Mama's (very large) Pecan Pie. 'Nuff said...

Last week I had an order for a pecan pie for an almost-family friend.  The recipient is the sister to a sister-in-law.  It was her birthday and she didn't want any sort of cake so her sweet spouse took it upon himself to order her favorite dessert:  pecan pie.

Like any child of the Deep South, there's only one pecan pie recipe to make.  Mama's.  She's made it for as long as I can remember, and indeed, the recipe is older than I am, being jotted down several years before I was born.

Favorite Child, aka Brother #4, was born in 1955, after almost a week of labor, some of it spent in traction from a slipped cervical disk (I'm so thankful he wasn't a girl or else I wouldn't be here tonight writing to you). It took a little while for her to recover from the birthing process, having had four sons in nine years time. Brother #4 was born in late summer and she was taking a noon-time rest, watching the news on WKRG out of Mobile, Alabama while waiting on As the World Turns and The Guiding Light to come on.  WKRG still has a local chef/cook come into the studio at noon, the same as the station did back in 1955.

Mama says that it was getting on closer to Thanksgiving after Brother #4 was born when WKRG premiered this pecan pie recipe.  She grabbed pencil and paper and wrote down the ingredients, much like I wrote them down some twenty years ago.

This recipe makes a deep dish ten inch pecan pie or two eight inch pies.  You'll notice there isn't a set amount of pecans -- that's entirely up to user discretion!

Here's what you do:

Beat five eggs until foamy and lemon-y in color.

Slowly add one cup sugar until well mixed.

Add one cup white corn syrup.

I can't tell ONE bit of difference between Karo brand

corn syrup and generic corn syrup.  Save your

dollars for something important like mayonnaise.

Add five tablespoons of melted butter.

Add vanilla.

I love using the little medicine dispenser cups for flavorings.

They have accurate measurements right on the cup

and are a whole lot of handy!

Pour into prepared unbaked crusts with desired amounts of pecans.

The fancy one on the left was for the client.  The ugly one on the right

was for fambly.  We like our pies with chopped pecans.  Whole halves
(if that makes any sense) are pretty in a pie, but won't cut worth a flip.

AND someone always eats out the center pecan within moments of coming 

out of the oven.  Sad, but true.  Sometimes that someone is me.

Use as many or as little pecans as you want here.  I used one a half cups

in the big pie and only a cup in the little one.

I like to put the pies on baking sheets to go into a 350 F. preheated oven.  They almost never cook over on a sheet.  Just let one go into the oven without a sheet, though.  That's one awful mess to clean up.

Bake until the center is set, anywhere from 30 to 45 minutes.  

Tadadaaaaaaa!

Here are the ingredients again for one deep dish ten inch pecan pie or two thinner eight inch pies:

One or two unbaked pie crusts

Five eggs

One cup sugar

One cup white corn syrup

Five tablespoons melted butter

One teaspoon vanilla

Pinch of salt (I omit this, using salted butter)

Pecans

Put it together like I did and you're sure to have deliciousness in an hour!

Y'all enjoy. 

<3 Mary

A Tale of Two Banana Nut Breads

I'm an absolutely horrible blogger, the posts coming in fits and spells.  I'd thought about doing a histiocytosis awareness post back in September when it was Histiocytosis Awareness Month.  I thought about doing another dental visit post similar to the last one.  I also thought about doing a combined post, championing histio awareness and dentistry, considering most of us adults with the disease (even in remission) seem to have a host of dental difficulties.  A recipe post on the fresh apple cake was almost written but, at the last moment, it was decided that posting it straight to the notes in FB would be a lot easier. I'd even considered writing a post on how I've gotten over food, previously my best friend, and lost 60 pounds this spring/summer/fall.   Days and weeks came and went.  Words didn't gel together.  Those five posts didn't get written.

And so it goes.  There's nothing much to tell these days, no amusing stories coming forth from Mama, no misadventures beyond taking a wrong interstate and driving completely around Birmingham, Alabama.

And it isn't that there's less free time to be a better blogger.  Free time exists.  Life gets complicated; minds get tired of thinking.  At the end of the day, I'd rather open a book and disappear into it than think another thought. Unless the book is thought provoking.  I like thought-provoking books...

Annnnyways.  I'm using a lot of words to apologize for not keeping to my own set standard of a post a week (on average).  I'll try to do better.  I will.

To kick off getting on the proverbial bandwagon, I've two recipes for Banana Nut Bread.  TWO.  Both of them start with a cake mix.  I'd been to the Pig earlier in the week and spotted a big bag of bananas in the reduced-for-quick-sale produce cart.  There must've been five pounds of bananas in the bag for a dollar.  A dollar!  Even after sharing half with Mama, there was still a huge bunch of bananas to do something with.

