Don’t go away!

Fine. You can go away, grab a snack – then maybe another snack – and then come back.

Just putting the icing on the new Simmer. We’ll be up and rolling soon!

Yours in all-butter goodness,

Marilyn

Really.

In the meantime: enjoying your summer? Sweltering along, hitting the road, watching the Olympics? That meatball up there is going for high dive gold.

If you are not my mother and are still waiting around for Simmer, I can’t thank you enough. Back soon.

Yes. Somewhere, deep within world spam headquarters, an extremely small-hearted bot decided that Simmer would be a good place to nest. Simmer Till Done is under spam attack. Serious spam. You know the kind I mean – male-pharmaceutical pick-me-up last-for-four-hours spam. Several weeks ago I began seeing unusual search terms. I usually see searches for “spritz cookies” or “Cleo’s pumpkin biscuits” or, may she rest in egg noodle peace, “Aunt Rose’s kugel.” What I don’t see too often: “how do I get free Viagra from Canada?”

What does it mean? It means links to this blog don’t work well, and our subscriber list is shot. It means every word I type* is attached to Internet ads for medical male assistance. It means when legitimate kugel-bakers Google a Simmer recipe, they now find odious pharmaceutical spam. It is most discouraging. What would Aunt Rose think?

Sigh. Let’s just look at latkes.

I feel better already.

The tech elves are working to fix Simmer – but I should note that this is the last post until we’re hack-free. The next time you read Simmer Till Done it will – hopefully – have a new design, spam-free archives and a happy, refreshed writer at the helm. In the meantime, I wish you the happiest of holiday seasons, full of golden potatoes and tart applesauce, roast beef and Yorkshire pudding or a marvelous onion-soaked brisket, like the one Cleo is so interested in, below:

Sigh (second sigh). Why can’t Labradors provide tech support?

* not every word you type, just me. Feel free to add your spam-safe commiseration.

1. Place a small piece of double-sided tape between bottom “seams” of the java jacket. Press together. Now you have a flat “pocket.”

2. Place another piece of double-sided tape on the back of java jacket “pocket,” and press into birthday card.

3. Place coffee gift card in pocket. (If card slides around, use a tiny piece of double-sided tape on back of gift card to keep in place)

4. Gift your happy, caffeinated, amazed friend.

And you didn’t think you were crafty. Feel like getting crazy? Like using a hole punch? Try the pretty-pretty version.

Punch two holes in top of java jacket. Pull ribbon through. Tie bow. Pretty!

Sparkly version? Use decorative stick-on gems.

And there we have it. A no-craft craft that reuses, reduces, recycles, and keeps your caffeinated friends happy.

Why would I bother doing this? For what it’s worth, I support our local coffee shops and drink many a cappuccino there. But I like that frothy Starbucks froth, and enjoy it on occasion. Now and then.

It’s not like I have a problem or anything.

To honor three food-and-tale-filled blogging years, let’s revisit a reader favorite: from May 13, 2009, here’s a story about my friend Andie, and also Andie’s mom and Judy Blume, and what we learned about men from them both.

——–

MOMS WILL BE MOMS, BUT JUDY IS FOREVER

Original post and comments found here.

{ A Mother’s Day tale }

In 1978 just three types of contraband existed for me and my pal Andie Lerner: shoplifted Bonne Bell makeup, those curious magazines in our brothers’ rooms, and Judy Blume’s teen sex novel, Forever. But at eleven, I feared juvenile cosmetics prison and declined the five-finger discount; despite many examinations of our brothers’ covert reads, Andie and I weren’t quite clear on the attraction; and finally, though we’d heard the title whispered and wanted it desperately, we were not wise to the horizontal goods in Forever. We were not actually wise to anything.

What we were was clueless, but lucky – a copy was circulating in our classroom by day, and pedaling home to bedrooms at night. The smudged paperback moved desk to desk – when Mrs. Endicott turned to the board, one girl slid it to the palms of another, and by the time she turned back, the deal was done. Math resumed with two flushed faces, one triumphant and one hopeful – and one day during fractions, the palms belonged to Andie. It was Friday afternoon, and our eyes locked in telegraphed plan: sleepover, toaster-oven snacks and a cover-to-cover inspection – no falling asleep like last time, Andie - of Forever.

