Category Archives: Meat Dishes

Frozen Solid

Posted in Meat Dishes, Recipes by

I woke up early yesterday morning and got on Amazon to place my Christmas order. I found everything I wanted and put it in my shopping cart, but decided to wait until afternoon to push the button because I wanted to ask one of my daughters-in-law what her youngest would like for Christmas. I thought I might be able to include it in the order.

By jove, I got her suggestion yesterday afternoon, went back to my computer, and my Amazon world had changed. Some things were no longer available; the price on one thing had gone up significantly; the delivery date for another was not until after Christmas. Holy Moley! Only four hours later. Cyber Monday v. Nana, and Cyber Monday won.

Still, I was able to figure most everything out, and now a big chunk of my Christmas shopping is done. The rest should be easy. As an interesting side note, according to Jeff Bezos (the Amazon czar), in a relatively short period of time (sometime after 2015), my order will possibly be delivered by a tiny little drone that will land in my front yard. Seriously, it gets creepier and creepier.

The four hours I spent not pushing the “place order” button on Amazon.com were not spent unwisely, however. I took two of my granddaughters to see the movie Frozen. It was a 1:15 showing, and after plopping down $23 for tickets and another $12 for popcorn, watermelon-flavored Sour Patch Kids and fruit-flavored Mike & Ikes, I hurried them into the theater, hoping we could still get a seat as the movie was scheduled to begin in a couple of minutes. Much to my surprise, the theater was entirely empty. Apparently, if people weren’t at work, they were either shopping at the malls or sitting at home buying all of my Amazon items. The movie, Friends, was phenomenal. Seriously, I enjoyed it very much. The animation was amazing and the music was awesome. Typical Disney princess story line, only in a frozen tundra. But some of the characters offered dialogue that made me laugh out loud.

I am so happy that they make children’s movies now that are also enjoyable to the adult person taking them to the movie. Back when my son was small, the movies I had to sit through were terrible. I will accept the PG rating for the new kids’ movies as long as I can enjoy them as well. They don’t understand the PG stuff anyway.

I highly recommend the movie.

Tonight, in keeping with my healthy eating post-Thanksgiving, I made a version of my mother’s chili recipe, adding delicious vegetables and a couple of kinds of beans to add fiber. When all is said and done, it really isn’t much like my mother’s chili, but I’m going to give you her recipe, exactly as it is on the recipe card, because it makes me laugh every time I see it.

Beckie’s Chili (originally my chili)

Ingredients
1 lb. ground beef
1 lg. onion, chopped
1 t. salt
2-3 T. chili powder
1 T vinegar
1-1/2 T. brown sugar
1 c. water
1 8 oz. can tomato sauce
1 can kidney beans
Garlic salt

Process
Brown ground beef and onion. Add rest of ingredients.

Nana’s Notes: It always makes me laugh that she calls it Beckie’s chili, but adds that it was originally her chili. Is my sister Beckie a chili recipe thief? Or is it just that Mom always loved her best so she will attribute her recipe to Beckie? I will never know.

My version uses very lean ground beef (sometimes I use half ground beef and half ground turkey). I sauté a clove of garlic with the onion and beef and leave out the garlic salt. In addition to the chili powder, I also add a tsp. of ground cumin. I leave out the vinegar and the brown sugar. Instead of tomato sauce, I used a can of tomato paste and a can of fire-roasted diced tomatoes. I also added a green pepper for flavor and vitamins. Finally, in addition to kidney beans, I also added a can of black beans. I know I was going to go low-carb this week, but beans are good carbs with lots of fiber. I won’t apologize.

If I were smart, I would have waited until Thursday to serve chili as the high is only expected to reach 8. Yikes!

Impatiently Waiting for Patience

Posted in Main Course, Meat Dishes by

We’ve had a really pretty and fairly warm autumn. My heavy winter coat still hasn’t seen the light of day. But this morning we all woke up to snow and the temperatures probably won’t get out of the mid-teens. Thankfully Bill got most of the leaves picked up during the warm weather last week, and the snow will make certain the rest will come down this weekend. Our daughter and her family will be making their way from Vermont on Friday, and this weather, which is supposed to last the next few days, won’t be anything new to them.