 Holidays are quickly approaching.  What better time to get a headstart on holiday baking?  Banana nut bread freezes very well, you know...

Except there were other cakes to be made and icing to be whipped and cardboard to be cut and covered.  I needed a recipe that wouldn't require a lot of preparation.  I googled recipes for banana nut breads and combined a couple of them to come up with two very tasty, quick and easy recipes beginning with butter cake mixes:  Pumpkin Spice Pudding Banana Nut Bread aka The One with Pudding In It, and Cream Cheese Banana Nut Bread.  I didn't photograph for tutorials;  just the ingredients and finished breads.

So, without another moment's procrastination, here are the ingredients for
Pumpkin Spice Banana Nut Bread

One butter golden cake mix
Four eggs
One half cup oil
Two to three bananas - mashed
Three fourths cup of buttermilk
One box of Jello brand instant pumpkin spice pudding mix
One teaspoon vanilla
One cup nuts

Despite all the directions to combine all the wet ingredients first and then add all the dry ingredients, I absolutely dumped everything but the pecans together in the KitchenAid bowl and let it do the work all at once.  Life is easier if you plow around the stumps.  It worked a charm.  Try, yourself, and see if it doesn't.  Stir in the pecans when it's all mixed well.

Pour into two greased and floured loaf pans or a small bundt pan.

Bake at 350 for an hour or so until it's done.
                                     

Maybe I should've rechopped Mama's chopped pecans.

Cream Cheese Banana Nut Bread

Five bananas - smashed

Three eggs

One butter cake mix

Eight ounces cream cheese - room temperature

One tablespoon vanilla

One cup chopped pecans

Seriously.  Just dump everything together and mix well, stirring in the pecans before pouring into two greased and floured loaf pans.

These are larger sized loaf pans 8 x 4 x 2 1/2.  If you've smaller

loaf pans, best to grease and flour one more.

Bake at 350 and hour or so until done.

At the point this was photographed, I was already well

into an insulin response over having consumed a slice of the

first banana nut bread.  It's a fuzzy photo.  My body was

feeling fuzzy and warm, too!

Both recipes yield a less bread-like i.e. dense loaf of tasty bread.  The pudding recipe, with oil in it, not to mention buttermilk, definitely is the moister of the two.  And the flavor the pumpkin spice pudding gives it is out of this world.  BUT, the cream cheese and banana-ness of the second recipe???  It's difficult to decide which recipe is the better one.

I've only found pumpkin spice pudding at WalMart.  Other food bloggers had been ranting and raving over it and I had to have it also.  It's worth tracking down, but you can use whatever pudding tickles your taste buds.  The original recipe had, of all things, instant banana pudding in it!

There.  It's a two-fer:  Two recipes for banana nut bread in one blog post after a month's slacking...

Y'all enjoy!

Mama's Southern-style Barbecue Sauce. Sweet!

Barbecue sauces across the United States are as varied and different as folks' accents.  In the Deep South of Mississippi we like ours sweet.  Here in Leakesville, there's none any sweeter or better than Mama's.

Mama can't remember where she got the recipe.  Her best recollection is of an old cookbook that was Grandma's.  Grandma didn't make this sauce, though, only Mama.  She's made it for as long as I can remember.  And I've made it for as long as The Fellows can remember.  It's a fambly tradition.

Here's what you need:

 Three medium or two large onions
Garlic to taste
Brown sugar
Worcestershire sauce
Vinegar
Catsup

Finely dice the onions and put in a very large non-reactive pot.

I love lots of onions in this sauce.  This isn't a place for sweet onions either;

they'll cook to nothing without flavoring anything.

Use yellow or white onions.

Add garlic, finely minced or pressed, to the pot of onions.

I've had this Pampered Chef garlic press for a whiiiiile.

It doesn't have a readily affordable equal. 

Add three (yes three) cups firmly packed brown sugar.

 I really prefer dark brown sugar in barbecue sauce

but didn't have any on hand and wasn't going

to The Pig to purchase any.  Use what you have, right?

Add one half cup vinegar or pickle juice.

I usually have sweet pickle juice on hand just for barbecue sauce.

Not wanting to sacrifice any from a jar of pickles, red wine vinegar

was used instead.  Dill pickle juice is good here, too!

Add one half cup of Worcestershire sauce.

I'm not a brand name label consumer for most things.  There is,

however, only one Worcestershire sauce used in this house:

Lea & Perrins.  Others are too hot, too tart, too weak...

