COOKING

 I have been reminiscing about my cooking.  The very first thing I remember making was a pumpkin pie. I was about 14 or 15. For some reason, I was staying with Grandma Horn.  She was gone visiting with Aunt Wilma and had taken the train to Denver.  

While she was gone, I was being supervised by Uncle Paul and Aunt Ollie.  They worked the farm, getting up early to milk the cows and other farming tasks.  

I was left on my own.  Heh, heh. heh.  I was hungry for pumpkin pie.  I had at hand a nice sized pumpkin.  I cut it up, scooped out the seeds and boiled it until tender.  I then mashed it up into pulp. 

I had two pumpkin pie recipes; Grandma Horn's and one other. For some demented reason I decided to combine the spices of both recipes.  I do not remember what I used for crust but it sure wasn't Grandma Horn's very tender lard and flour version.  

I combined the ingredients and baked it at 350 degrees for one hour.  I let it cool before tasting.  It was very strong.  I knew I could not waste it no matter how bad it tasted.  So I ate a piece each night until it was gone.  

I did not make another pumpkin pie until I was grown and married.

Mom always commanded the kitchen, she fed us and input to preparation of food was limited to sorting pinto beans on the table to pick out rocks in preparation for chili

The only other time any of us were drafted into the kitchen was to hold down the breadboard to which was clamped the meat grinder.  This was used to grind up cranberries for the black cherry jello, cranberrie, celery, walnut relish.  I love this stuff!

Our job was also to hold the jar to hold the dripping from the crushed cranberries.  This was accomplished with much exhortation to hold still! Keep the jar under the drip! 

My next major attempt at the culinary arts was an attempt to make Saurbraten.  That is a tasty German dish made by marinating meat in vinegar.   

It just so happened that I had on hand some venison.  I followed the recipe, I marinated the cut up venison in vinegar for three days.  When it was completed it had turned gray and looked like bad tuna fish.  I tried cooking it but had no takers.  It got tossed.  

I also had a recipe for pie crust that called for a tablespoon of vinegar.  Any mention of vinegar to the family caused much hilarity.  Even though that pie crust recipe is pretty good.

I have eaten my share of venison and do not care to have any again.  It is best when fried in bacon grease, or ground up with pork and buckwheat flour for hamburger patties.  The absolute best venison liver I have ever tasted was a young buck shot in season at Grandma LaVann's ranch.  We had fresh back strap and liver quickly fried in bacon grease.  It was fabulous.  But then, working hard in all that fresh air gives one an appetite that is easily appeased.

I discovered year later that I am genetically a non-taster.  That means I do not taste bitter very well.  I learned that when I was attending biology at BSU. The professor handed out litmus paper.  He told us to chew on it.  If we were non-tasters we would not taste anything but paper. Tasters would taste the bitterness of the litmus paper.

However, Mom used to occasionally cook liver and onions everytime we had a steer butchered. Fortunately that was only once a year because the cow only had one, thank God, liver.   

She would brown the onions, fry the liver then bake it until it was the consistency of leather.  We ate it because that was the only way to get dessert.  The onions were delicious. The liver was gritty, gray, tough and took much chewing and drinks of milk to get it down.  But get it down, we did. Dessert was waiting.

Another unpleasant beef byproduct was tongue.  One day I cam home from school and there was a large gray cow tongue on a plate.  I asked what it was and Mom said tongue.  I was disgusted but went on about with homework and reading etc. 

About a week later a new sandwich spread appeared for sandwiches.  It was the beef tongue. She had boiled it, peeled it, ground it up in the meat grinder.  Surprisingly enough, I was not the one chosen to perch on the breadboard.  

She ground it up, added onions, dill pickles, salt, pepper and mixed it with mayonnaise.  It was delicious.  

I used venison to make mincemeat one year. It was quite a production.  I canned the mincemeat and forced...uh gave it away as Christmas gifts that year.  Got rid of some venison and did not make any mincemeat pies.

I have a wonderful recipe for Fruit cake.  It have always disliked fruit cake and discovered quite by accident that I did not like citron.  So Letha Fashouer's recipe calls for a basic batter of lots of egg, some flour, vanilla, salt.  To that add chopped dates, green and red marischino cherries and the pinapple sold the same time as the cherries.  Also lots of walnuts.  When baked cool and soak in brandy.  I used to make several loaves each year.

This year I decided to adapt the recipe and it bears no resemblance what so ever other than the batter.  I did a trial batch using a mix of cranraisens, almonds and cashews.  I soaked some with Limocello and some with Lemon jello.  I actually prefer the lemon jello version.  Next batch I will zest a couple lemons for more flavor.

I also have an ancient recipe for chocolate mayonnaise cake.  I brought it home from the Brownies way back when mom was being suburban housewife.

A couple weeks ago I decided to make one.  The only substitution I made was to use Splenda instead of granulated sugar.  It turned out okay but I wasn't happy with it.  It was not nice and moist on top.  I have determined that I will use granulated sugar next time, give it to my neighbors across the street along with the rest of the sugar.  You eat it!

One of our favorite cakes as kids was raisen spice bar with powdered sugar frosting.  Mom came to have this recipe from when we lived in one of the trailer parks on the Hell's Canyon project.  A neighbor lady made one and Mom got the recipe. This same neighbor lady taught me how to make button holes.  Handy thing to know.

When ever she made this we knew we were going someone.  It was usually to a dance in Ola.  This was a family affair. The wives made dishes for a potluck supper. They passed the hat to pay the musicians and the midnight supper was held.  I learned many things at those dances; for instant never get in between two men determined to punch each other in the face.  This cake made many appearances at the Berglund dinner table.  We always had dessert. As a result of all those desserts, I have quite a collection of jello recipes.  

One of my favorite condiments is green tomato pickles.  My Grandma Horn made them and I was introduced to them as garnish on a hamburger.  Yummy!  I have made and hoarded several batches over the years.  

I have always loved cooking a turkey for either thanksgiving or Christmas.  We always got a free turkey at work and I loved to pick the carcass and boil it in a large stock pot and strain that for use in future dressings.

My favorite Christmas dish is to get a bone in ham to cook overnight in the oven at low temp. At the same time I like to take frozen Rhodes rolls, put in a pan, sprinkle with butterscotch pudding (NOT INSTANT) on top of the rolls. When the ham comes out in the morning, the rolls will have risen, don't forget lots of butter on top. Bake at 350 for about 20 minutes for perfect sticky buns.

A while back I decided to purchase three boxes of butterscotch pudding from Amazon.  I received three large boxes containing three packages of six boxes each.  I possessed a total of fifty four butterscotch puddings!  I managed to get it  down to one box by schlepping some to Davita and some to my neighbors. Oy! I have sticky buns in my future!!

I have a recipe for tamale pie from Barrow days.  I got the recipe out of the Sunday Anchorage paper.  It called for using breakfast steak, which is thin sliced steak.  Yellow, green and red bell peppers roasted.  Ricotta cheese. Onion. Garlic.  Red pepper flakes. Salt. Pepper.  Corn meal. Topped with frozen onions.  I took it to a potluck once in Barrow, the nurse eating it exclaimed, "I want to bury my face in this!" It is a favorite of husband.

Dammit now I'm hungry! Must go walkies.