Low Calorie Poppy Seed Bread Machine Bread

Max, dear, I just have to pass on this delicious Low Calorie Poppy Seed Bread from my neighbor Ellie Platt. Ellie’s mother was originally from Hungary and she is a fabulous baker. Her strudels are to die for. Anyway, yesterday she brought over a loaf of bread for me to try.

I could tell right off that it came out of a bread machine and you know that I am not a fan of bread machines. I love kneading bread. It’s so therapeutic. For five to ten minutes you can punch any irrating person you know.

But, this bread was really good and it is supposed to be Low Calorie. Ellie has been on a diet for a couple of months and the lack of good bread is killing her. Someone in her exercise class brought in this recipe and when Ellie heard it had poppy seeds she just had to try it. Since you love poppy seeds as much as I do, you really ought to try it.

This bread comes out with a lovely golden crust and little poppy seeds all through the bread. Ellie, good Hungarian cook that she is, upped the poppy seeds to 2 teaspoons.

Low Calorie Poppy Seed Bread:

1 1/4 cups warm water
2 tablespoons soft butter
2 tablespoons brown sugar
¼ cup dried minced onion
1 ½ teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon poppy seeds
½ teaspoon onion powder
½ teaspoon pepper
3 cups bread flour
2 tablespoons dry milk powder
3 teaspoons active dry yeast

Place all ingredients in your bread machine in the order suggested by the manufacturer. Select the basic bread setting. After 5 minutes of mixing, check the dough and add 1 or 2 tablespoons of flour or water if needed.

Makes one loaf of 16 slices. Each slice is 100 calories, 2 grams of fat, 4 milligrams of cholesterol, and 20 grams of carbohydrates.

Unusual Potato Cakes

Max, you know how I love onions. I am convinced that part of my good health is due to eating lots of onions. The better half says that because I eat so many onions, no person, ill or well, will get close enough to spread their germs.

You know that I am NOT cooking until next week, but this recipe tempts me to break that rule. It was passed on by a good friend, who like us, lived in California for a while. She got it from someone from Spanish Forks, Utah years ago, and she swears that it is do die for.

Cris doesn’t know where Spanish Forks is and neither do I, but someone there sure knows how to cook.

Deviled Potato Cakes from Spanish Forks, Utah:

6 potatoes, cooked
1 4 ½ ounce can deviled ham
3 tablespoons minced onion
2 tablespoons flour
2 tablespoons minced parsley
1 tablespoon mustard
½ teaspoon salt
¼ cup butter
1/3 to ½ cup evaporated milk

Grate the cooked potatoes with a grater. Combine the potatoes, ham, onion, flour, parsley, mustard and salt. Form into 6 to 8 patties. Brown one side slowly in butter in a skillet. Spoon the milk over the patties. Cook until the milk has evaporated and bottom of the patties are crusty. Carefully turn over with a pancake turner. Cook until the other side is crusty.

Serves 6 to 8.

Baked Onion Casserole from Iowa

I knew it, Erma. A week can’t go by with out you liquoring up a good recipe.

That Kentucky Prune and Black Walnut Bread sounds so good that I am going to make a loaf this afternoon. Lucky for me that I always have a jar of brandied prunes ready to use.

Brenda’s new daughter-in-law brought an interesting casserole to the dinner yesterday. Nice to learn that some of the younger women can cook. She said it was one of those dishes that her family always had, and she could not bear the thought of Thanksgiving without it.

It’s Iowa Baked Onion Casserole because her family is from western Iowa. Duh. Since you all love onions, I thought you might want to try this out.

Iowa Baked Onion Casserole:

2 pounds of onions, thickly sliced
8 slices buttered toast
¼ pound Cheddar or American cheese
2 eggs
2 cups milk
½ teaspoon salt
Dash pepper
1 tablespoon butter
Paprika

Cook the onions in boiling, salted water until tender. Place half of the toast in a 13 x 8 inch baking dish. Arrange a layer of onions and a layer of cheese over the toast. Repeat with a second layer.

Beat eggs slightly with a hand whip. Add milk, salt and pepper. Pour over the onions and dot with butter. Sprinkle on paprika. Bake at 350 degrees for 40 minutes.

Serves 8

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.

