janeer

I would like it, thank you for sharing! Uncle Art's Molasses Cake 1 cup sugar 1/2 cup brown sugar 1 cup butter 2 eggs, beaten 2 cups dark molasses 5 1/4 cups flour 1 rounded tsp. baking soda 1 cup sour milk* sugar for topping Preheat oven to 325 degrees F. Line a 9" by 13" pan with buttered wax or parchment paper. Cream sugars with butter; add eggs and molasses. Sift flour and soda together and add alternately with milk. Mix well. Pour batter into lined pan and sift lots of white sugar (top should be solid white, at least!) over the top. Bake at 325F about 1 hour, or until pick comes out clean. Will keep for weeks. *Buttermilk or 1 T. vinegar in a cup of 'regular' milk can be substituted. Thank you. You know it is a true old fashioned cake when it calls for sour milk (which I keep on hand). This I will definitely try.

I have not made it. But I use farmer's cheese a lot. It is getting hard to find except in certain areas. If you live near a Portuguese, Jewish, or Polish community, try their grocers. Here is the main brand Not to be confused with some other cheeses labeled as farmers which are more like commercial mozzarella.

Wonder if you could use a tortilla press, too. Tortilla press....interesting! Wonder if I can find one around here and how much they go for? I should have gotten one while in the US and sent it over with my shipment.... they are cheap, around $20, and you should be able to order one online, I would think

Not to put too fine a point on it, but please note that there are two different items being discussed here. A pudding cake, which involves pouring a hot liquid over (usually water), and what I call a cake-pie, which uses separated eggs/beaten egg whites, no liquid poured over. Call them what you will, they are two different desserts.

Beautiful! Can you tell me what kind of tofu you use for stuffed tofu and what is the stuffing?

Here's one I've been making for some 40 years. Got it out of a military officer's wives cookbook. It's been a family favorite for all these decades. Can't remember a family get-together that somebody doesn't bring it. As you say, it's perfect to go with ham, or roast pork, or fried chicken, or barbecue, or ribs, or whatever. Easy to make, and the children love it. Hot Pineapple and Cheese Salad 1 large can pineapple chunks (not drained) 1 C all-purpose flour 1 C sugar 1 lb good-quality Cheddar cheese, grated or shredded. Combine the dry ingredients, stirring until well blended. Add the pineapple and cheese and mix until combined. Pour into a greased casserole dish. Bake at 300 for 30 minutes, or at 350 for 20 minutes, until hot and bubbly. Serve while still hot. ETA: If you google 'hot pineapple salad,' you'll find quite a few recipes, with varying measurements and ingredients. Many add Ritz Crackers. If this simple one of ours doesn't work for you, you should be able to find another one that is just perfect. The key seems to be to google 'hot salad' rather than 'casserole,' if that's what you've tried. AHA! Thanks, Jaymes; I never thought of that approach! Darienne, it's pineapple in juice, and I'd be inclined to cut back on the amount of sugar, but that's just me... (ETA juice) Well, seems to me thinking back that when we first started making this, canned pineapple only came packed in heavy syrup, and I did, indeed cut back on the sugar. But I often like things less sweet than others (I never buy those cookies in the mall for that reason - too sweet for me), so some family members make it sweeter than others. Pineapple packed in its own juice isn't as sweet as that packed in heavy syrup, though. May not be the most helpful advice, but let's face it, this is so easy, I'd suggest you just try it a time or two and come up with a sweetness level that pleases your family. Also, some folks drain the pineapple, which makes it less soupy. And you can squeeze in a bit of lemon juice if you'd like. Or top with maraschino cherries, or whatever. Sometimes I make it by laying whole pineapple slices in a shallow baking dish or glass pie pan, combining the flour, sugar and cheese, and sprinkling it over. It's really versatile and easy to adapt to your personal preferences and needs. I too have never heard of this and must try. Ever make it with fresh pineapple?

I feel a need to make a distinction here. A pudding cake is NOT the same as a cake pie or I suspect is what "sponge custard" is--a true sponge cake and a custard layer, not a sauce. The layers separate--but no water is poured over. My Pennsylvania Dutch grandmother made this in a pie crust often, and it was my mother's favorite pie.

I would like it, thank you for sharing!