Andie lived two houses down from our split-level, in a rambling old Tudor. Her family snacked on flax bread, and ate lentil soup in hand-thrown pottery crocks. Wide oak stairs led to a sunny living room crammed with macrame plants and art books and an enormous black Steinway, on which Andie’s dad would balance a glass of red wine and frequently bang out jazz. My own dad liked to browse tax law, so I found it all thrilling, right up to the day Mr. Lerner met a young woman and left the grand piano – and Mrs. Lerner – behind. Andie’s mom started wearing bangles and scarves and higher heels, and buying potato chips, and was never home. Mr. Lerner’s unfortunate weakness had built a premier sleepover destination.

So it was in an empty house, in the sitting room that held just a sofabed and television, that we holed up with Forever. Our props meant business: sleeping bags, Twizzlers, root beer, at least a dozen pillows and a few of their Persian cats. The fridge revealed one package of cocktail franks, and I’d brought a can of Wiener Wrap – a kind of processed dough you wrapped and baked around hot dogs. We could bake them in the toaster oven. I could sprinkle them with cheddar, and was excited about that, about sprinkling cheddar on Wiener Wraps.

But first, Forever. We literally tore through it – pulling back and forth – until we finally took turns munching licorice and reading aloud, all about Kath and Michael, and what they were doing. But…what were they doing? An hour later we’d read all the words, laughing – ha ha, he called his member Ralph – and while we knew what Judy Blume was saying, sex on a multicolor rug, we didn’t quite know what sex on a multicolor rug, or any rug, was supposed to mean.

So we put the book aside and chugged root beer, and watched TV. They were showing Planet of the Apes, and we were mesmerized by chimp makeup and funny lines. Charlton Heston was yelling about something. “I bet he never had sex on a multicolor rug!” Andie said. I pointed to Roddy McDowell’s ape. “Not him either!” I said. We howled and turned out the lights, and everything on TV was hilarious, and Forever fell to the floor. Eventually we heard a key turn, and a clack-clack down the hallway. “My mom,” Andie shrieked, “get the book!” I reached under the bed for the paperback but couldn’t find it, scrabbling. Mrs. Lerner poked her head in the dark room, then swept in all the way.

“You girls are stillll up,” she said.

“We’re going to sleep, Mom,” said Andie. Mrs. Lerner smelled like sandalwood, and swayed on her heels a little. Instead of leaving, she plunked down on the bed. I breathed in, but inched away. She leaned over. “What’s this?” In one floral-sleeved movement, she brought the book off the carpet.

She took a flashlight from Andie. “What is it?” She shined one spot on the cover. “Oh ho,” she said, “oh yes I do see!” My lungs collapsed. I could run home, I thought, I could bang on the door and I could confess to having the book, but at least I’d be out of here.

Now Mrs. Lerner swung to face us. Andie and I huddled on the sofabed, toward the wall. She turned the flashlight off for a moment, then on again. Then pointed it at us. “So you got this. Okay. Okay. Just tell me one thing, ONE THING.” We held our breaths. “Was it good?”

Was it good. I looked at Andie, who was looking at me. Good? Her mom was still lurching. “Was. It. Good. Was it good for her the first time?”

Oh, now we were truly up a creek. Neither of us had an inkling, but from her wild-eyed jangly look behind the light, we sure needed an answer. Andie looked stricken. So I gave her one.

“Oh yeah, it was great!”

She looked suspicious, pressed the book under her palm. “It was great. The first time.”

It seemed to be working, so I went on. “Yeah, fantastic! Everything was perfect!”

Mrs. Lerner slipped the flashlight off, and was silent for two minutes. I thought she might be asleep.

“Then it’s a LIE!” she yelled. I touched Andie’s arm. “If it was good for her then it is BULL.” She jumped to her feet, and yanked her beaded shawl. “All men are assholes,” she said, “and don’t you forget it.” She reached down, grabbed the book, and left.