As you can see, I don’t really have much in the way of a theme this morning. Yesterday Bill had his semiannual checkup with his neurologist/movement disorder specialist. He is always calm; I, on the other hand, am always a wreck. Having survived yesterday, my mind is kind of weary.

I’m happy to say that his appointment went well. His progression remains slow, and he was put on a different medication which is purported to be practically magical in how well it treats the symptoms! Keeping my fingers crossed.

There is no point in dwelling every day on why Bill has Parkinson’s. The reality is that no one knows why anyone gets it. I’ve never believed, certainly, that God sits up on his big white throne in heaven and points at people and says, “You’re going to get cancer, and you’re going to be in a car accident, and you’re going to get PD.” He put us on earth and we have free will and the way the earth was created leads to weather events and so forth. And, frankly, yucky stuff happens to people who don’t deserve it, and nobody understands why.

What I do spend a lot of time thinking about, however, is how Bill and I can handle our life and what we can we get out of it. Bill, for his part, handles his PD with absolute grace and dignity. He pretty much just ignores the fact that he has PD and lives his life, perhaps doing things different ways or asking me or others for help with no embarrasment. I am telling you, the man NEVER, EVER COMPLAINS.

I complain a lot, I’m afraid. Maybe not to others, but to myself, through impatience. But I believe that I am slowly but surely learning to be more patient. The other day I was walking down a narrow aisle behind a woman with a slight walking impairment who was moving quite slowly. I found myself getting so impatient, though I had nowhere I had to be. The good news is that I recognized my fault. She is clearly unable to walk faster, I reminded myself, and she likely wishes she could. Get a grip!

Patience is a virtue, isn’t it? It’s hard for me to wait to gain that particular virtue! (Wow. I crack myself up.)

I was tired after the appointment and knew I wouldn’t want to cook, so we made a stop at the grocery store and I bought the fixings for a really cheating dinner. I bought a half pound of ground beef, a bottle of good spaghetti sauce, and some spinach and grated carrots from the salad bar. At home I browned the ground beef and added the vegetables to the browned meat to soften. I added the sauce and served it over spaghetti. A one-pot meal! I didn’t even have to bother with making a salad.

Kitchen Update

Posted in Main Course, Meat Dishes, Recipes, Side Dishes by

Some friends of ours are selling their beautiful loft/condominium in the Golden Triangle area in downtown Denver. It’s interesting that some of the feedback they are getting is that the kitchen is supposedly in DIRE need of updating. The condo is 15 years old or so, and really lovely. The countertops are granite, the floors are hardwood. Apparently the fact that it has an electric stove and the appliances aren’t stainless steel makes it a no-go, my friends.

Bill and I recently talked about people’s varying needs to update their kitchens as we were discussing his mother’s cooking. Wilma, who is an amazing 96 years old, now lives in an independent apartment in a retirement community. Prior to that, she lived in their family home in a beautiful old neighborhood on the south side of Chicago. They moved into that home somewhere around 1952 or 1953. Envision the appliances in a kitchen circa 1952. Fast forward to the year 2000, and imagine that those very same appliances are in that house. And they all work perfectly. We were at a museum recently that featured a 1950s kitchen and Bill said, “Look, it’s Mom’s kitchen appliances!” And it really was.

This is not particularly a commentary on how in 2013 we all need the best and coolest kitchens available. It’s really more of a testament on how well things were built years ago compared to today. For example, Bill’s parents received a toaster as a wedding gift when they were married in 1939 or 1940. Until eight or nine years ago, Wilma used that very same toaster. It would break; Rex would fix it. Can you imagine taking the time to fix a toaster today? It was with great consternation that Wilma finally agreed to buy a new toaster. I remember Bill saying to her, “Well, Mom, you could call the manufacturer and see if they have the parts for a GE toaster, Series ONE.” She, as I recall, was not amused.

