Kapers for January 23, 2014
We’ve awakened to some wonderful wintry days lately, as well as some maybe just a tad too cold and a little less than wonderful. Mostly it’s been a very nice Florida-style wintertime.
Cold days can make steaming hot breakfasts (and lunches and suppers, too) very much appreciated pleasures awakening sleeping appetites. Interesting recipes perfect for these rare winter-cooled days in usually sunny hot Florida are plentifully found in Apopka’s community cookbooks.
Choose the hot foods below which most suit your liking and keep on enjoying as much as you can the luxury of this nice cool season while it lasts. Kitchen Kapers will continue providing good cold-weather recipes while these days are wintry enough for us to appreciate hot foods rather than our usual hot weather cooling-down favorite foods.
Stay warm with cold-days-baking. Turn on the oven and bake something good. Fill the house with warmth and wonderful aromas of baking breads and hefty hot pots of stew or soup or chill-killing chili on the stove.
Enjoy the Tater Tot Hot Bake or any of the several other hot potato recipes below and enjoy as well this Florida-style just-mildly-cool-enough winter of early 2014!
CINDY O’LEARY’S DAD O’LEARY’S HOT WISCONSIN STEW
Recipe from St. Francis of Assisi Parish Cookbook
1 small onion
2 stalks celery
2 pounds ground beef
2 (16-ounce) cans kidney beans with liquid
Ebow macaroni
2 cans tomato soup
1/2 cup ketchup
3/4 teaspoon chili powder
Brown together the onion, celery and ground beef. Drain grease. Add tomato soup, two cans water, ketchup, kidney beans with liquid, chili powder, salt and pepper to your taste. Simmer the mixture, covered, for one and a half hours, the uncovered for 30-45 minutes. Serve over cooked elbow macaroni, topped with shredded Cheddar cheese if you like.
JE
ANNE GLASBRENNER’S HEARTY AND HOT
MINESTRONE SOUP
Recipe from Sweetwater Oaks Favorite Recipes
1/3 cup olive oil
1/2 pound lean beef, diced
1 tablespoon butter
1 large onion, sliced
2 large stalks celery, sliced
2 carrots, scraped and diced
1 zucchini, sliced
1/2 medium head cabbage, finely sliced
1/2 pound green beans, sliced
2 cans beef broth
1 (16 ounce) can tomatoes
1 (6 ounce) can tomato paste
1/2 package frozen Lima beans
4 cups water
Salt and pepper (amounts to your taste)
Parmesan cheese grated
In a 6-quart or larger pot, heat the oil and butter. Brown meat, add onion and sauté. Add all remaining ingredients except Parmesan cheese. Simmer pot, covered, for several hours. Serve with Parmesan cheese and crusty bread.
APOPKA HISTORICAL SOCIETY’S EASY “BIG POTATO” HOT SOUP
Recipe from Apopka Historical Society’s Preserving The Big Potato
1 bag (16 ounces) frozen hash brown potatoes
1 (14-1/2 ounces) can of ready-to-serve chicken broth
1 (10-3/4 ounces) can cream of celery soup, undiluted
1 cup chopped onion
2 cups water
2 cups milk
Optional garnishes: shredded cheese, diced cheese, diced ham or bacon
Combine potatoes, chopped onion, chicken broth and water in a Dutch oven. Bring to a boil. Cover, reduce heat and simmer for 30 minutes. Stir in soups and milk. Heat thoroughly. Garnish if you wish. Recipe yields two and a half quarts of potato soup.
DAVID SNIDER’S TATER TOT HOT BAKE
Recipe from Favorites for All Seasons
1 pound ground beef
1 onion, chopped
Salt and pepper (amounts to your taste)
16 ounces Tater Tots
1 can cream of mushroom soup
1/2 can milk
1-1/2 cups shredded Cheddar cheese
In a large skillet, over medium heat, brown the beef and onions. Drain off fat. Season with salt and pepper. Transfer this mixture to a two-quart casserole dish after spraying the dish with non-stick spray.
Top the mixture with Tater Tots, covering the entire mixture. In a small bowl, mix the soup and milk together and pour over the Tater Tots and beef. Sprinkle cheese over the soup layer.
Bake at 350 degrees for 30-40 minutes until cheese is bubbly and slightly browned. Recipe makes eight servings.
APOPKA HOT POTATO CAKES
Recipe from Apopka Historical Society’s Preserving The Big Potato
1cup leftover mashed potatoes
1/2 cup seasoned bread crumbs
1 egg, slightly beaten
2 tablespoons butter or margarine
2 tablespoons oil
Make round one-and-a-half- inch patties out of cold potatoes. Dip patties in the egg. Coat with bread crumbs. Continue this until all patties are used up. Refrigerate patties for 15 minutes, to firm up the patties. Heat the butter and oil in a skillet. Saute the patties over medium heat until brown on both sides.
ROSE ROYER’S HOT GERMAN POTATO SALAD
Recipe from New Vision Community Church’s Feeding The Flock
5 potatoes, cooked and drained
4 slices diced bacon, cooked and drained (reserve drippings)
1/3 cup vinegar
2 tablespoons brown sugar
1 onion, thinly sliced
Salt and pepper, amounts to your taste
Add cooked, drained bacon to the cooked and drained hot potatoes, reserving bacon drippings. Add vinegar and brown sugar to bacon drippings; heat thoroughly and add to potatoes. Add onion, salt and pepper. Mix and serve this Hot German Potato Salad warm.
EVELYN FLUSCHBEIN’S HOT HOPPING JOHN SQUARES
Recipe from New Vision Church’s Feeding The Flock
1/2 cup chopped green pepper
1 tablespoon finely chopped onion
2 tablespoons margarine
2 tablespoon flour
3/4 teaspoon chili powder
1/4 teaspoon ground cumin
1-1/4 cup milk
2 eggs beaten
1 cup shredded Cheddar cheese
1 (15-ounce) can black-eyed peas, rinsed and drained
1 cup cooked brown rice (instant is okay)
3/4 cup diced cooked ham
Cook pepper and onion in margarine until tender. Stir in flour, chili powder and cumin. Mix well and stir in milk. Cook and stir until bubbly. Remove from heat. Stir in three-fourths cup of cheese and the remaining ingredients.
Bake in a greased 8- by 8-in. pan or baking dish at 350 degrees for 30 minutes or until heated through. Top with remaining cheese. Let stand five minutes or so before serving. Cut into squares.
