Recipes

Well, Laura Beth asked for some recipes.

That at least gives me something to write about. For my daughter I don't really have to put it in a blog - I can just email the recipes to her or call it out over the phone. So - 2 of the recipes were in the recent luncheon menu - and I had said I would provide those recipes in a post -

I never did, so here we go.

Menu

Chicken Tetrazzini

Whole Grain & Sticky Rice

Florence Northcutt Price

Deviled Peas Casserole

Vida Law Robinson

Congealed Salad

Edith Nelson Northcutt Wilkerson

All-Bran Rolls

Ella Henderson Northcutt

Individual Cream Pies

Chocolate, Butterscotch, & Coconut Cream

Edith Northcutt Wilkerson

Coffee, Tea, & Water

That was the menu for the luncheon - and within that menu are the two recipes that Laura Beth asked for - the Pastry and the All-Bran Rolls. She also asked for the Christmas Bread which was a tradition since the early 60's at my childhood home and continued when I married and had children. December 2006 was the first Christmas since Mother began making it in the early 60's(I think 63) that I haven't had Christmas Bread on Christmas morning. I ran out of steam that year. I just couldn't get it ready and decided it didn't matter if I "broke with tradition". I've made it again - but I broke the record in 2006. I didn't think we could have Christmas without Christmas Bread, but we did. My sister, Mary Ann, has Mother's original recipe from the magazine(I think Better Homes & Garden) and when I'm there and have the time, I'll look for it and take pictures of it for the post, and perhaps make the bread so I can take more pictures and then I'll share the recipe and it'll all be like a little fantasy I'm in, doing a magazine spread. Weird.

Back to the recipes LB asked for.

All Bran Rolls

1 cup crisco, 3/4 cup sugar, 1 cup All-Bran Cereal, 2 tsp. salt, 1 cup boiling water, 2 eggs, 2 pkgs. yeast, 1 cup lukewarm water, 6 cups flour.

Mix together Crisco, sugar and All Bran. Add boiling water. Mix well with electric mixer. Mix the lukewarm water and yeast. When this is well dissolved, add to Crisco mixture. Add 2 eggs well beaten. Sift flour and salt and add to this. Add enough flour to make dough to a consistency to handle. Place in large, clean, slightly greased bowl. Cover bowl with thin cloth or paper towel. Place in warmest spot (I place mine in laundry room) Let dough rise (1-2 hours) double and punch down. Let stand 30 minutes. Divide dough and roll and cut in the size roll you like. (I do the fold over kind and put a dot of cold butter in the crease before folding and pinching together.) Let rise and bake in 350 oven. When folding the rolls over, keep fingers free of grease and flour. Even moisten finger tips all along in a small glass of water, so you can get the dough to stick. Often my rolls will open up during baking, if I don't have them pinched together good enough.

This is a great roll recipe. My grandmother, Mom's mother, made it a lot as did my mom. Loved it always, still do. Sister Schubert has made good homemade tasting yeast rolls so easily accessible, that one is rather discouraged from making them at home. I like doing it, it's very satisfying and somewhat therapeutic - but when it gets down to it, I usually just buy Sister S. I also enjoy, now, using dough hooks. I used to think that was just WRONG, and part of the soul of bread was kneading by hand. But, the dough hooks knead so well and quickly, getting the dough smoother than I can, actually, that I now use dough hooks. They come with my mixer. I have arthritis in my hands, and it helps me a great deal not to have to knead.

Message to Laura Beth - I still think you and I just need to take the time to do this at my house, side by side, you at one end of the island, me at the other - just to talk through the little steps and nature of yeast - and just what do I mean by lukewarm and all the other little tips.

When writing out a roll recipe or a pastry recipe, the writing makes it all look a bit complicated, I think. It really is very easy and quick. The most time consuming thing about the rolls, is waiting for the rising and then the messiness when I'm rolling out the rolls. It takes a large surface and the little items, like the rolling pin, the roll cutter, other stuff, measuring cups - I don't know, the second stage clean up finds me a bit burned out.

It's good to have an empty dishwasher and just throw EVERYTHING in there.

Also, must have a good rolling pin. I have the one that was my grandmother's in Troy. I know that she always had a cook, and I remember one of those cooks in particular, named Willy. She was delightful, and always greeted us with gusto when we drove into Grandmother's backyard. She would come out the back door with a limp. She had a limp and it was so her. I loved seeing her and don't remember her without a smile. I know that it was she who used this rolling pin that I have. I also remember Willy when we would be eating in Grandmother's dining room. I sat in wonder as Grandmother would ring her little bell which sat next to her plate. And immediately in would come Willy through the swinging door of the dining room, with her limp, and with her smile. I remember Willy with a lot of respect, because that was in the 50's in South Alabama - Willy was hired help and I know her life away from 110 Murphree Street was, well, different from ours, to say the least. I was oblivious to the dividing walls of blacks and whites and I was just comfortable in my world. Willy appeared very happy. I wonder what she thought of all of us. She was very very kind to Mary Ann and me, and to Mother and Daddy - as if she was really excited to see us when we drove up.

Anyway, I love my rolling pin, and I never use it without thinking of Willy.

I imagine her in Grandmother's kitchen.

I'll do the pastry next post - perhaps later in the day.