Andie and I sat frozen for five minutes. Not until we heard shoes on wood, then shoes hit a wall upstairs, and finally the flump of a body in bed, did we finally start laughing, laughing so hard that root beer came out my nose. We did not discuss Kath and Michael, nor virgins or moms nor multicolor rugs. At two a.m. we went to the kitchen, preheated the toaster oven, and carefully wrapped pink cocktail franks in canned yellow dough. We sat on the brick floor in pajamas and tore open a bag of Oreos, giggling and crumb-faced, waiting for Wiener Wraps.

——————

* no illustration of Wiener Wraps; remember what happened last time?

They just can’t wait. They just cannot wait for Saucy Hot Dogs.

“Be sure to make plenty…”

“…because everyone will want ‘seconds’.

Not editing, really. Finessing. Alcott may have mastered prose at the desk, but in the kitchen she was likely closer to Jo March, for whom the “bread burned black” and the “cream turned sour.” Making Apple Slump would be like cooking with Ms. Alcott’s domestically-challenged ghost, and while I cored and sliced I considered my years reading and rereading the March girls, picturing Amy’s limes, Meg’s vain high heels and lonely Jo in the attic with apples, writing and cursing scarlet fever, the villain that stole Beth. I regretted that my little tweaks – dash of vanilla, an extra apple – could not make Laurie come to his senses and dump Amy. Pecans would add crunch but they would never make Jo marry Laurie, nor bring Beth back. They’re a matter of personal taste, like my feelings about Meg wedding that dull John Brooke, and while they won’t change the story they can at least enhance Ms. Alcott’s kitchen legacy, and certainly perk up the Slump.

————-

For Fall Fest’s Apple Week, a few choice scenes – with apples – from Little Women.

- THE LAURENCE BOY -

“Jo! Jo! Where are you?” cried Meg at the foot of the garret stairs.

“Here!” answered a husky voice from above, and, running up, Meg found her sister eating apples and crying over the Heir of Redclyffe, wrapped up in a comforter on an old three-legged sofa by the sunny window. This was Jo’s favorite refuge, and here she loved to retire with half a dozen russets and a nice book, to enjoy the quiet and the society of a pet rat who lived near by and didn’t mind her a particle. As Meg appeared, Scrabble whisked into his hole. Jo shook the tears off her cheeks and waited to hear the news.

- BETH FINDS THE PALACE BEAUTIFUL -

“See the cunning brackets to hold candles, and the nice green silk, puckered up, with a gold rose in the middle, and the pretty rack and stool, all complete,” added Meg, opening the instrument and displaying its beauties.

“‘Your humble servant, James Laurence’. Only think of his writing that to you. I’ll tell the girls. They’ll think it’s splendid,” said Amy, much impressed by the note.

“Try it, honey. Let’s hear the sound of the baby pianny,” said Hannah, who always took a share in the family joys and sorrows.

So Beth tried it, and everyone pronounced it the most remarkable piano ever heard. It had evidently been newly tuned and put in apple-pie order, but, perfect as it was, I think the real charm lay in the happiest of all happy faces which leaned over it, as Beth lovingly touched the beautiful black and white keys and pressed the bright pedals.

“You’ll have to go and thank him,” said Jo, by way of a joke, for the idea of the child’s really going never entered her head.

“Yes, I mean to. I guess I’ll go now, before I get frightened thinking about it.” And, to the utter amazement of the assembled family, Beth walked deliberately down the garden, through the hedge, and in at the Laurences’ door.

- HARVEST TIME -

There were a great many holidays at Plumfield, and one of the most delightful was the yearly apple-picking. For then the Marches, Laurences, Brookes and Bhaers turned out in full force and made a day of it. Five years after Jo’s wedding, one of these fruitful festivals occurred, a mellow October day, when the air was full of an exhilarating freshness which made the spirits rise and the blood dance healthily in the veins.

The old orchard wore its holiday attire. Goldenrod and asters fringed the mossy walls. Grasshoppers skipped briskly in the sere grass, and crickets chirped like fairy pipers at a feast. Squirrels were busy with their small harvesting. Birds twittered their adieux from the alders in the lane, and every tree stood ready to send down its shower of red or yellow apples at the first shake.

“Yes, Jo, I think your harvest will be a good one,” began Mrs. March, frightening away a big black cricket that was staring Teddy out of countenance.