Bill’s father Rex loved nothing more than to fix things. Wilma has told me that when Rex would come home from work and she would tell him that her washing machine was making funny noises, he could hardly contain himself through dinner in his eagerness to get downstairs and start taking the washer apart. I can understand because the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, and Bill is a fixer himself.

Occasionally I will look at my quite dated kitchen and start thinking about updating it. Bill will listen to me, and then he will say, “WWWD?” That’s our code for “What would Wilma do.” My appliances work, the marks on my hardwood floor show it’s been well used, my kitchen table has knicks in it and stains on it because kids and grandkids have colored, played with play dough, pounded their baby spoons, and otherwise been comfortable sitting there. I guess I don’t mind the weathered look of the table.

No updates to my kitchen for a while.

This week I’m not really following a cooking theme; I’m just cooking what sounds good to me. And today Beef Stew sounded good. I saw Ree Drummond make a stew with root vegetables recently, and that’s the recipe I used. It was every bit as good as it looked.

Beef Stew with Root Vegetables, courtesy Ree Drummond

Ingredients
3 T. olive oil
1 T. butter
2 lbs. beef stew meat
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 medium onion, diced
1 can or bottle beer
4 c. beef broth, more as needed
1 T. Worcestershire sauce
2-3 T. tomato paste
1-1/2 t. sugar
½ t. paprika
½ t. kosher salt
Freshly ground black pepper
2 carrots, roughly sliced
2 parsnips, roughly sliced
1 small turnip, roughly sliced 2 T. flour, optional
Minced fresh parsley, for garnish

Process
Heat the oil and butter in a pan and brown the beef. Remove the beef from the pan, throw in the garlic and onions and cook until softened, about 3 min. Pour in beer, beef broth, Worcestershire sauce, tomato paste, sugar, paprika, salt and pepper. Then return the beef to the pan, cover and simmer on a low heat until the meat is very tender, 1-1/2 to 2 hours. If the liquid level gets too low, add more broth as needed.

Add the carrots, parsnips and turnips and continue to simmer until the vegetables are tender and liquid is reduced, about 30 min.

If the stew is still too liquidy, remove a cup of cooking liquid from the pan and stir in the flour, Add flour mixture back into the pan and stir. Simmer for 10 minutes until the stew is thick. The meat should be very tender; if it’s tough, let it continue to cook.

To finish, add the parsley and stir through the stew.

I also made a batch of Kentucky Biscuits, from a recipe I found on Pinterest.

Kentucky Biscuits

Ingredients
2 c. flour
1-1/2 t. baking powder
½ t. baking soda
2 T. sugar
Dash of salt
½ c. butter
¾ c. buttermilk (Don’t have buttermilk? No problem, just add 1 or 2 T. vinegar to milk)

Process
Mix dry ingredients. Cut in butter, add milk and knead into soft dough. Do not over knead! Pat into an ungreased 6 X 6 pan. I use a pie pan. Cut into serving size portions before you cook. Bake at 400 degrees for 15-20 min. or until done and golden brown.

Nana’s Notes: I halved the beef stew recipe for Bill and me, and it worked great. Enough for two large bowls of stew. As for the Kentucky Biscuits, they were delicious; however, I’ve never made them before so I have no idea if they were the right consistency. Mine were sort of like corn bread. Also, next time I would grease the pie pan. Very good drizzled with honey.

Spanx for the Memories

Posted in Main Course, Meat Dishes, Recipes by

My sisters and I were all born before 1960. Dressing up in the 50s and 60s meant something a bit different than it does now. For example, outer garments often included a hat and gloves, at least if we were going to church (which was generally the reason we dressed up).

For women of the 50s and 60s, undergarments included nylons with garter belts (which, for my sisters and me, were not sexy, mostly twisted and beige with age as they were inevitably Mom’s hand-me-downs). And of course, the dreaded girdle. As young women (meaning puberty and beyond) we, too, wore these restrictive undergarments because that’s what “ladies” did.

