Thanksgiving is now part of Apopka’s and America’s history and happy memories, gone but not forgotten. Happily, however, Christmas season 2015 is now arriving, coming soon ’round the bend, nearly here, hurrying back to us fast-at-last after another year’s too long absence. It’s been way too long since that major annual holiday’s last visit brought us all of the colorful Christmas trees’ bright holiday lights, stacks of incoming and outgoing Christmas cards, the joyful sound of Christmas carolers, and of course, all of the season’s favorite food treats cooking in kitchens everywhere and all of the other multitudes of wonderful festive things we all love about Christmas. It won’t be long now till our cookbooks or just our well-aged and treasured old notebooks filled with equally vintage nostalgia-filled handwritten recipes from so many of our best Christmases past will be dug out of whatever safe places we have guarding them since their last use 12 months ago for last year’s Christmas cooking. Soon our home ovens will be turned on and warmed up for our latest cooking adventures. Stacks of our most delicious favorite sweet ingredients will be brought out again and set up on kitchen counters ready for our mixing bowls and baking pans. For all of the many really inspired home chefs who truly enjoy cooking, another all-new Christmas season will get under way any day now and pull family and friends into our kitchens as we get our stoves going again for another busy and most enjoyable holiday season of cooking Christmas treats and edible Christmas gifts. For some of us, baking time requirements can be kept to a minimum, maybe limited by necessity to a few precious moments from other hectic holiday activities and events. Folks fortunate enough to have free time for hours of creative cooking, mainly just for fun might choose to dedicate that time to Christmas baking of cookies, cakes, pies and of course some accompanying big pots of more health-oriented Christmas food gifts such as nice big pots of freshly cooked homemade vegetable soups or anything ranging from a special potato salad recipe to breakfast pancakes. Enjoy finding lots of ideas below as well as some of our other interesting local recipes which could come in handy, all from your Apopkaarea friends’ and neighbors’ recipes in our Apopka area cookbooks. Enjoy this week’s recipes and a most very Merry Year 2015’s Christmas season!
WOMEN’S AGLOW
FELLOWSHIP’S CHRISTMAS PIE
Recipe from Doris Mech’s
Joy With Honey
Crust For Christmas Pie:
1/4 cup butter or margarine
1/4 cup honey
1/2 cup carob chips
2 cups cereal (Special K or Rice Krispies)
In a saucepan over low heat, stirring constantly until smooth, melt the butter, honey and carob chips. Remove from heat. Add cereal, stirring until the cereal is well coated. Gently press the mixture in a buttered 9-inch pie pan to form the crust. Chill the pie crust.
Filling For Christmas Pie:
4 packages (three ounces each) cream
cheese, softened
1/2 cup honey
1/2 cup quartered maraschino cherries
A few halved maraschino cherries
1/2 cup chopped almonds
2-1/4 cups whipped cream
In a small mixing bowl, beat the softened
cream cheese until smooth. Gradually beat in
the honey. Carefully fold in the cherries, almonds
and whipped cream.
Spread filling in the chilled crust. Garnish
with maraschino cherry halves and toasted slivered
almonds if you wish. Freeze for at least four
hours.
Ideally, you might want to make your Christmas
pie a bit ahead of time before all the last
minute bustle of happy holiday activities. Just remember
to have it well wrapped or in an air-tight
container in your freezer.
Remove the Christmas Pie from your freezer
15-30 minutes before serving and let stand at
room temperature.
Then it will be just perfect to cut and serve as
the sweet final course of your Christmas dinner,
according to this recipe’s instructions summary
in last line.
LUCY McDONALD’S
APRICOT-CHERRY-PINEAPPLE
CHRISTMAS JAM
Recipe from Apopka Memorial Middle
School Cookbook
12-ounce package dried apricots
14-ounce can chunk-style pineapple
3-1/2 cups water
8 ounce jar maraschino cherries
6 cups sugar In a large saucepan, combine apricots, pineapple and juice, water and cherry liquid. Let stand for one hour. Then cook slowly until apricots are tender. Add sugar and continue cooking slowly, stirring often until thick and clear at 216 degrees. Add cherries, cut in quarters. Cook for a few minutes longer, then pour into hot sterilized jars. Cover with paraffin.
ESTHER BROSCHE’S CHURCH WINDOWS CHRISTMAS TREAT
Recipe from 1990 Presbyterian Women First Presbyterian
Church of Apopka, Treasures and Pleasures cookbook
1 (12-ounce) package of chocolate chips
1/2 cup of margarine
1 (10-ounce) package multi-colored marshmallows
1 cup finely chopped pecans
Flaked coconut (small can)
Melt chocolate and oleo over low heat and let it cool, then add marshmallows and nuts to the chocolate mixture. Place mixture on waxed paper and shape into two rolls, 1-1/2 to 2 inches in diameter. Pat mixture with hands to make mixture hold together, then roll them in coconut. Refrigerate and then when thoroughly chilled slice into half-inch slices. Recipe yields three dozen of the beautifully colorful as well as delicious “church windows.” They can be frozen after slicing layered with wax paper.
AGNES GREEN’S MICROWAVE
OLD-FASHIONED FUDGE
Recipe from Lake Hill Baptist Church’s
Treasures from Heaven
2 cups sugar
5 tablespoons cocoa
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup milk
1 tablespoon light corn syrup
2 tablespoons butter or margarine
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 cup chopped nuts
Combine sugar, cocoa and salt in a three quart to three-and-a-half quart mixing bowl or casserole dish. Stir in milk and syrup thoroughly. Cover. Microwave uncovered for 10-14 minutes. Test by dropping a small amount of mixture in ice water. It should form a small ball when picked up. Without stirring, cool mixture to lukewarm, 120 degrees on the edges of the mixture. After 10 minutes, the casserole may be placed in a bowl of cool water if you wish. Add vanilla and nuts, then beat until mixture is thick and creamy, starts to hold its shine and holds its shape. Then pour the mixture quickly into a buttered 9-by-5 or a 10-by-6 inch loaf dish. If fudge is too thick to spread, stir in a few drops of cream or milk.