Wonder if you could use a tortilla press, too. I use a heating pad when I make yogurt. Garlic press for extruding dough for cookie decorations (great Santa beard). There are some classics: glasses as biscuit cutters, rolling pins for crushing nuts, dried bread or crackers into crumbs, Braun coffee grinder for small amounts of nuts and spices, etc.

Looks like a popularity contest. Like city magazine's "best of." Have been to 6 or 7 the list. Two are good for the suburbs--including Yangming, although others, like Changsho in Cambridge, MA, are completely missing. A couple are barely passable. Interesting to see Yank Sing hanging in there at #2 after all these years.

chiffon cakes

Exactly. The recipe is designed to form a cake and a thick sauce. A very popular homemaker cake.

It is hard to tell from the photo what this was like, but the recipe reads a little like a "lemon cake pie," a traditional Pennsylvania Dutch recipe. A pudding cake generally means something that cooks up into a soft cake and a SAUCE. Did it? Chocolate pudding cake was very popular many years ago; I think you can even buy a prepared mix for it now.

I got a nasty cut once using someone else's cheap serrated knife because there was nothing else. My biggest problem with knives is wet or slippery hands--I don't wash and dry them enough, and then I cut myself.

These, I fear, are truly lost--I never had them, just have been searching for the recipes for 20 years, and no one seems to have them. There was a bakery in upstate NY called Sweeney's, a man who baked in his garage. He made a sensational bread he called Lumberjack Bread that I have come close, but not close enough, to replicating, and thick, glazed, brownish yeast doughnuts that, well, they have quite simply died with him.

My Sabatier carbon steel thin slicer, bought on my first trip to Paris in 1973, for which there is really no substitute. My giant Detecto "store" scale. Two amazingly sharp handmade wrought iron choppers (the large one cuts a pizza like nobody's business). My collection of rolling pins of all sizes and types, each suited to a different purpose. A number of little hand vintage tools, from a flat coiled whisk that does yeoman's work to a French beaner. Scale, knife, choppers shown. And of course, I can't live without my Cuisinart food processors and Kitchen Aid. And I really like my Demeyre chef's pan...

True Mexican, hands down. Followed by Sichuan.

Oh my. My grandmother was primarily a pie baker, but most of all she was a baker, and we frequently had: Angel Food Cake with Chocolate Glaze; Tomato Soup Cake and Mayonnaise Cake, both dusted with 10x although the tomato soup cake occasionally got chocolate frosting; chocolate layer cake; and Coconut Cake, a specialty, often with lemon curd filling,frosted with buttercream and flaked coconut. And her yeasted coffee cake, although not the type of cake you are talking about here, was to die for. We all still talk about it.

Rhode Island Red hens produce brown eggs, I'm guessing it might mean eggs from the Rhode Island Red variety of chicken. Yes, Rhode Island. Just promoting that great state and brown-egg-laying hen. Of course, any egg will serve.

