Bakin' Bacon

Daddy had the patience of a saint and was the KING of "low n slow". He was an Iowan farmer, up at 4 every morning and by the time we lazy bums got out of bed at 5.30 he had a pound of bacon ready, a "Howdy, howdy!" and a "How many eggs to you want for brefkes?" We had bacon and eggs and white toast and grits and butter every single morning...obviously well before Dr. Oz.

I am not good at all at makin' bacon. I don't know why. When I make it for Hoppin' John I take scissors and cut it up in to inch bits and stir and stir and stir. (My world-famous recipe here.) I found this easy peasy recipe about a decade and go and it's fool-proof. I always see that a lot of people put the bacon on a baking rack and place that inside a lasagna pan. I find that this produces a dryer bacon and it takes longer to cook.  I like putting the bacon directly on an aluminum foil lined cookie sheet and it works beautifully. I've never had splatters, I've never had spills and at the end you have about a 1/4 cup of bacon grease ready to make other recipes yummy!

Place slices of bacon on a foil-lined cookie sheet. Do not ! stack them or overlay them, they must be side by side.
Place in a COLD oven.
Turn up to 400 degrees, bake for 20 minutes and remove the bestest crispest bacon you've ever had.

 Cranberry-Pecan Muffins

From the episode: Rise and Shine Breakfast, America's Test Kitchen.

I reproduce this article here with no intention of copyright infringement. It bothers me that you have to go through an entire registration process to get this recipe. It's rather brilliant, making "flour" with nuts and all, and I would have just posted the link but I don't want you to be obligated to register.

Makes 12 muffins

If fresh cranberries aren't available, substitute frozen: Microwave them in a bowl until they're partially but not fully thawed, 30 to 45 seconds.

INGREDIENTS

STREUSEL TOPPING

• 3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 4 teaspoons granulated sugar
• 1 tablespoon packed light brown sugar
• 2 tablespoons unsalted butter , cut into 1/2-inch pieces, softened
•   Pinch salt
• 1/2 cup pecan halves

MUFFINS

• 1 1/3 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 1/4 cups pecan halves, toasted and cooled
• 1 cup plus 1 tablespoon granulated sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 6 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and cooled slightly
• 1/2 cup whole milk
• 2 cups fresh cranberries
• 1 tablespoon confectioners' sugar

INSTRUCTIONS

• 1. FOR THE STREUSEL: Adjust oven rack to upper-middle position and heat oven to 425 degrees. Process flour, granulated sugar, brown sugar, butter, and salt in food processor until mixture resembles coarse sand, 4 to 5 pulses. Add pecans and process until pecans are coarsely chopped, about 4 pulses. Transfer to small bowl; set aside.
• 2. FOR THE MUFFINS: Spray 12-cup muffin tin with baking spray with flour. Whisk flour, baking powder, ¾ teaspoon salt together in bowl; set aside.
• 3. Process toasted pecans and granulated sugar until mixture resembles coarse sand, 10 to 15 seconds. Transfer to large bowl and whisk in eggs, butter, and milk until combined. Whisk flour mixture into egg mixture until just moistened and no streaks of flour remain. Set batter aside 30 minutes to thicken.
• 4. Pulse cranberries, remaining ¼ teaspoon salt, and confectioners’ sugar in food processor until very coarsely chopped, 4 to 5 pulses. Using rubber spatula, fold cranberries into batter. Use ice cream scoop or large spoon to divide batter equally among prepared muffin cups, slightly mounding in middle. Evenly sprinkle streusel topping over muffins, gently pressing into batter to adhere. Bake until muffin tops are golden and just firm, 17 to 18 minutes, rotating muffin tin from front to back halfway through baking time. Cool muffins in muffin tin on wire rack, 10 minutes. Remove muffins from tin and cool for at least 10 minutes before serving.

TECHNIQUE

• RAMPING UP NUTTINESS, TONING DOWN TANG

  
  MAKE NUT FLOUR Instead of chopped nuts, we incorporate homemade toasted pecan “flour” into the batter, which lends the muffins richer, heartier flavor. 
• 
  CHOP CRANBERRIES WITH SUGAR—AND SALT Processing the berries with confectioners’ sugar sweetens them; a dash of salt masks their bitter edge.
• 
  TOP WITH STREUSEL A classic nut streusel sprinkled over the top of the muffins adds rich buttery crunch and just a hint of sweetness.