Twist on Traditional Thanksgiving Raw Cranberry Relish

You know, Erma, that I always keep some Cinnamon Sugar made up in the spice cupboard.

Certainly not much could be easier to make up (although I hadn’t thought of using brown sugar instead of white), and what could be cheaper? Ever price those little bottles of Cinnamon Sugar in the spice section? Those people ought to be ashamed of themselves.

I’m going to have to try your Cinnamon Crunch Delights. You certainly can’t get much easier, or cheaper.

Like you, I am today in Full Cooking Mode.

By the end of the day, all my casseroles, rolls, pies, and other dishes will pretty much be fixed. All that remains in most cases is popping them in to cook. After about 20 years of the Thanksgiving Day Cooking Marathon (as you put it), I finally wised up and started a Cooking Plan. Basically that Plan is: Do everything possible the day before so all you have to do is keep track of the time stuff bakes (for some reason most of our traditional foods need to be baked), set the table (I used to do this the day before, but that was pre-cat days), and talk to the family.

I’ve scrubbed out the five gallon plastic soaking bucket and the frozen turkey will go it this evening. Maybe it is all in my head, but letting the turkey thaw in cold water seems to produce a moister bird. Since you passed on that tip to me, I have found that there is no such thing as a dry turkey. I will put up my 25 pound frozen turkey at 68 cents a pound against any “fresh turkey” in the gourmet meat markets. It’s all in the thawing and baking, baby.

I hunted out my old Meat Chopper/Grinder last evening. It is pretty much retired now by the food processor, but when it comes to Raw Cranberry Relish, I think it is better. The processor wants to turn stuff into mush, and we like our Relish with some body.

How about the price of fresh cranberries this year? Ouch!!

And how about the way the processors have reduced the bag size to 10 and 12 ounces instead of the old pound bags? Like we won’t notice? Probably most women wouldn’t, or at least no one seems to be complaining about this little trickery.

No matter what the price of raw cranberries, we have to have the Raw Relish. It’s such a nice contrast to all the other soft, white foods.

I know we both have been using the same recipe for dozens of years, but I found out last year that a pair of pears is a nice addition.

Cook on, Lady Erma.

Raw Pear/Cranberry Relish:

1 quart of cranberries
1 apple
2 pears
2 ½ cups sugar
2 oranges

Wash all fruit well and remove any seeds. Put all through a food chopper on coarse grind, or carefully use a food processor to pulse fruits coarsely. You want lots of texture. Stir in the sugar and store in covered container in the refrigerator for at least 3 to 4 hours. Overnight or several days is better.

This can also be used as a basis for a Cranberry Jello Mold. Simply make up one package of strawberry or cherry jello and let set until thick. Stir in 2 cups of the Pear/Cranberry Relish and one cup of chopped celery.

Thanksgiving Ideas for Stale Rolls

Went to the store today and came out with a pickup truck load of groceries. I was doing my part to help the economy–at least the grocer’s bottom line.

Now to begin The Cooking Marathon. Let the Baking Begin!!

So, I began with making several batches of Refrigerator Rolls.

Now, normally, in our house, a leftover dinner roll has a life expectancy of about 24 hours, if it is lucky. But last week, I baked up some extra rolls, stored them in one of those Tupperware thingies, and forgot all about them for four days. They probably would have reheated okay in the microwave, but I wasn’t in the hot roll mood.

Then I remembered this thing my mother used to do with old rolls. So, on Sunday morning we had juice, sausage and Cinnamon Crunch Delights (Okay, I added the Delights to the name.) Nobody guessed that they were leftovers and youngest son gave them a 9 ½ out of 10 for taste.

These are actually worth saving back a few rolls to go stale just to serve this Delight.

Cinnamon Crunch Delights:

Baked Dinner Rolls, at least a day old and up to a week old–staler the better
Butter
Cinnamon Sugar
1 cup white sugar (brown sugar makes a richer taste)
2 teaspoons cinnamon

With a serrated knife cut the rolls into 3 or 4 pieces. Spread generously with butter on all cut surfaces. Cover tops well with Cinnamon Sugar. Bake on a foil lined cookie sheet at 450 degrees until crispy. Ten minutes or so. Serve hot.

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.