“Not half so good as yours, Mother. Here it is, and we never can thank you enough for the patient sowing and reaping you have done,” cried Jo, with the loving impetuosity which she never would outgrow.

LOUISA MAY ALCOTT’S APPLE SLUMP

from Orchard House, Concord, Massachusetts

4-6 tart apples (I used 3 large Granny Smith and 3 medium Golden Delicious)
1/2 cup firmly packed brown sugar
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup sugar
1 egg, well-beaten
1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup melted butter

Peel, core and slice the apples. Preheat oven to 350° F. Grease with butter the inside of a 1-1/2 quart baking dish. (NOTE: for a shallower, more even apples-to-topping ratio, use a 9 x 13 pan.) Put into the dish the sliced apples, brown sugar, nutmeg, cinnamon and 1/4 teaspoon salt. Bake apples uncovered until they are soft, about 20 minutes.

While the apples are baking, sift together into a bowl the flour, baking powder, 1/2 teaspoon salt, and sugar. Mix into this the beaten egg, milk, and melted butter. Stir gently. Spread this mixture over the apples and continue baking — until the top is brown and crusty (about 25 minutes). Serve with whipped cream. Serves 6.

NOTES (with apologies to Ms. Alcott)

1. Use at least 6 good-sized apples – 7 or 8 if they’re small – or you’ll have more topping than fruit.

2. Where the instructions say “Put into the dish the sliced apples, brown sugar, nutmeg…” I tossed the apples with the brown sugar, nutmeg, cinnamon and salt in a separate bowl, then poured the mixture into the baking dish. I also added 1/4 teaspoon pure vanilla to the apple-sugar mixture.

3. I sprinkled 1/2 cup chopped pecans over the batter topping.

4. Baking times (for both the uncovered apples and the batter-topped Slump) may be longer than noted. Watch for the apples to soften and the top crust to turn an even, light gold-brown.

Did the Marches have vanilla and pecans? No. But they didn’t have blogs, either.

————

Summer Fest is now Fall Fest, an ongoing celebration of good food and great ideas from food and garden bloggers around the globe. Every week we share great recipes, stories and tips for marvelous seasonal ingredients. You can participate by visiting the guest blogs to share links or comments – and if you’re particularly inspired, contribute a post of your own. Drop by A Way to Garden for details on how join the party.

THIS WEEK’S LINKS: APPLES

Todd and Diane at White on Rice Couple: Apple picking, and Broiled Leeks with Apple Vinaigrette

Alana at Eating from the Ground Up: Apple pie and its place in her family religion

Caron at San Diego Foodstuff: Remaking The Silver Palate Cookbook’s Medieval Apple Tart

Alison at Food2: 22 Awesome Ways to Use Your Apples

Michelle at Cooking Channel: Apple Dessert Recipes

Dana at Healthy Eats: 31 Days of Apple Recipes

Liz at Food Network: Pick the Perfect Apple

Caroline at The Wright Recipes: Apple Stack Cake and Dark Caramel Apples

Food Network UK: Five English apples you should know and love

Gilded Fork: Apples—Sweet Seduction

Paige at The Sister Project: Third-Prize Apple Pie

Nicole at Pinch My Salt: Favorite Apple Recipes

Margaret at A Way to Garden: Apple Season: A Windfall of Recipes From My Friends

Writing experts would say she was telling, not showing. Why was it nice? Did her Kyoto hosts present her with a yellow origami-wrapped book while crossing a carved red bridge at dawn? Because that would be nice. She of the generalized journey might have benefited from an old-fashioned slide show because something – if not someone – must bring a story to life.

Most of the food I share here on Simmer comes with a story. But what if there is no story? If I make something new with no taste of history, I find myself like our details-challenged traveler, vaguely at the surface, story-less, but glad that with little to tell I am, at least, oh-so-grateful to show.

I made up a scone for Fall Fest. It’s a beautiful scone. Made of scone dough.

Everything in the filling was so nice.

Making scones. A wonderful time.

They are nice.  Nice delicious scones. So they are nice, and delicious, and also good. A wonderful experience.