TECHNIQUE

• THICKENING THIN BATTER

  We thought a lack of gluten was causing our nut flour-base muffin batter to be thin and runny, leading to muffins that baked up flat. But when we accidentally let the batter rest briefly—a fluke occurrence when we walked away for 30 minutes—the batter thickened and the muffins baked up nice and tall. Could the rest be what improved the muffins' structure? We prepared another batch, this time deliberately letting the batter rest for 30 minutes before baking, and compared the results with muffins we baked right away. Once again, the rested batter thickened considerably and produced muffins with nicely domed tops, while the unrested batter was thin and created predictably flat muffins that spread across the tin.
  After a chat with our science editor, we understood why: As batter rests, a small amount of gluten develops, providing structure. But the main effect is that water more fully hydrates the starches, causeing them to swell. This swelling thickens the batter and helps prevent it from spreading during baking.
• 
  JUST MIXED
• 
  AFTER 30 MINUTES—SHAZAM!

Sister's Apple Crisp

This recipe is from one of my dearest friend's mama from my well-worn copy of "The Friendship Collection" created for the members of University of Southern Mississippi-Gulf Coast Elderhostels. Wanda passed recently, but she'll live on as long as I do, through her generosity of spirit, her love and her recipes! This one is her Sister Frances' Apple Crisp. I do use it with fresh apples but I also have used it successfully for a decade with frozen fruits too. Straight from the bag without defrosting. I just throw them in frozen and it works BEAUtifully.  Another good'un is to use this mixture and these spices and chop up some crystallized ginger in to them and place that over BlueBerries for a nice refreshing bite in your mouth.

The greatest thing about this recipe is you can throw dinner on the table, pop this in the oven and it'll be ready by the time you're done.

SISTER'S APPLE CRISP

by Wanda Jackson, God rest her soul

"Peel and slice apples to fill an 8 inch square pan. Sprinkle the following mixture over apples and bake at 400 for about 30-40 minutes.  Blend in to a crumble mixture and spread over apples. Serve warm.

NOTE:  My nephew, Billy, is an apple grower in North Carolina and very generously shares his delicious harvest with his Mississippi kin, so we get to try many apple recipes.

3/4 cup oatmeal
1/4 cup flour
1 cup sugar
1 stick "oleo" (i use butter, please note below)
1 teaspoon cinnamon
(I use 3/4 teaspoon cinnamon, 1/2 teaspoon allspice and a 1/4 teaspoon of cloves, but that's just me)"

Now, I got this recipe from my bestest friend, her son Jay, and I tried to make this, unsuccessfully, for years. I don't know if you know about this, but there's a Southern viciousness that you either leave an ingredient out or you don't tell quite the whole truth when you pass on a recipe. I tried everything I knew to do with that stick of butter. I made that crumble mixture with it, I melted it and poured it over the top ... I begged Jay once to watch me make it once and h e LAUGHED and laughed. What's meant to happen is, you mix all that mess together WITHOUT the butter, you spoon that mixture all over the top of the fruit, and then you SLICE-uh the butter in to pats and place them all over the top of the pan.

You may want to cut the sweetness of this recipe by serving it over French Vanilla Ice Cream.

Say a little prayer for Wanda and her family every time you enjoy it. Please.

Peach Cobbler

It's hard to believe in all these years I've never published this recipe before. It's THE EASIEST recipe in my repertoire and it's GORgeous. It takes about three seconds and it's fool-proof. It's TOTES adaptable for any sized pan, if you have surprise compny you can make it while you eat dinner, and it's especially wonderful to make and take to large gatherings. You just keep the ingredients stocked in your larder and whip it up as the need arises.

It's based on the 'ole Cuppa-Cuppa-Cuppa recipe and its intent is for a 9x11 and at least 3 inch high pan. If the pan is bigger, you can just FEEL how you need to increase it by the way the dry ingredients cover the bottom.

And please? for pity sake? don't come complaining to me if you make this with margarine or use peaches in pear or "natural" juices and it doesn't taste good. This isn't supposed to be good for you, this is just supposed to be good.

Deep Dish Peach Cobbler

Pre-heat oven to 350.