Pay the extra cents for the good stuff when it comes to

Worcestershire sauce.  It's worth it.

And most importantly:

Add a big can of catsup.

Is there any food can not shrinking while the price remains fixed?

This isn't a gallon of catsup at all!  Brand doesn't matter here. 

Stir it all in the big pot.

Place on low heat, stirring often to avoid sticking or scorching.

I don't know why the crock pot wasn't used tonight.

I guess with all the rain from Isaac and the beginnings of cabin fever,

it was good to be busy tending a pot.

Cook for almost two hours on low heat or until onions are fully cooked and sauce is almost standing-spoon thick.  It will continue to thicken some upon cooling.

Pour into jars or bowls or even leave it in the pot and let cool on the counter.

Tadadaaaa!

It'll be good in the refrigerator for upward of a month, maybe longer.  It doesn't last much past that around here;  not because it's spoiled, but because of getting used.

This isn't a sauce to have on the meat when  it's put on the grill.  The tomato base and brown sugar will burn in a heart beat!  When the meat is almost fully cooked, start basting with it, turning often to create layers of grilled sweetness right on the meat.  It's good for everything:  beef, pork, chicken, sausage, hot dogs, hamburgers, catfish.  Well, maybe not catfish...

Serve it on the side with brisket.  Use it for pulled pork.  You won't be disappointed.

Y'all enjoy!

Sweet Pickle Sticks: Remembering Mr. Joe and Mrs. Ila Maude

Mr. Joe and Mrs. Ila Maude Carpenter lived up on the little hill above Aunt Selma and Uncle Sherman.  They were an ancient couple to a child, living well into their 80's (Mrs. Ila Maude lived into her 90's).   They were, reaching back through a youngster's memory, the little old couple that loved friends and family, loved to garden, and loved each other.  There was never a cross word uttered, each waiting on the other's needs with the sweetness of genuine affection that defies time.  They were slim, both wrinkled with care and age;  both stooped with years of work;  fixtures of the community as kind as the day is long, living long years in the little white house on the hill.

They used to buy whole milk and yard eggs from Mama.  Mama had her pet milk cow, Bossie, a black Angus of all breeds, that'd give two to three gallons of cream-rich sweet milk a day - more than enough for the bunch of us to eat everything with an abundance of real butter and clotted cream.   And yep - it's another story for another day.

Annnnyways...  More often than not, Mr. Joe'd come in the back door with a jar of something or another he and Mrs. Ila Maude had made:  strawberry figs, pickled okra, pickled banana peppers, or these sweet pickle sticks.

Tart, tangy, and sweet, loaded with flavor from the turmeric, mustard seed, and celery seed, I used to love them.  Lately I've had a hankering from them.  With a gift of over five gallons of cucumbers too large for pickles,  I decided to make them for the first time in roughly twenty-five years.  I had Mama dig out the Carpenter's recipe, not trusting memory enough to look for a similar one online.

This is roughly half of the cucumbers.  See how big they are?  

They're too large for 14 day sweet pickles and I didn't want

to make relish or mock spiced apple rings.

It's a good recipe to use those cucumbers that stayed on the vine three or four days beyond when they needed to be picked.

The pickles take two days to make and need to set (sit?) a week before opening and enjoying.  Y'all ready?

Wash, peel, deseed, and slice cucumbers into half inch strips.  I sliced a few of them thinner and wished I hadn't.  They were limp after the first night.

Don't forget to save the waste for the compost pile or your mama's chickens.  Or your chickens.

They'll cluck in delight you've afforded them this kindness.

Boil enough water to cover cucumber strips by an inch.

I didn't want to crank up the stove twice so I made sure there was

plenty of boiling water to cover them the first time.

Cover with boiling water, weighing cucumbers down, and let sit (set?) overnight or at least 8 to 10 hours.

Heavy porcelain on steel pot lids work great for pressing the

cucumbers under the boiling water and keeping them there.

I let mine set (sit?) overnight.  And most of the day, too, since Favorite Child is coming back in and a certain residence at Pine Level required cleaning.  Pour off water and let strips thoroughly drain.

**giggle** I almost forgot to get the pic, not that y'all need it to know

how to drain something.

Pack strips into clean, sterile jars.  Since these aren't going into the pressure canner I've used glass mayo jars.

Mama doesn't remember adding the turmeric directly into the jar.  I didn't tell her her memory was faulty, finding more and more hiatuses in my own lately than is comfortable.  I added a heaping teaspoon of turmeric to each quart jar - use 1/2 heaped teaspoon for a pint jar.

See?  I told you they were mayo jars.