(I can also tell you the golden tops break at first bite, sending tender crumbs to your lap. They are savory, earthy and salty, with a scallion edge and mellow streaks of dill. They’ll share the plate with smoked salmon and eggs for breakfast and thick seafood soups at night. I nibbled a crusty, cheese-baked corner and thought they’re good, okay, maybe needs something, and twenty minutes later I’d eaten three. Scones, not bites.)

So. Now we know about showing and telling and it appears, at least where food blogging and community trip reports are concerned, that showing is best. Now, off with you to make these scones. I hear they’re quite nice.

SPANAKOPITA SCONES

Spanakopita Filling

1 1/2 tablespoons olive oil
4 oz. spinach, washed, trimmed and chopped (about 2 cups chopped)
5 green onion stalks, chopped
4 large sprigs of fresh dill, chopped
8 oz. feta cheese, crumbled
1 teaspoon sea salt
1/2 teaspoon ground white pepper

Scone Dough

4 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon sea salt
1 teaspoon sugar
2 oz. Parmesan cheese, grated (about 1/4 cup)
6 oz. cold butter, cubed (12 tablespoons)
4 large eggs
1 cup half and half (light cream)

extra half and half, for tops
extra sea salt, for sprinkling

———————

make spanakopita filling:

Heat olive oil in large skillet over medium heat. Add chopped green onions and saute, stirring, until onions are softened and slightly browned. Stir in spinach and saute with onions until spinach wilts, about 2 minutes. Remove from heat. Set a strainer over a bowl. Scrape spinach mixture into strainer, and press on spinach to drain as much liquid as possible.

When spinach mixture is drained and slightly cooled, place in medium bowl. Add chopped dill, feta cheese, sea salt and white pepper, and stir together until chunky, but thoroughly combined. Set filling aside.

mix scones:

Preheat the oven to 400° F.

Whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda, sea salt, sugar and grated Parmesan in large mixing bowl or stand mixer bowl.

Cut in butter. You can do this one of two ways:

Electric stand mixer With the flour mixture in the stand mixer bowl and the paddle blade attached, turn on the slowest speed and slowly add butter chunks, mixing to a coarse meal texture, with only a few remaining large flour-butter crumbs.

(or)

By hand Using a sharp-bladed pastry cutter tool, or two knives, “cut” the butter pieces into the flour mixture until you have a coarse meal texture.

In a separate bowl, whisk together eggs and half and half.

Add liquid mixture to dry ingredients by hand or with stand mixer on low, using “on-off” mixing. Stop just before mixture comes together. Add cooled Spanakopita Filling, then continue mixing briefly to form a soft and sticky dough. Scrape dough onto lightly floured surface and turn over a few times to combine, adding flour if necessary.

Form scones Pat dough 3/4 – 1″ thick and use tall cookie or biscuit cutters to form round or triangle shapes, large or small. As you cut and remove scones, gently push remaining dough together (do not knead or press dough again) to cut new scones. Alternatively, you may divide dough in half, form each half into a 3/4 – 1″ thick round, and cut equal wedges.

Transfer scones to parchment-lined sheet pans.

If desired, lightly brush tops of scones with half and half, then sprinkle each with a dash of sea salt. Bake 15-18 minutes, or until set and tops are golden brown. Cool briefly on baking sheet, then transfer to rack.

Approximately 12-16 large scones, 24-32 smaller scones. Serve warm or at room temperature. Scones are best served the same day.

For more on mixing and forming scones, see Scone, Scone on the Range.

Summer Fest is now Fall Fest, an ongoing celebration of good food and great ideas from food and garden bloggers around the globe. Every week we share great recipes, stories and tips for marvelous seasonal ingredients. You can participate by visiting the guest blogs to share links or comments – and if you’re particularly inspired, contribute a post of your own. Drop by A Way to Garden for details on how join the party.

