Norm Matthews

Tri2cook, glad you like the recipe. When I was living on Strawberry Hill, the only way one could get it was from someone in the neighborhood and it was always made with a walnut filling. Now flash forward to today, the Strawberry Hill Bakery (which isn't on Strawberry Hill) now makes it and they have added a lot of flavors. As far as i know, they came up with all the new flavors and only the walnut is traditional but they are all good. When I made it, I used pecans and I loved it with pecans.

I know I gave Martha Stewart permission to print one of my recipes. It was published in one of her mags. and is still on her website and gives me credit at both, but a San Diego newspaper reprinted and gave the credit to MS. It was subsequently reprinted in at least a couple other places with her getting the credit. I know that I have passed recipes on, giving credit to the person I got it from, only later to hear it being accredited to me. So how can anyone really know the true source of most recipes?

With some of the leftover ham I made some ham salad and split pea soup, neither of which were photogenic.

Tri2Cook I have never had Babka so I don't know what differences there are, but here is the recipe I have. It must have been around 60 years ago when my mom asked our neighbor for the recipe. She was told it wasn't written down but she was welcome to sit in the kitchen while she made it and write down what she did. This recipe makes 4 loaves if I recall correctly. It's probably been around 40 years since I made this. Povitica Bread BREAD: 4 cakes yeast 2 Pints milk 16 Cups flour 2 teaspoons salt 2 Cups shortehing 2 Cups sugar 8 Eggs Filling 8 cups shelled walnuts pecans 2 1/2 C. milk 1 teaspoon butter 2 1/2 cups sugar 3 tablespoons honey 8 eggs 3 teaspoons vanilla 1 teaspoon salt BREAD: Heat milk to lukewarm, add yeast and one cup of flour. Set aside in a warm place for about 30 minutes to “test out”. Beat eggs well. add sugar, beat to combine. Melt shortening. To the yeast sponge add the remaining flour and salt a cup at a time alternating the liquids, the melted shortening, beaten eggs and milk. Mix well, adding more flour only if needed for kneading. Knead until smooth and elastic, then put in a gresased bowl, turning so that the top of the dough is greased. Cover with plastic wrap (original recipe said to cover with waxed paper and a damp cloth); set aside in a warm, draft free place. FILLING: Grind nut meats and add 1 tsp salt. Scald milk and add 1 tsp. butter, the sugar and honey. Pour hot over nutmeats and mix well. Beat eggs thoroughly, beat in vanilla and add to nut mixture. Mix well. ASSEMBLY: After dough has risen to twice its original size, punch down and divide into to. roll out on a large clean dish cloth of sheet until the dough is paper thin. If the dough resists rolling, cover and let it rest a few minutes. By tablespoons, dot the filling around the dough halves. Spread with a rubber spatula. Take the ends of the cloth and start rolling up like a jelly roll. Seal the edges and ends. Roll end over end and place in a greased bread pan. Bake 350 degrees 1 hour and 20 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean. OR you could order it from http://www.povitica.com/category/53-online-store.aspx

The most different Easter tradition for us is Povitica bread. It is a Croatian holiday sweet yeast bread with a walnut paste filling. Someone in our neighborhood would give us a loaf every Easter. I believe we were the only Irish protestants in the neighborhood. I don't think I realized that other non-Catholics came out on week-days until I was in my teens. Many years ago I made this a couple times with pecans when my uncle from Arkansas gave me a bag of them each Christmas, but now it is easier to just get a loaf at the Strawberry Hill bakery. This picture was last year's Povitica. Here it is on the table this year. This year I went for a newer variety: the filling was apple cinnamon

We liked it. Not sure they will clamor for me to make it again, but it was good.

That is the exact recipe I made yesterday except I made it half size with a regular pkg. of lime Jello. A friend told me her mom substituted cream cheese for the mayo and ginger ale for the water.

Joyeuses Paques Paul and everyone, Happy Easter.

Because Cassie has to work tomorrow, we had our Easter dinner today. We had ham with an apricot glaze, sweet potatoes, warm 3 bean salad with fresh mozzarella, povitica bread, devilied eggs, pineapple upside down cake and because several people mentioned seafoam salad in the remembered Easter dinners past, I thought I'd try some. We thought it was good. Maybe not a keeper but it was good. I usually get traditional walnut povitica but this time got one with an apple-cinnamon filling.

mgaretz. Nice looking baby backs. They are really meaty.

I'll probably have some left overs in the morning. I think she will be OK.

