Thanksgiving Breakfast Bread

Happy Thanksgiving, Max. May you cook and eat all day.

I should have sent this recipe on to you yesterday so you could have it for breakfast today. So, I’m late, as usual. Make it up tomorrow as your family will be there all the rest of the week.

Ever notice that in all the hoopla over Thanksgiving Dinner, that the magazines ignore Thanksgiving Breakfast? And that is an important part of the holiday.

We usually eat the main meal in the middle of the afternoon, so you don’t want to spoil anyone’s appetite by having a lunch at noon. So breakfast is a must.

Oh, I know that most people just buy some doughnuts or Danish at the store and call it a meal.

I like to make a sweet bread and serve it toasted with butter or cream cheese.

There are several versions of Kentucky Prune Bread from the last century. Many are yeast risen. And no, I don’t know why so many Prune Breads have Kentucky in their names. We certainly never had a prune industry.

I like this one as it is a Quick Bread without yeast, and because with the prune juice you end up with a dark, moist bread that keeps well.

If you don’t have Black Walnuts (or your better half refuses to crack out a cup of nuts), you can use English Walnuts. It will have a slightly different flavor, but faced with the chore of cracking out a cup of Black Walnuts (there are plenty in our driveway right now that we are driving over to remove the hulls). Since driving over Black Walnuts doesn’t crush the shells, you can imagine what effort it takes to crack them open. We used to use an anvil and a sledge hammer. Believe me, there is a reason that you can’t buy nice plastic bags of Black Walnuts in the nut section of the grocery.

As you know, I only use prunes that have soaked for weeks in brandy in my kitchen. That does add an additional degree of richness to the bread. Also, as you know, Max, the baker should ALWAYS test sample the brandied prunes before using. Snack on a prune, or two, or three. Your outlook on life will mellow out appreciably.

Kentucky Prune and Black Walnut Bread:

1 cup prunes
½ cup prune juice
¼ cup orange juice
1 egg
1 cup sugar
2 tablespoons melted butter
3 teaspoons baking powder
2 cups flour
¼ teaspoon baking soda
¾ teaspoon salt
1 cup black walnut meats

Original recipe: “Soak the prunes for one hour.”

Erma’s Recipe: Skip this step as you have already soaked your package of prunes in brandy for several weeks.

Drain the prunes well and cut into small pieces with kitchen shears.

Beat egg in a stand mixer, and stir in sugar and prunes. Add melted butter.

Mix flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt together and add to the mixture. Alternate with the prune and orange juice. Be sure batter is well mixed.and add the chopped nuts.

Place in a greased bread pan and bake at 350 degrees for about 1 hour.

Thanskgiving Ideas

You are right, Max, Thanksgiving is our kind of holiday. I’m already cooking and hunting up favorite recipes. I don’t know about your house, but try a new recipe for Thanksgiving (in hopes that you can drop another dish) and it instantly becomes a “must have” dish. So the menu just keeps getting longer and longer.

You know how I am about Thanksgiving pies. There must be Mincemeat, Pumpkin and Bourbon Pecan–and only three of us for dinner!! We often don’t even get to the pies until late that evening or sometimes the next day after all the other stuff on the menu.

I’m thinking about adding a Kentucky Lemon Pie this year. One of the great aunts used to always bring it and with its nice tart lemon taste, family members would often eat a bit of this directly after the main meal. This is an old recipe from at least the 1930’s, and it travels well since it isn’t runny or covered with a meringue. Quite different than what most people think of as Lemon Pie.

Kentucky Lemon Pie:

6 eggs
Juice of 2 lemons
1 ½ cups light corn syrup
¾ cup sugar
1/8 cup butter
Grated rind of 1 lemon
1 teaspoon cornstarch
One unbaked pie shell

Beat eggs well in mixer. Add syrup and continue beating. Mix cornstarch and sugar and slowly add to the eggs. Grate the lemon with a grater. Juice the lemons with a citrus juicer. Add lemon juice, rind and melted butter to eggs.

Pour into unbaked pie shell. Bake on lower rack of the oven at 375 degrees for 15 minutes and then reduce the temperature to 300 degrees for 40 minutes until pie is set. Remember that pies will continue cooking after they are removed from the oven.

Serve chilled and in small slices as it is rich.

Antique Shaker Apple Recipes

Max, can you name a fruit that has as many uses as an apple? Think of it. You can eat them raw. You can fry them. You can bake them. You can turn them into jelly. You can preserve them as apple sauce or apple butter. You can juice them. You can let the juice turn into vinegar or go to Hard Cider or Apple Jack–which can warm up the coldest winter evenings.

Growing up near the Shaker Village at Pleasant Hill here in Kentucky, I was exposed to some of their old recipes and ideas about cooking. The Shakers, who were early into the health food diet, devised hundreds of recipes for apples. All of the Shaker villages had huge fruit orchards with hundreds of different kinds of apple trees. Their cookbooks and household guides are filled with references to what kind of apples to use for what purpose, and some of them are rather unique.

Take this Shaker Apple Omelet that dates from the early part of the 19th Century. There was a period when all the Shaker villages became vegetarian, and from that period came an emphasis on herbs and unusual main dishes that were meatless. This recipe came originally from the Watervliet Village in New York. Today we would serve this as a side dish or dessert, but for a while this was a main dish served without meat.

While more of a pudding than what we today think of an omelet, this is still a fine dish. To save on cooking time, one could begin with unsweetened apple sauce. This makes a nice presentation in individual casseroles.

Shaker Apple Omelet:

6 large tart apples
1 tablespoon butter
1 cup sugar
Cinnamon and nutmeg to taste
4 eggs

Peel and core the apples. Place in saucepan, cover with water and cook until very soft. Place in food processor and turn to sauce.