THIS WEEK’S LINKS: SPINACH

Todd and Diane at White on Rice Couple: Tuna and Spinach Bruschetta

Cate at Sweetnicks: Spinach Egg Breakfast Cups

Caron at San Diego Foodstuff: Mixed Mushroom Ragout with Herb-Polenta Cake

Alana at Eating from the Ground Up: Spicy Indian Lentil Soup with Spinach

Gilded Fork: Spicy Artichoke Spinach Dip, and a Dossier on Spinach

Nicole at Pinch My Salt: Spinach and Sausage Soup

Caroline at the Wright Recipes: Spinach Rotolo, a rolled ricotta and pasta extravaganza

Alison at Food2: Spinach Artichoke Dip

Michelle at Cooking Channel: Paneer With Spinach

Kirsten at FN Dish: Everyday Spinach Dishes with Giada

Liz at Healthy Eats: Mini Spinach-Mushroom Quiche

Food Network UK: Eggs florentine, brunch of champions

Margaret at A Way to Garden: Why I plant spinach late, and other tasty tidbits

The tangy yellow pie was a triumph, especially the graham-crumb star on top, which they had pictured on page 58. You may want to make up your own design, the book said. Nothing doing. I copied it, certain their six-point star would unlock the door to mouth-watering. Fancy party. I cooked my way through the book step by 1-2-3 step, carefully turning out Tutti-Frutti-Ice Sparkle, Quick Walnut Penuche, Flip-Flop Pancakes and steaming, butter-pat perfect Baked Potatoes.

Baked potatoes had few ingredients – one – but apparently required a recipe. I followed it. Fifteen years and four kitchens passed before I stopped following recipes, before I started jotting yolk-stained notes, before trusting my own hands, before saying why yes, I will make up my own design. Enough experience and the deceptively easy – the omelet, the pie crust, the potato – will come easier. Directives loosen and slide and one day, in your kitchen, you throw in this and take out that, and the recipes serve as inspiration. Your hands trust you.

Still, even the seasoned cook takes steps forward and back. For Summer Fest Potato Week (soon to be Fall Fest),  I thought nothing like baked potatoes, and since no tricks or twists can make them better than they are, I decided to pull my BHG Junior Cook Book and retrace my steps, following the Baked Potatoes recipe exactly as I did in ’75, which is to say, exactly. I found the beloved blue squares basic and soothing, and also found they produced the finest baked potato a beginning cook – or any cook, of any age – can make.

Set oven at 425°. Scrub dirt off potatoes. Stick with a fork to make holes for the hot steam to escape.

Note that the wire brush is not the exact one pictured in the book. Had I the wrong brush in 1975, I might have assumed the potatoes would come out wrong – deflated or something. Guess what? Brush not important.

Put potatoes on oven rack. Bake potatoes 40 to 60 minutes. They will be soft when squeezed with toweling.

And indeed, they are soft when squeezed with paper toweling. I was so enamored with the word. Would you pass me a paper toweling? Mother, I think we are out of toweling.

Cut a cross in the top of each potato with a paring knife. Place a pat of butter or margarine in each opening.

That cross-cutting bit was clear to me but oh dear, butter or margarine. Which one? Also, the BHG illustration (see above, #3) taught me that when dealing with butter, a pat was not just a slice, but a square yellow thickness of your choice.

There we have it. I followed my own junior footsteps and turned out the same excellent, crisp-skin and fluff-center potatoes. I didn’t toy with perfection then and, experience aside, don’t see any reason to now.

Well. You know.

Summer Fest is an annual online celebration of good food and great ideas, featuring food and garden bloggers from around the globe. Every week we share great recipes, stories and tips for marvelous seasonal ingredients. You can participate by visiting the guest blogs to share links or comments – and if you’re particularly inspired, contribute a post of your own. Drop by A Way to Garden for details on how join the party.

THIS WEEK’S LINKS: POTATOES

Alison at Food2: Boil ‘Em, Mash ‘Em, Stick ‘Em in a Stew

Kirsten at FN Dish: Twice-Baked Potatoes

Sara at Cooking Channel: Duck Fat Roasted Potatoes

Healthy Eats: A Day of Potatoes: Spuds for Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner

Caron at San Diego Foodstuff: Hatch Chile Potato Salad

Nicole at Pinch My Salt: Taquitos de Papa, made with leftover mashed potatoes

Caroline at the Wright Recipes: Indian Spiced Potatoes with Chickpeas (Aloo Chole)