In a non-reactive pot combine vinegar, sugar, salt, celery seed and mustard seed.  Bring to rolling boil, turn down a bit, and let cook for five minutes.

Pour over packed cucumber sticks, wipe rims, and seal jars.

See those socks in the corner of the pic?  I've repurposed stretched

hole-y socks into something beyond rags.  I'll show you!

Tadadaaaa!  The canner rack has been gone way long

time ago.  Old socks work GREAT for keeping the jars safe.

Water bath for thirty minutes.

Really.  I think the socks work better 'cause the jars are actually

cushioned and not bumping against the wire rack.

Tadadaaaaa!  Let them sit (set?) a week, open a jar and enjoy the complex flavor that these pickles are.

Sweet Pickle Strips Recipe (exactly as Mr. Joe wrote down for Mama)
Ten pounds cucumbers, peeled, deseeded, and cut into strips

Pour boiling water over and let stand overnight or 8 to 10 hours.

Pour off and drain.

Pack solid in jars.

In a porcelain pot, combine and boil for five minutes

3 1/4 cup vinegar

3 cups sugar

3 tablespoons salt

4 1/2 teaspoons turmeric

4 1/2 teaspoons celery seeds

4 1/2 teaspoons mustard seeds.

Pour over cucumbers in jars and seal.

Makes six pints

--------------

Since I had a lot more cucumbers than that I tripled everything but it's not rocket science by any means.  Double or triple as needed.   Y'all enjoy and have a Happy Fourth of July!

<3 Mary

Skillet Fried Honey Buns: How to Repurpose Mediocre and Dry Prepackaged Pastry to Artery-Clogging-Blood-Sugar-Raising Awesomeness

Fried honey buns.  MMMmmmm...  Mama's cooked these for our breakfast long before I was ever born.  I cooked them for her earlier this week.  

There's no way to make them part of a healthy diet, trust me, I've looked.  There's no way to excuse the refined sugars and animal fats in the dish.  You have to know that you have to cook these at least once in your life.  If you're a fan of Southern cooking, they'll be worth any temporary inconvenience due to adjustment in diet for the week prior to or after the consumption of them.

Mama said she started griddle frying them this way out of the need to feed her boys (really, I wasn't around when she started).  It'd come as no surprise to y'all to find out the entire fambly has a bit of a sweet tooth.  The brothers loved pancakes with syrup and syrup with biscuits and cinnamon toast by the loaf.  Mama says she looked at a honey bun one day in Mr. Maurice's grocery store and knew it could be heated with butter on the griddle for another sweet breakfast food.  I knew Daddy loved Mama but I'm pretty sure it doubled the day she fried the first one.  

Daddy was the littlest person in the fambly with the biggest appetite and worst sweet tooth.  One of his favorite sweets, when a rice or bread pudding couldn't be thrown together, was to open a can of sweetened condensed milk and eat it with a spoon.    He wasn't a big fan of chocolate, though.  I still think I might be adopted: Mama only likes milk chocolate.

Annnnyways.  I'm sticking close to Mama for the next few weeks and months.  We're going to meet with the surgeon about the mini(sternotomy) AVR the 31st of this month.  When I do a food post, it'll be prepped and cooked out at Mama's house on Havard Lane.  She has the good skillets we all want to rip each other's eyes out over  love to cook in.  Some of them were her mother's-in-law, they're just that durable and well-taken care of.

This is the little flat griddle that's seen more action than Chuck Norris (please pardon me, Mr. Norris, I appreciate you letting me live and humbly pay tribute to your actions that are second only to this little griddle).

Fried eggs for sandwiches, pancakes, grilled cheeses, and honey buns are the only things that have ever been cooked on this griddle.   

Add a blop of butter and turn the heat on medium to heat to melt.  There is no measuring.  A blop is whatever little bit is left in the wax wrapper.  It's usually enough.

When the butter is melted, unwrap (duh) a honey bun.  I like to place it on the skillet with the most stickiness down to get a coating of butter and quickly flip it over.

Turn the heat down and let it gently sizzle a little while.  It's okay to pick up the edge to check on the progress of the crunch crust the sweetened bread is beginning to make.

Don't get distracted by the washing machine, mother's telephone ringing incessantly, floor needing sweeping, etc. to check on it often.  I did.  The crust was a bit, uhmmmm, crustier than normal.  I ate the dark one since my taste buds prefer an almost bitter intensity to food (I think it was from all the chemo years ago -- taste buds have never been the same).

Flip it over to melt the glaze and caramelize it a little big and voila:  fried honey buns.  

All you need is a fork.  Y'all enjoy!