Add butter, sugar and spices and allow the mixture to cool. Beat the eggs with a hand whisk in a small mixing bowl. Stir into apple mixture. Pour into a medium sized buttered casserole, or two buttered pie tins.

If using 6 individual ramakins or small casseroles, reduce the baking time slightly.

Bake at 300 degrees for about 15 to 20 minutes when top is lightly golden.

Serves 4 generously. Use with Roast Pork for a main side dish, or serve for dessert.

More Traditional Southern Cucumbers

So you have become a convert to the Shaker style of cooking? I often pull out some of my old Shaker cookbooks, and just read them. It was the Shaker cookbooks that first introduced me to the concept of using herbs in everyday cooking.

Think about it, when we were growing up, the average recipe called for salt and pepper as a flavoring. Cinnamon, nutmeg, and vanilla went into desserts, and that was about it. Herbs were exotic things we read about in historical books from the Medieval Period. Did you know anyone who grew their own herbs? Not likely.

Then as a teenager, Shakertown at Pleasant Hill near Harrodsburg, Kentucky opened up as a working museum. Their dining room featured real Shaker food served in that wonderful house with the two story spiral staircase, and out back was a Shaker style herb garden. They smelled so good. I was inspired to try and grow my own herb garden, and ever since herbs have been a part of our landscape.

Cucumbers with White Vinegar Dressing is something that appeared daily on the table here, and probably everywhere, when families ate whatever the garden produced. The Shaker touch was the addition of the chopped dill, which adds just a hint of additional flavor.

Cucumbers with White Vinegar Dressing:

3 medium sized cucumbers
1 teaspoon salt
2/3 cup white vinegar
1/2 cup sugar
1 teaspoon finely cut fresh dill
Optional: One medium onion, cut in thick rings.

Wash cucumbers and cut off each end. (Rub the cut ends over your face and get an instant cooling facial). Leave the peel on unless you are using waxed cucumbers from the grocery. (Ugh!). Slice cucumbers very thin and place in a deep bowl. Sprinkle with salt. Stir a bit and then place a smaller heavy bowl, like a cereal bowl, to weigh the cucumbers down.

Chill in the fridge for a hour or two. Drain in a collander and wash with fresh water.

Stir the vinegar and sugar together until sugar is completely dissolved. Add cucumbers and dill, (and onions if using) and chill for an hour or so until serving.

Serves 3 to 6 as a side dish.

After you serve the cucumbers, you can use the left over marinade over a salad. It is quite mild and is excellent over plain sliced tomatoes.

Free Paris Hilton Radio Promotion

Erma dear, it has been a lovely Memorial Day weekend here. We were able to grill out between showers, even if the deck was wet. We had our first new peas which are always a treat.

I suppose you watched the Indy 500, only this one will have to go down as the Indy 450? We saw your Ashley Judd from Kentucky standing out in the rain. I didn’t know her husband was a racecar driver. Is she still the biggest Kentucky Basketball fan?

Talk around town is still the Paris Hilton thing. At least half my friends are certain that she won’t spend a day in jail. I don’t either, but it certainly has focused attention on the girl, and isn’t that what Hollywood is all about?

One of our sponsors, www.farmtoysandmore.com happened to have a Paris Hilton clock up on the Internet when the latest bru-ha-ha hit. They said the interest suddenly jumped. Then radio station WCVQ in Clarksville, Tennessee contacted them to be a part of their “Free Paris Hilton” promotion this week. Five of our Paris Hilton Celebrity Clocks will be given away in their promotion. Check it out at www.q108.com. Someway I think that those down home Tennessians will be voting for a looooong jail term for Miss Hilton.

The last time I was down visiting friends in Nashville, they served a luscious Tennessee Fudge Cake topped with a Hot Chocolate Sauce and ripe strawberries. Let me tell you, those Tennessee ladies know how to make you forget you are on a diet. Paris herself might be tempted to indulge in this chocolate dream.

Tennessee Fudge Cake:

2 cups of sugar
2 cups flour
1 stick of butter
1/2 cup Crisco
4 tablespoons of cocoa
1 cup water
1/2 cup buttermilk
1 tablespoon baking soda
2 eggs, slightly beaten
1 tablespoon vanilla

Mix the flour, sugar, and baking soda in a large mixing bowl. In a large sauce pan, bring the butter, Crisco, cocoa and water to a rapid boil. Cook for one minute. Mix the buttermilk, eggs, and vanilla with a whisk. Pour the hot liquid over the flour and still well; then stir in the egg mixture until all is smooth. Batter will be thin. Pour into a 9 x 15 baking pan, and bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes.

While the cake bakes, make the Hot Chocolate Sauce:

1 and 3/4 cups of sugar
2 tablespoons cocoa
2/3 cup of milk
2 tablespoons of butter
1 teaspoon Jack Daniels (that’s the Tennessee touch, vanilla also works)

In medium sauce pan mix the sugar, cocoa, milk and butter. Bring to a boil and cook for one minute. Stir in the Jack Daniels (vanilla). Serve the Hot Chocolate Sauce hot over the cake.

Note when this sauce cools, the sugar becomes grainy. Don’t worry, when it is reheated (a minute in the microwave usually does it), it returns to a smooth sauce. My husband has been known to stir a teaspoon of this into a cup of hot coffee for a rich chocolately drink.

The Tennessee ladies dipped ripe strawberries in the Hot Chocolate Sauce about half way up the berry and then chilled them in the fridge.

When they served this, the cake was room temperature, the Sauce was hot, and the strawberry was on the side with a few sliced strawberries scattered over the sauce. Talk about rich!!!