Candied Apples Apple Compote

 

This is  another recipe out of Masies cookbook.  It is labled Experiment X  Apple Compote

This is a dish that in our day seems to better go with dessert as it is sweet, but it is a dish that was served along with the meat course in another day.  We eat it either with dinner on our holidays or as a dessert either way.  I will put this one in as it was written in her cookbook.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Aim:  To determine the family method of cooking apple compote.

Method:  6 apples (baking variety)
1/2 cup sugar
1 cup water
pinch of salt
a small handful of cinnamon "red hot" candies

 
Wash, pare, and core apples.  Into a granite kettle (or another medium large pot) put the sugar, water, salt and cinnamon candies.
Heat till boiling.

 
Put the apples in the hot syrup.  When the syrup reaches the boiling point again, turn head down so it cooks very gently.   Cover the kettle tightly.

After the apples ahve cooked about 10 minutes test with a fork and turn each one over.  Care must be taken not ot cook too long or they will come apart when turning.   

Conclusion:  Apple compote must not cook at too high a temperature.  Ideal to serve with meats.  Good with bacon for breakfast, Nice to serve in a dish by itself at a dinner course.  Must choose apples very carefully. 


We also eat them as a dessert with whipped cream on it. 

Cornbread Dressing

 

Lets start with the cornbread.  Ma's cornbread recipe. 

We usually make 3 pans of cornbread to go in the dressing.   You can make it several days ahead of time and just put it in a big baggie or you can wrap it in foil.  It wont hurt anything if it is even a little dried out, because then it will reabsorb more of the broth.  We also cook our cornbread in cast iron skillets.   At Ma's house, we use her square pan because "Pie are round... and cornbread are square"  Ask about the joke if you dont understand the punchline.

 

Corn bread recipe

1 1/2 cup of corn meal (ma uses white corn meal if you can find it. Yellow works fine though,)

3 Tbs of flour

1 1/2 teaspoons of Baking POWDER

1teaspoon of salt

1 1/2 cup milk

1 egg

2 Tbs of oil.  (shhhhh dont tell anyone, we usually melt crisco and put it in there.)

 

When I make the cornbread, I melt the crisco in the skillet to grease it then pour it into the mix. 

Bake it in the oven at 425 degrees for 20 to 25 minutes. 

 

Mashed Potatoes, yeah but added anyway

Dumplings

Turkey (Our Style)

     How to cook a turkey, OUR WAY... as if that is very different.  To some it is because we use a roaster instead of baking it in the oven, frying it or smoking it.  It is almost like putting it in a sauna for a water bath.  Anyway, we use the roaster for this task and for making our dressing in.

So, put your turkey in the sauna, on the rack so that you can lift it out later. 

I use fresh herbs to the extent possible.  Lots and lots of sage.  I also use rubbed sage and ground sage.  We like sage.  I also put just basic salt and pepper on the outside and maybe some of all of it in the open cavity as well. 

Cook at 350 degrees until the thermometer is at 180 degrees in the breast.  We then let it cool a little bit, lift the turkey out of the broth (which will be used for dressing and dumplings) and debone it before we take it to the table. 

There were always more kids around than turkey legs so deboning it kept the arguments down over that particular piece.  It also makes the clean up after that very filling meal much easier as we just have to put the left overs in to ziplock bags to either put in the refrigerator for next day use or in the freezer for much later use. 

Giblet Gravy

Candied Sweet Potatoes

 

This recipe is another of Masie's holiday fare recipes from her cookbook.  The flounder next to the ingredients are not part of the overall recipe by the way. 
The ingredients are sweet potatoes or yams, cinnamon imperials (sometimes known as red hots)  sugar and water.  you might also use a little red food coloring if you want the added color. 

 

We really dont have measurements for how many potatoes either, but generally count one per person invited and add to that however many you want to have left over.  Wash them and put them in a pot of water to boil until just fork tender.  You don't want them mushy as they will fall apart in the next round of cooking. 

 

When cool, peel and dice the sweet potatoes.  As you can see, we leave them in fairly large chunks. 

Add 1 cup of sugar and 2 cups of water to your pot and heat, stirring requently until combined and melted.  Drop in a handful or two of red hots (cinnamon imperials)  and let them desolve as well.
After the sugar, water and red hots are melted and at a boil, put the sweet potato chunks in and return to boil. 

 

 

Stir gently to coat the sweet potatoes with the sugar mixture and boil gently until they are very done. 

These can be served immediately warm, you can make them a few days ahead of time and kept in the refrigerator to be served cold.