cheesecake instead!

But two days ago, when I was enjoying a slice of my family’s favorite chocolate cake, I thought of Sis and this shared memory of a fifteen day tour dotted by pieces of chocolate cake.  And with today’s visit to Dad, it seemed right to flip through the photos from the trip and share this recipe with you, along with the few memories that will forever be held together by crumbs of chocolate cake.

Make a chocolate cake memory and you’ll see what I mean.  From my life to yours.

Chocolate Sheet Cake

2 cups sugar
2 cups flour
1 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda
2 sticks butter
1 cup water
4 Tbsp cocoa
1/2 cup buttermilk
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla

In a large bowl, sift together all dry ingredients.

In a saucepan over medium heat, bring butter, water and cocoa to boil.  Add the hot mixture to flour mixture.  Sitr well.

Add remaining ingredients and mix well.  Pour in a greased jelly roll pan (10″x15″x2″) and bake at 350 for 20 mins.

Chocolate Frosting

1 stick butter
4 Tbsp cocoa
6 Tbsp milk
1 box powdered sugar (16 oz)
1 tsp vanilla
1 cup chopped pecans (optional)

In a mixing bowl, add powdered sugar.

In a saucepan over medium heat, bring butter, cocoa and milk to a boil.  Immediately pour over powdered sugar, mixing with an electric mixer until smooth.  Mix in vanilla and nuts.   Immediately spread over hot cake.