“If Pasta could sing!”
- Eating Out -
-Recipes from Babula's Trunk-
You ever wonder why I put so many salavating recipes in my books? Well, let me put it this way. In our family, it is a crime not to know how to cook. Mama started us in the kitchen at 9 years old, including my older brother. By now, I have discovered my own favorite conglomerations (which turn out to have a very Russian-Greek flavor); but I also enjoy my sister's Italian and Jewish recipes. Because of our Gluten, Egg, Milk and sugar intelerance, we have come up with a lot of very interesting and tasty recipes. Sometimes we've been down to literally nothing in our pantry cupboards. I've been poor all my life. So what can you make with a little bit of corn meal, a stray can of oysters and one questionable zucchini? :) What would you do?
Below are some of my own recipes. "Babula" is the Polish name for Grandma.
You can also access Rebecca Lee's recipe blog, E-Meals, for her international cookbook! Everything from Gluten-free Pizza to Soul Food to Bangla Rice, your tastebuds will feel like they've just won a cruise, for only a few dollars a plate!
Rebecca Lee's website is called I Cuochi. Enjoy a savory experience!
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Saramales (Cabbage Rolls)
Stuffed cabbage leaves can be found in Russia, Romania, Ukraine, and other Slavic and Eastern block countries. Every family, every village and every country has their own version.
This recipe is from an Italian-Romanian village in southern Romania.
Prepare ahead of time:
Boil one head of cabbage with 1/2 cup vinegar, a small chunk of horseradish, and 1/4 of an onion until leaves are tender, but not overly soft.
Filling:
Chop and sauté 3 onions per 2 pounds of ground meat, and add 2 teaspoons paprika. Add salt and pepper to the sautéed onions. Mix with raw ground meat and 1/2 cup raw rice. Add salt, pepper and 6 cloves finely chopped garlic to meat and mix.
Preparation:
Lay cabbage leaf in the palm of your hand. Place a small spoonful of filling in the large part of the leaf toward the bottom. Roll the bottom of the leaf over the filling. Stop and tuck the side in, before rolling to the top. Hold the saramale in your hand, making your fingers cup and meet at the thumb, then tuck the loose part of the top of the leaf inside gently and firmly. A perfect saramale measures 2 1/2 inches in length and does not exceed 1 inch thickness.
Line the bottom of a large kettle with pickled cabbage leaves, and lay several slices of raw bacon and cooked dill weed with 1/4 of the juice on top. Place saramales in a circular pattern in the kettle. After first layer, you may add several more slices of raw bacon and cooked dill weed. Add water to the kettle until just covers the top of the saramales, and add 1 teaspoon salt and 1 tablespoon tomato paste. Simmer until saramales are tender, about three hours. Prepare the evening before, not pouring in the water until the next morning, and let it simmer all morning into early afternoon. By an hour after noon, test the saramales, and serve with French bread (no butter), chicken noodle soup or Ciorba Radauteana, mashed potatoes or mamaliga (see pg ), and rich chocolate cake with butter frosting for dessert.
Jessie's "Lee Tradition" Mincemeat Pie
First: Boil about 2 lb. venison or beef which has a tender bit of juicy fat attached, until the meat falls off the bone. Keep broth in the pot. (When measured it should be about 3 quarts or 16 cups.) Cool meat. With a butcher knife mince the cooked meat until it is so fine it feels like feathers. Set aside.
Combine into the broth:
*1 cup apple cider vinegar
*2 cups apple cider (if you happen to have it on hand)
*1/2 cup Welch's grape juice
*1 TBL cup lemon juice
*2 TBL Musselman's Apple Butter
*The meat
Filling:
Pile into the large kettle and simmer for about 2-3 hours:
*3 lb. apples (about 6-7 medium apples), peeled, cored, diced
*1 lb. raisins
*2 clementines, gently diced
*1 TBL each ground cloves, cinnamon, nutmeg and allspice (yes, allspice as in the individual spice allspice, not the combo mix of spices)
*1 bay leaf
*1/4 cup molasses
*1 cup firmly-packed brown sugar
Simmer the filling, stirring occasionally so the mixture does not stick, for 2-3 hours, until the apples are the consistency of applesauce, and everything is perfectly blended. Cool and remove the bay leaf. Mix in 1 large can of Musselman's Cherry Pie Filing. This mixture can be refrigerated/frozen/canned for future use.