Yesterday I attended the funeral of an acquaintance. I generally only dress up on Sundays, and mostly I wear a pair of black pants with some kind of a jacket, blouse, or sweater. So I put on a pair of black pants and a brand new lightweight knit shirt.

I took a glance in the mirror before I went downstairs. Yuck. Panty lines. I could hear my mother’s voice in my ear saying, “Nobody is looking at you, Kris,” and knew this to be true. Still, panty lines. Yuck.

So I went to my drawer and dug deep for a pair of long-unused Spanx. You know Spanx: Torture device of the old and unfit. Purportedly good for slimming your abdomen and bottom. “It takes off 10 pounds,” according to the advertisements. Yes, but those 10 pounds have to move somewhere….

Mostly I was just trying to get rid of those panty lines.

I pulled them on and had no more panty lines. But it made me think about my mother as a young woman, likely wearing a girdle much more often than I and never complaining. It really was quite horrendous when you think about it.

So, I guess I won’t. And it sure was nice when I could take it off.

I don’t usually post a recipe on Saturdays, but I wanted to be part of the family and let you know what recipe I would have my mother make if I got that last chance for her good cooking. Spareribs and sauerkraut. Yum.

I’ve mentioned before that Mom was not big on recipes, unfortunately. She wrote down a few of her specific dishes, such as her cole slaw dressing or her gazpacho. But as for her regular main dishes, not many recipes. Sometimes I try to recreate her meals from memory, but mostly I call one of my siblings, go on the Internet or look at my cookbooks and see what I can find.

That’s what I did when I decided to recreate her baked spareribs. And I found my recipe in a somewhat surprising place – one of my Lidia Bastianich cookbooks!

The recipe comes from Lidia’s Italian-American Kitchen, copyright 2002.

Spare Ribs Roasted with Vinegar and Red Pepper

6 servings

Ingredients
1 rack (about 3-1/2 pounds) pork spare ribs
Sea or kosher salt
Freshly ground black pepper
1/3 c. extra-virgin olive oil
12 cloves garlic, peeled
4 fresh or dried bay leaves
1 cup (or as needed) canned chicken broth
1 cup dry white wine
½ cup red wine vinegar
2 tablespoons honey
1 to 2 teaspoons crushed hot red pepper

Process
Cut the rack of spare ribs between the bones into single ribs. Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.

Pat the spare ribs dry and season them with salt and pepper. Toss them in a roasting pan into which they fit comfortably with the olive oil, garlic, and by leaves. Pour in the broth and roast, turning occasionally, until the liquid is almost completely evaporated and the ribs are golden brown, 45 minutes to an hour.

Meanwhile, stir the wine, vinegar, honey, and crushed red pepper together in a small bowl until the honey is dissolved.

Brush all sides of the ribs with some of the vinegar glaze, and then pour the remaining glaze into the roasting pan. Continue baking, turning every few minutes, until the glaze is syrupy and the ribs are mahogany brown and sticky to the touch, about 30 minutes. Spoon off as much of the fat as you like before serving the ribs.

Nana’s Notes: I used a rack of baby back ribs instead of spareribs since they seem more manageable, and I was cooking only for my husband and me. It took the whole hour before the liquid came close to being evaporated. And I’m not sure my ribs were ever sticky to the touch, but they did turn a lovely golden brown.

Lidia’s recipe doesn’t include sauerkraut, but I just buy a package of the lovely, ice-cold sauerkraut you find in the deli case at the grocery store and add it to the pan towards the end or heat it separately. To be honest, I like it cold! At some point my mom started putting apples in with her sauerkraut, I assume to make the kraut less sour. I didn’t like this, and remember trying unsuccessfully to eat around the apple. So I served the sauerkraut without apples.

It’s been fun cooking with you all week, Mom!

Nana Love

Posted in Main Course, Meat Dishes, Recipes by

I never asked my mom the question directly, but I assume she liked being a mother. However, I KNOW she liked being a grandmother. You can see her pride and her love in this picture of Mom and Dad with my nephew and sister on the day of my nephew’s First Communion.

