Make a variety of delicious dishes with the recipes below

4556

This week’s offering is a mish-mash of food items in no particular category. Several are just fun things to make and offer your friends and loved ones.

Nancy Baum makes mouth-watering buttermilk biscuits, and she tells us how to do it in Feeding the Flock.

We thank Mrs. T. R. Downer for her recipe she calls Lazy Gal Cobbler. We found this versatile delight in Plains Pot Pourri. You can use different fruits or berries in this very basic recipe. For our younger readers or those not fluent in Southern-speak, the term “sweet milk” that Mrs. Downer uses is simply plain cow’s milk that is not buttermilk or sour milk.

From Cooking with Foliage La Sertoma of Apopka, we have Peach Praline Pie. This pie makes me really hungry for peach pie made from wonderful, fragrant, beautiful golden/pink peaches! Did I mention “fragrant?” If I can’t smell a peach, I won’t buy it.

Marie Trivento’s simple and tasty Deviled Ham Dip is made with canned deviled ham and softened cream cheese. We found her recipe in Sharing Our Finest Cookbook, published by the Apopka Citizen Police Alumni Association.

From our friends at The Apopka Woman’s Club, we have Amelia Napier’s Orange Marmalade. She included this recipe in the little treasure titled What’s Cookin’? We appreciate that wonderful organization for all the events they make happen in our town.

Plains Pot Pourri brings us Margaret’s Jam Cake submitted by Mrs. Ginny Callis. This cake is one of few not made with baking powder. Instead, the rising is made possible by the baking soda mixing with the acidic buttermilk.

A few folks, including me, are sensitive to the taste of baking powder; it makes foods containing that ingredient taste bitter. I just looked up on the internet “bitter taste from baking powder” and found a comment that advises Rumford baking powder doesn’t contain aluminum and therefore doesn’t cause the bitter taste. (I’m not pushing Rumford, here!)

The New York Times New Natural Foods Cookbook has some wonderful recipes. Their Cranberry Crunch is made with fresh cranberries cooked for a short time prior to baking in the recipe. It looks really good.

From our friends in Plains, Georgia, in their publication titled Plains Pot Pourri, we find Strawberry-Banana Salad from Mrs. Gloria Simmons. This is a wonderful concoction she calls a “salad,” but we know it is a tropical delight.

NANCY BAUM’S

BUTTERMILK BISCUITS

Recipe from

New Vision Community Church, Plymouth, Florida

Feeding the Flock

3 cups self-rising flour (King Arthur’s is best)

1 tablespoon sugar (optional)

1/2 cup cold butter or vegetable shortening

3/4 to 1 cup buttermilk

Place flour (and sugar, if desired) in medium bowl. Cut butter into 1/2-inch cubes and toss pieces into flour. Cut butter into flour until the size of small peas. Add 3/4 cup buttermilk and toss with fork until liquid is absorbed. For more moist biscuits, add remaining 1/4 cup buttermilk.

Place dough on floured work surface. Fold over three or four times and pat into a 1-inch thick circle, square or rectangle. Cut 1-1/2 to 3-inch round or square biscuits. Place on ungreased baking sheet and brush tops with melted butter or buttermilk for shiny crust.

Bake at 450 degrees for 12 to 14 minutes until golden brown. Yield: 6 large or 12 small.

Note: Dough can be made day before, refrigerated, then shaped and baked.

MRS. T. R. DOWNER’S

LAZY GAL COBBLER

Recipe from Food Favorites of Plains, Georgia

Plains Pot Pourri

1 stick (1/4 pound) margarine

1 cup sugar

1 cup self-rising flour

1 cup sweet milk

2 cups sweetened (peaches, berries, or apples)

Melt margarine in baking dish. Mix sugar, flour, milk in bowl. Pour this mixture into melted butter. Into the center of this, pour the 2 cups of fruit with juice. Do not stir. Bake at 400 degrees until crust is brown, about 30 minutes.