I accidentally posted this in the breakfast thread. Cassie tripped and fell down a short flight of carpeted stairs and stayed home from work today. She is sore and bruised but I think she will be fine. Since all three of us were home together tonight, I made Breaded chicken cutlets, Romano cheese sauce, linguine and green beans.

OOPS. Sorry, I meant to post this in the dinner thread. I made breaded chicken filets, green beans, and linguine with a Béchamel and Romano cheese sauce

Thanks for the Crepes Cassie, my DIL, made chili rellenos with Anaheim peppers once when she could not get poblanos. They were good. Making the bacon rolls with them instead of poblanos is a good idea. I may try those with the ones I make next month.

It actually snowed night before last. It was just a light dusting and was gone by sun-up. It was fairly cold this morning but daffodils are blooming and is supposed to start warming up some more. I am really ready for winter to be gone. Host's note: this topic continues in the topic Dinner 2015 (Part 2).

The probe was at 175 when I took it out of the bacon roll and laid it down. By the time I took the picture, it had cooled down to 91. Outside temperature today is in the 50's.

Green grass is good, especially when I have a son who mows it.

My nephew is having a Bacon N Bourbon party next month and I have been trying to think of something to take. I have seen BBQers make something called Fatties before but never tried one myself until today. I tried a couple of ideas and have settled on one with some variations on the next ones. A Fattie is often meatloaf sized sausage with cheese and other stuff on the inside and a bacon weave on the outside. I roasted a couple of poblanos first. Then i rolled out some hamburger between two sheets of plastic for one and some pineapple bratwrust for the second. Wove some bacon on top. Another sheet of plastic then a sushi roller on top of that and then inverted it so the roller is on the bottom. After it was turned over so the hamburger was on top, I sprinkled it with a BBQ rub. For the bratwurst, I didn't add any additional seasoning. I put cheese and poblano in the middle of each one. I used string cheese for the beef and queso quesadilla for the second. This is the first one I did and it was a little messier than the second one They got rolled up after taking a knife and scraping off excess meat. After it was rolled up. I trimmed the bacon. No one I know ties these things up but I felt better with some string on them which I did right after this picture. They went in the smoker @ 225 with apple wood for a little over an hour... until they reached 165 in the center. They were basted with BBQ sauce and bourbon. Here they are out of the smoker. I sprinkled onion rings on the hamburger one. And here they are sliced up. You could call them bacon sushi rolls if you don't want to call them fatties, I guess. We decided we liked the pineapple bratwurst ones better. Perhaps next time I'll use a sweet bbq sauce instead of the spicy one I used this time. Also plan to use more chili peppers and cheese.

Shelby, once at our restaurant, when the Asian market delivered a crate of crabs and I remember one that 'escaped' and ran across the floor and it took a little while to catch it.

chimichurri sauce with chicken is something I think I'd like to try sometime soon. We've only had it with beef so far.

I have been wanting to try a corned beef-to-pastrami recipe but didn't dare try it for the annual corned beef day dinner. Cassie likes it too much for me to mess with that day's dinner. The pastrami came out really well. There was practically nothing left over. Next time I think I'll try it in my smoker. This one was in heavy duty foil in a slow oven for 7 1/2 hours. With it we had store-bought pretzel buns, Irish Whiskey Butter, sweet potatoes and a salad with dried fruit and toasted nuts.

I grew up on Strawberry Hill in Kansas City. Many of the people there were of Croatian descent and every Easter someone in the neighborhood would give us a loaf of Povitica bread, a traditional holiday nut bread. The closest way describe it is that it's like baklava but is a nut paste in a sweet yeast bread instead of phylo. It was a real treat that I have always associated with Easter. Mom always made a ham. i don't remember real eggs playing a large part of our family tradition.

First let me say I am not familiar with these and I've never made any, but rice cakes are made with a steamed rice that is sticky when it is cool enough to handle. If you roll it in some non stick foil and let it finish cooling, it will stay like that. If you want something sweet, perhaps you might have some success if you think about how rice crispy treats are made.

Cassie's favorite meal of the year is the corned beef one I make from scratch. She has to work tomorrow so we had ours today. Along with the corned beef was butter softened with Irish Whiskey and sugar beat in with the mixer, carrots, rutabagas, cabbage, soda bread, smashed potatoes, and some store bought rye bread. I put some Guinness in the cooking liquid and divided what was left between us. Fortunately for me, neither of them drank any and I was forced to finish off the bottle by myself. We also had a couple of Irish cheeses with dinner.

Your mention of mirepoix and roast make me wonder if you are confusing 'roast' with 'pot roast' which is also called braising. With a pot roast, the crust, if it is there at all, is done by browning the meat first.