Preparation:
Prepare your pie dough into four 9-inch circular pie pans with with scallop edges. Flour your pans well. Leave your dough unpinched until the filling is inside the pan. Fill the pan until it is almost to the top with mincemeat. Pleace your top crust on, then pinch it on for a scallop, and trace your artistic cuttings on the middle. Bake at 350 for about 30 minutes, until golden brown. Serve as a follow-up to your family traditional dinners with lots of coffee, tea, cocoa, family and some poor homeless person who hasn't seen a dinner like this in years.
Excellent as a breakfast the next morning!!
Yields: 3-4 stuffed pies worth 8 generous slices each
First Prize Irresistible Pumpkin Pie (non-dairy, non-egg, gluten-free)
First: Scrub two medium size pie pumpkins (very round ones that are extra brown-orange, not the oblong which tend to be more yellowish-orange), and slice in half. Bake in the oven with a little water at the bottom of the pan, at 400 degrees, until the pumpkin skin caves in and the pulp falls apart (about 3-4 hours for small pumpkins, about 5-6 for large ones). Cool and scrape out the pulp (make sure no peeling gets in), and put through food processor. If you don't have that, do your best to mash up the pumpkin until it is creamy. One medium pie pumpkin will yield about 4 cups mashed cooked pumpkin.
Combine large bowl:
*4 cups fresh, mashed cooked pumpkin
*4 cups coconut milk
*2 cup firm-packed brown sugar, 2 cup white sugar
*1 TBL lemon juice
*5 TBL applesauce (substitute for egg)
*6 TBL oil
*1 TBL molasses
*2 TBL pumpkin pie spice mix
*5 (generous) TBL corn starch
---> If you are going to bake your pie the next day, do not add the corn starch until the day after, because otherwise, the pie will be a soupy mess instead of a perfect custard pie.
Preparation:
Prepare your pie dough into 2-3 9-inch circular pie pans with with scallop edges. Flour your pan well before laying in your bottom crust, and pinch in the edges.
Pour in your pumpkin batter until it is about 3/4 full. You may pour the pan half full, but this makes for a skimpy piece.
Bake at 400 for 10 minutes, then turn the oven down to 350 and bake another 30, until golden brown, crusty around the edges and firm in the middle. Remember that a pumpkin pie is a custard pie and must be firm, sweet, moist and almost like bread pudding to be successful, and the crust must be flaky and delicate.
Serve as a follow-up to your family traditional dinners with lots of coffee, tea, cocoa, family and some poor homeless person who hasn't seen a dinner like this in years.
Excellent for newliweds over morning coffee!! It will get his heart and keep it for sure.
Yields: 2-3 pies worth 8 generous slices each
Holiday Chocolate Spice Shortbreads
Note: they taste like autumn leaves and rainy Sundays, laughter, tears, memories and family
Cream gently:
2 cups softened butter or 1 1/2 cups Blue Bonnet margarine + 2 TBL
1 1/4 + 1 TBL white granulated sugar
1 1/2 tsp. vanilla or rum flavoring
1 cup chopped semi-sweet baking chocolate
1 tsp. Allspice (it is actually a spice; it is not a mixture of spices)
Thoroughly mix the above. Fold in the below ingredients into a well (hole) in the middle.
2 cups white rice flour
1 cup corn starch
1 cup Gluten-free baking mix
1 cup gluten-free oat flour
Gently mix ingredients and if it is too dry add a little more butter/margarine. Pat delicately (like you'd pat a baby) and shape dough into a large ball. Roll dough out 1/4 inch thick; then cut into various shapes. Poke with fork three or four times, and place on greased baking sheet.
Bake in preheated oven at 300 degrees F for about 20 minutes or until flaky and crisp. DO NOT LET THEM BE GOLDEN BROWN OR THEY WILL BE BURNT.
Enjoy with a cup of hot chocolate!!
Especially if you happen to be trying to fight pneumonia.
It gives you just exactly the right amount of morale to fight it off
so you can go back to work.