Yikes, sorry, I must have screwed up the link. Try this, which includes photos. And here, to be sure, is recipe (from my blog, so some extra comments): My Chiles Rellenos in Spiced Tomato Broth This dish makes a wonderful supper for family or friends or for you alone. Like all true Mexican food, it is beautiful to look at and cries out for a party. You can make the sauce and prepare the chiles the day before if you want, and the finished chiles rellenos can be held quite nicely for half an hour in the oven without compromise (it took me 20 years to discover this, so I’ll just save you some time. . .), making this a reasonable choice for entertaining. Apologies to Anne, who begged me not to post this recipe because it was too unique. But when it comes to food, I share. The chiles 1 roasted, peeled, and seeded fresh poblano pepper per person 1 large brown RI egg, separated, per person, and 1 for the bowl 2 or 3 slices queso blanco or good-quality California Monterey Jack cheese, about 1/8” thick x 3” long (mozzarella, goat, or Philadelphia brand brick cream cheese can be used too) per chile 1 1/2 tea flour for each egg (when making a large quantity, you can cut this down) salt-big pinch per egg lard for frying (no substitutes please! You may as well eat at Taco Bell! Long article on the virtues and necessities of lard for everything to come in future editions!) To roast the peppers, place them whole a few inches from a hot broiler or on the grill, turning occasionally, until blistered all over; they should char somewhat but be careful not to burn or they will be ruined (“toast,” I almost said). If you are just doing one or two, your toaster oven works fine. Place in a plastic bag to steam for a while, and when cool enough to handle, rinse the skin off under running water. Gently pull on the stem to remove, hopefully bringing most of the seeds with it. Remove any others by rinsing under running water, and pull away any big fleshy veins. Try really hard not to tear them. Dry between layers of paper towels. When dry, insert a few pieces of cheese into the opening; if pepper is torn, try to fold the pepper edges over each other. Cover and set aside. Mix the egg yolks with the flour and salt; it will be pasty. In a separate bowl, beat the whites until they form soft peaks: keep them moist and dry/don’t let them break. Fold into the egg yolk mixture in two or three batches, keeping a light touch. Once you’ve done this, you should cook the chiles or the batter will separate and become watery. In a large frying pan, melt enough lard over medium heat to give you about 1/8” inch of fat (chiles rellenos are not to be deep-fried, ever); Goya or Armour brand is fine if you don’t have a farm source. With a large spoon, drop and spread an oval of batter into the pan, making them large enough to form a “bed” for your chiles, according to their size. Place a chile on top of each oval, and cook over medium heat until golden brown on the bottom and the base is partly dried. Top each chile with more batter and, with supreme confidence, flip them neatly, adding a little more lard to the pan if necessary and corralling any batter that threatens to run away. Don’t worry about them merging together or having imperfect shapes; just sever them at the seam with the spatula as needed and enjoy the informal character of the dish. Sometimes I tip them on their sides to cook them a bit more evenly. When the chiles rellenos are evenly golden, remove them and place them in a large, shallow serving dish, such as a gratin or Italian pasta dish, filled about half-way with the spicy broth. Serve the chiles over rice, and spoon broth over all. The broth This should be thin without being watery, a broth with body and texture, not a sauce. You want it to be absorbed a little into the chiles rellenos and the rice. 1 medium-small sweet onion, such as Vidalia, chopped 2 cloves garlic, peeled and chopped fine 2 T lard 5 or 6 whole frozen tomatoes, defrosted (in summer, of course, use fresh), or 1 28-oz can Italian plum tomatoes 6 whole cloves 8 whole peppercorns 1 bay leaf 4” piece cinnamon , broken in three ¼ tea dried thyme 2-3 cups pork, ham, or light chicken stock (see Note) Briefly whiz the tomatoes in the food processor and set aside. Melt lard and sauté onion and garlic quickly over medium-high heat. Throw in the spices and herbs and stir for a minute or two. Pour the tomato into onion-garlic mixture, blending well, and cook for a minute. Add 2 c. broth, reduce heat, and simmer the mixture for 20 minutes or so to meld the flavors; add more broth or water to as needed to achieve a consistency that is thin and brothy but has a some body to it. I like to leave the whole spices in, for both the rustic look and the flavor. If stored overnight, it may be necessary to thin it again. NOTE: If you do not have homemade stock, Goya’s Sazon brand ham bouillon powder works quite well; use 1 small packet only, as it’s strong; add additional water to thin.

Fish tacos, "an invention of the Southwest and border states"? Are you saying fisherfolk along the coasts of Mexico haven't been wrapping up their catch in tortillas? And then sprinkling on a little hot sauce? For hundreds of years? Probably even thousands? For as long as they've been making tortillas? And fishing? In fact, not until some norteamericanos thought of it? I'm sorry, but I simply can't imagine that. Am I missing something? _________________ No, you're not. Fish tacos are from Baja, California, which is Mexico.

In the absence of a gas stove, a toaster oven on the broil setting does very nicely. For more, a comal or iron griddle set on the stove. Grilling ideal for many. I always use the plastic bag in which the poblanos were purchased. FYI, here is my recipe for chiles rellenos

I think this was a misguided way to start. Oven-fried chicken is excellent; I defy you to try the recipe in Marcia Adams's Cooking in Quilt Country (ya know how you were looking for easy family dinners...). Agree with low-fat (add sugar-free), foam, and vegan. "Brined" (brining is for amateurs).

Red is all wrong, that says Valentine. And I'm offended by the use of Campari, my favorite summer drink. I suggest black. Something foul, like a licorice martini, colored with black food coloring.

I've used Morton's for decades. But I think that may be because that was always what was available in Boston, in Philly, and now in Nashville. I like it. But that doesn't mean I wouldn't try DC if available.