Paige at The Sister Project: French Fries to soothe a burnt-out cook’s soul

Margaret at A Way to Garden: Potato Growing, Curing and Storage Tips

Food Network UK: We like spuds

Alana at Eating From the Ground Up: The strange experience of growing potatoes

Cate at Sweetnicks: Bleu Cheese Potato Mashers

Gilded Fork: A roundup of potato recipes

So many cooks out there right now, today, standing in a kitchen riffling crumb-filled pages and spotted recipe cards, looking for that kugel. Grandma’s kugel, my mom’s neighbor’s kugel, that kugel we had at Lynn’s house, Aunt Rose’s kugel. Those bags of yellow egg noodles form a rock-solid tradition, so once a year – the old-school, annual way we used to watch The Sound of Music or The Ten Commandments – we’ll revisit Aunt Rose’s kugel. She was a lovely lady who smelled of atomizers and Aqua Net, always ready with a hug (and an index card). Wishing you good cooking, with an orchard of apples and a river of honey. Have a sweet year.

Noodle Kugel: Four Sisters, One Card

From October 18, 2008. Original post here.

Noodle kugel is a humble dish with an outsize name – a funny name, good for comedians and grandmas and giggling kids. Kugel is ripe with pronunciation – koo-gle or kuh-gle or whatever, just pass-me-that-stuff-now. It’s found on Jewish holiday tables and in deli case pyramids, golden twisty egg noodles cut in thick and improbably square slabs, bound by sour cream and more eggs, cottage cheese and drifting sugar. My family’s kugel is found on this 3 x 5 card.

Wearing butter stains and cinnamon age spots, the card appears each holiday in my mother’s kitchen – first under a fridge magnet (“I need to know where it is”) and eventually, on the counter. She could probably make kugel in her sleep, but it sits there, near the Pyrex, guiding the process like a curious lucky charm.

Most Jewish families pass down a kugel and inevitably a kugel family “secret,” some earnest addition like peaches or carrots or even chocolate chips. Kugel-lovers divide into “sweet” or “savory,” and at least in the matter of kugel, I stand with the sweet. I like my kugel luscious, sugared and cheesy, with distinct overtones of blintzes and dessert.

My mom received the Selectric-typed card long ago from Aunt Rose, as dear a lady as there ever was, and it was fondly known as “Aunt Rose’s Kugel” for decades, right up to the shocking family moment when it was revealed to be Aunt Ruth’s. My Grandma Trudy had three sisters – Ruth, Rose and Florence – and all four lived close, wore curlers, shopped sales and checked in by phone before ten. The four Weinstock girls – actually “LaVin,” lost at Ellis Island – were bound by love so fierce that it often excluded their husbands but extended monumentally, and quite judgmentally, to each other. At one time or another, they all baked and served this kugel.

Florence and Rose were the better cooks – my Grandma never met a Cantonese menu she didn’t like – and though Rose’s dish may be as sweet as Ruth’s, there was, of course, satisfaction in setting the recipe record straight. Enjoy noodling around on your own, and repeat the motto with me – never attribute a kugel to the wrong sister.

—————
Noodle Kugel

1 lb (16 oz) wide noodles (egg noodles)
4 eggs
1/2 pint sour cream (8 oz)
1 lb cottage cheese
1/2 cup milk
1/4 lb (one stick) butter
1 small can crushed pineapple – optional
1/2 box raisins (golden raisins are perfect) – optional
3/4 – 1 cup sugar
1 tablespoon cinnamon (my mom’s addition – Aunt Ruth is still alive, so let’s keep that between us)

Preheat oven to 350 F. Coat a 9 x 13 pan with baking spray.

Melt butter, and set aside to slightly cool.

Cook noodles in boiling water until done; drain and slightly cool, placing noodles in a large bowl.

In a separate bowl, lightly whisk together eggs, sour cream, cottage cheese, milk and melted butter. Toss egg mixture together with the noodles to combine, then add sugar and cinnamon, mixing to coat. If you are using the optional pineapple and raisins – and let me add it’s delicious to do so – toss them in now.

Place noodle mixture in prepared pan and bake until the top is lightly browned, 45 minutes – 1 hour. Cool until safe to handle, then cut into squares and serve warm. Leftovers freeze and reheat well.