You'll need a fork or a small spatula.

In the pan, sift together one cup of SELF-RISING flour and one cup of sugar. Shake that around so it's level.

Pour in one cup of milk and take the fork and slowly swirl it around until you have a nice paste. This is a good time to breathe and pray for people. It takes about five minutes. Make sure the paste evenly covers the bottom of the pan.

PUT THE FORK AWAY AND DON'T TOUCH IT AGAIN.

Melt a stick of butter. Pour that down the very dead center of the pan lengthwise.

Open a 16.5 ounce can of sliced peaches IN HEAVY SYRUP. Take the slices and GENTLY place them about the surface of this paste. Make sure they're in the corners and in all the perfect spots. Pour the heavy syrup all over the top.

Place in the oven and cook i don't know how long. Look at it after about a half an hour. If it's not golden brown then give it another ten minutes. Sometimes it takes 45 minutes, sometimes it takes 30. It all depends on the humdidity and the flour gods and i don't know what-all.

This is best served with french vanilla ice cream ... to cut the sweetness ... ENJOY !

xoxoxo, your auntie dasch

Spiced Applesauce Bread

This is one of the best and one of the most reliable recipes in my repertoire. I've been making it for absolutely ever and the tweaks I do are for variety and it's so easy because the recipe is so versatile. Over the years, I've substituted soy or almond milk for the milk required and I've switched up the applesauce and switched up the cereal. Instead of applesauce I've used pumpkin pulp (which is EXTRA yummy) and I've also used kinda dead pears or bananas and mashed them up (and I once tried avacado, but it was just not my thing). In lieu of Fiber One cereal I've used any kind of hearty whole-grain cereal and yesterday I actually used frosted shredded wheat cause I thought we had bran cereal but we didn't and it was the only cereal we had in the house ;-) My husband doesn't really like raisins, so I haven't used them in the recipe for a decade and he doesn't like nuts but I gotta tell you, there is nothing more delicious than some coarsely chopped walnuts up in this baby.

Spiced Applesauce Bread

• ½ cup firmly packed brown sugar
• ¾ cup Fiber One cereal
• 1¾ cups Gold Medal all-purpose flour
• ½ teaspoon salt
• ½ cup granulated sugar
• 3 teaspoons baking powder
• ¾ teaspoon ground cinnamon
• ½ teaspoon ground allspice
• ¼teaspoon ground cloves
• 1 cup applesauce
• ½ cup milk
• ¼ cup vegetable oil
• 1 egg or 2 egg whites (or ¼ cup cholesterol-free egg product)
• ½ cup raisins

Heat oven to 350 degrees.

Grease a 9 by 5 by 3 inch loaf pan.

Crush cereal and place it, with the brown sugar, at the bottom of a mixing bowl.

Sift all dry ingredients together at one time in to the mixing bowl. Add wet ingredients and stir. Crack and egg in to the batter and stir until fully incorporated.  Pour batter in to the greased loaf pan and spread the top so it's pretty and even.

The original instructions say to "bake 55 to 65 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean". I always check at 60 minutes but it normally takes about another 20 minutes to cook.

The instructions say to "cool completely before slicing". I've never been able to wait that long.

When I don't care about calories and want to make this extra special, I take a tablespoon of butter and rub it over the top of the loaf to make it extra moist and then take a spoon of regular sugar and sprinkle that over the top for a glistening presentation.

I've never stored the rest of the loaf in an air-tight container and I've never gone out of my way to wrap it up overnight. I generally just throw a tea-towel over the top of the loaf pan and keep the remainder in a cool space.

My Mother's Cornbread by Jaybird's Mama

 This recipe is from one of my dearest friend's mama from my well-worn copy of "The Friendship Collection" created for the members of University of Southern Mississippi-Gulf Coast Elderhostels.  It is what where I'm from we call "High-n-Dry" Cornbread.  It's BEEYOOTEEFUL and it's also fun to make!

"My Mother's Cornbread"

Preheat oven to 450 degrees and get everything ready because this all happens VERY quickly:

• 1 1/2 cups white cornmeal (i've used yellow in a pinch)
• 1/2 teaspoon of baking soda
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 2 eggs, slightly beaten
• 1 1/2 to 2 cups buttermilk
• 2 tablespoons "shortening" (yes, lard or crisco)

Sift dry ingredients.  Lightly beat eggs, stir together with buttermilk and add to dry ingredients.  "Batter will be thin."