PEACH PRALINE PIE

Recipe from Cooking with Foliage La Sertoma of Apopka

4 cups sliced ripe peaches

1/2 cup sugar

2 tablespoons quick-cooking tapioca

1 teaspoon lemon juice

1/2 cup sifted flour

1/4 cup firmly packed brown sugar

1/2 cup chopped pecans

1/2 cup margarine

1 9-inch pie shell

Bake pie shell at 450 degrees for 10 minutes; cool. Combine peaches, brown sugar, tapioca and lemon juice in a large bowl and let stand for 15 minutes. Combine flour, brown sugar and pecans in a small bowl. Cut in margarine and mix with fingertips until crumbly. Sprinkle 1/3 of pecan mixture over the pie shell bottom. Cover with peach mixture and sprinkle remaining pecan mixture over all. Bake in a 450-degree oven for 10 minutes. Reduce heat to 350 degrees and bake for 20 minutes longer or until peaches are tender and topping is golden brown. Makes 6 to 8 servings.

MARIE TRIVENTO’S

DEVILED HAM DIP

Recipe from Apopka Citizen Police Alumni Association,

Sharing Our Finest Cookbook

1 8-ounce package cream cheese, softened

1 small can deviled ham

1/2 cup mayonnaise

1/4 teaspoon dill seed

1/2 teaspoon chopped parsley

1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce

1/2 teaspoon salt

Cream the cream cheese and deviled ham with electric mixer. Add mayonnaise and seasonings and blend. Serve with crackers or potato chips.

AMELIA NAPIER’S ORANGE MARMALADE

Recipe from The Apopka Woman’s Club, What’s Cookin’?

4-5 oranges

1 lemon

6 pints water

4 pounds sugar

Slice thoroughly cleaned oranges and lemons, removing seeds. Put through the coarse blade of a meat grinder; if you don’t have a meat grinder, use a food processor. Pour the water over the fruit and let stand 24 hours.

The next morning, boil for one hour, skimming constantly. Stir in the sugar just before removing from the stove. Let stand another 24 hours. Return to stove and boil slowly until thick. The syrup should congeal when tested by putting a little on a frozen saucer while it is hot, tilting to one side. If it runs easily, it is not ready.

MRS. GINNY WILLIAMS CALLIS’ MARGARET’S JAM CAKE

Recipe from Food Favorites

of Plains, Georgia

Plains Pot Pourri

2 cups sugar

1-1/2 cup butter or margarine

1 teaspoon each of desired spice: cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice, or cloves

6 eggs

1 cup buttermilk

3 cups flour

2 teaspoons baking soda

2 cups blackberry jam

Cream sugar and butter. Sift flour, soda, and spices. Add flour alternately with milk and eggs. Add jam. Pour mixture into well-greased and paper-lined pan. Bake at 325 degrees about 30 minutes or until done.

CRANBERRY CRUNCH

THE NEW YORK TIMES NEW

NATURAL FOODS COOKBOOK

Copyright 1982 by Jean Hewitt

1 pound fresh cranberries

Honey to taste

1 cup rolled oats

1/2 cup whole wheat flour

1 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup butter

Homemade vanilla ice cream or plain yogurt

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Put the berries in a saucepan and cook until they pop and then a minute or two longer. Do not let them get mushy. Sweeten very lightly with honey. Cool slightly. Put the oats, flour, and sugar in a bowl. Cut in the butter with two knives or a pastry blender until the mixture is crumbly. Put half the oat mixture in the bottom of a buttered 8-inch square baking pan. Cover with the cranberry mixture. Top with the remaining oat mixture. Bake for 45 minutes or until done. Serve warm with ice cream or yogurt. Yield: Six to eight servings.

MRS. GLORIA SIMMONS’

STRAWBERRY-BANANA SALAD

Recipe from Food Favorites of Plains, Georgia Plains Pot Pourri

3 3-ounce packages strawberry-flavored gelatin

1 cup boiling water

1 10-ounce package frozen strawberries, thawed and undrained

1 15-1/4 ounce can crushed pineapple, undrained

3 bananas, sliced

2 cups sour cream, divided

1/2 cup pecans, chopped

Dissolve gelatin in boiling water. Stir in fruit. Pour half of mixture into 8-inch dish and refrigerate until firm, then at room temperature. Spread 1 cup sour cream over the congealed gelatin. Spoon remaining gelatin over sour cream and refrigerate until firm. Top gelatin with remaining sour cream, spreading evenly. Sprinkle with pecans. Yield 8 to 10 servings.