Heat shortening in an iron skillet until smoking hot.  You sort of have to stand sideways to wait until you see huhWHIsps of smoke come off the skillet and you know it's ready.  Pour hot shortening in to mixture (SSSSSSSSSS ! ! !), mix quickly and pour batter quickly back in to hot skillet (ahhhh).  Bake for 25 to 30 minutes.

There are beautiful notes on the bottom of the cards in this recipe collection and the one at the bottom of this card says:  "If God shuts one door, He opens another -- Irish proverb"

Happy New Year Hoppin' John

Wikipedia has much to say about the theories of serving Hoppin' John on New Year's Day and self-references to a verse from the Talmud about how eating black-eyed peas on New Year's Day
(Rosh Hashana) is thought to bring prosperity.  Suffice it to say, no good Southerner would dare to go to bed on New Year's Day if she hadn't had some Black Eyed Peas.

The laziest way to accomplish this is to open a can of peas, mix it with some Ro-Tel ("a mouth-watering combination of vine-ripened red tomatoes blended with select green chilies and a savory mixture of secret spices") and slurp that up with some Fritos Scoops! (you also may want to know that Ro-Tel stirred in to melted Velveeta can bring a grown man to tears with glee).

Hoppin' John recipes are as diverse as the states in which it is made.  My friend Jaybird and I have a joke that I was raised "redneck trashy" because my family pour dark Karo syrup on low sweet cornbread where his Mama's cornbread is high and dry.  (There are lines from To Kill A Mockingbird about this.  The heroine is in the position to have Walter, a poor farm boy, over to lunch.  He asks for syrup and Scout has a COW.  Her Daddy has to pull her from the dining room.  She says, "What in the Sam Hill are you doing... But, Atticus, he's gone and drowned his dinner in syrup...and now he's pouring it all over EVERYthing..." and her Daddy says, "That boy is your company. If he wants to eat that tablecloth, you'll let him.  If you can't act fit to eat like folks, you can just sit here and eat in the kitchen."  So Jaybird lets me have my Karo...

I'm gonna give you a quick-n-dirty Hoppin' John.  It takes about an hour to make.  A more complicated version has you washing, de-stoning and blanching greens, deepening the stock with ham-hocks and soaking peas overnight.  Hoppin' John is traditionally served with Corn Bread ... The Neelys have a GORJUS Honey Corn Bread Muffin recipe here and Jaybird's Mama has allowed me to provide you with her Mother's High-n-Dry Cornbread here.

Quick-n-Easy Hoppin' John

• Cut one pound of thick bacon in to two inch pieces and fry until crispy.
• Reserve half of the grease in a tall skillet and stir TWO CUPS of WHITE RICE in to the grease until coated.
• Stir TWO TABLESPOONS of CHICKEN BOUILLON in to the rice and pour FOUR CUPS of CHICKEN STOCK over that.  Bring to a rolling boil and reduce to simmer for 40 minutes.

[NOTE:  If they can stand it, you want to put 20 shakes of some hot sauce in that water but I'm married to a Yankee and that kind of thing doesn't go over well up here so I generally mix my own in once I've plated it.]

• Prepare TWO CUPS of chopped spinach, kale and/or collard greens from frozen packs.  A ham-hock in that water does a world of good.  So does some bacon.  Drain and press dry.
  
• In the reserve fat, fry up a very large diced onion until translucent.
• Drain TWO CANS of black eyed peas, pour in to the onions and stir, letting those flavours marry.  Before rice is done, stir in to this the greens and all the bacon.
  
• When rice is done, stir in ONE STICK OF BUTTER and let that melt.
• Add freshly ground black pepper to taste.
• When butter is melted, stir in TWO CANS of CAMPBELL'S CREAM OF CELERY SOUP.  (This is the secret to all of Mama's recipes.)
• Stir in ONE or TWO CANS of RO-TEL.  (It depends on how humid it is in the air, whether you will need one or two cans.  This recipe is not soup, it's sticky rice.)
• Stir in the greens/onion mixture.

ENJOY ! !