We are all many things. For example, I am a Catholic, an American, a Coloradan, a sister, a wife, a mother, and many other things. I enjoy all of my various roles. But unquestionably being a grandmother ranks high when considering what I like and do best.

I love all of my grandchildren. They all have their own unique personalities. Shockingly, I think they are all the smartest, funniest, cutest children on this earth. Each one of them.

Indulge me while I tell you a funny story about my precocious 3-year-old granddaughter Mylee (the same spitfire who wouldn’t brush her teeth in an earlier blog post). Yesterday morning her mother was hunting for the missing Mylee, and finally found her, totally naked, out on their deck enjoying Colorado’s unseasonably warm weather. “I’m hot,” she explained. She then came into the house and told her mother she needed a scarf. Apparently she understands, even at that early age, that scarves are the perfect accessory for any outfit.

I don’t think there is really anything quite like being a grandmother. My mother definitely understood this as well. Like me, she thought all of her grandchildren walked on water. As an example, when my son didn’t make his high school basketball team, it was really all we could do to keep her from marching over to the high school and making the coach aware of his mistake. She would have done the same for any of her grandchildren.

Mom died at the much-too-early age of 69. Though she has been gone for over 18 years, I miss her every day. I no longer mistakenly pick up the phone to tell her about something, but I very often am sad that I can’t. The story about Mylee is a good example. It would have made her laugh.

I take my role of Nana very seriously. I have very vivid and pleasant memories of the time I spent with my grandmother, whom I loved with my whole heart. I have always vowed to provide that same unconditional love to all of my grandkids so that they will remember me with joy, just as my son and all of my nieces and nephews remember their nana.

I often wonder where my mother got her recipes. She probably got many from magazines, and I know she got plenty of recipes from her sisters and sisters-in-law. Her recipe box also holds many recipes she gleaned from the recipe boxes of her children. I have no clue, however, from where this recipe came. She made beef stroganoff often when I was growing up, and it was delicious. My brother doesn’t even have to hesitate for an instant when asked about his favorite Mom-recipe.

Mom’s Beef Stroganoff (exactly as written on her recipe card)

Cut 1 lb round steak into 3X1 inch strips. Brown strips in 2 tbs shortening in large skillet. Add ¼ C cut-up onion, 1 tsp salt and ¼ tsp pepper. Blend in 2 tbs flour, then 1½ C tomato juice and, if desired, 4 oz can mushroom stems and pieces, drained. Cover and cook over low heat 1 hour until tender. Stir in a mixture of 1 small can evaporated milk and 1 tbs Realemon. Heat until steaming but do not boil. Serve over cooked noodles or rice.

Nana’s Notes: 1 small can evaporated milk = one 5-oz can. As with yesterday’s recipe, Mom always used the least expensive cut of round steak – thin piece of meat. My brother insists it tastes better than using a more expensive cut of beef. Though her recipe says it can be served with noodles or rice, I never remember a single time that she didn’t serve it over rice. I can’t imagine serving it any other way! Tonight I served it with a bottle of wine called Middle Sister, perfect for me as I am a middle sister!

Happy Homemaker

Posted in Meat Dishes, Recipes by

Battling another cold today, I spent more time than usual in front of the television. I chanced upon a movie, Mona Lisa Smile, starring Julia Roberts. Being a Julia Roberts fan, it sucked me in. I’m somewhat embarrassed to say that if you held my feet to the fire and ordered me to tell you my favorite movie of all time, with a very red face (from embarrassment, not the fire), I would admit that it is Pretty Woman. But I digress.

The movie was about a woman (Roberts) who comes to teach at Wellesley College in 1953 from California. Much to this professor’s chagrin, the young female students, though exceptionally bright, were for all intents and purposes simply biding their time at college, eagerly awaiting their destiny of a ranch-style home and a husband and children. Two hours later, Roberts’ character had taught them that there was more to life than setting a pretty table and having four beautiful children. Cue 50s music and photos of post-WWII housewives as the credits ran. Not a bad movie, by the way.

But seeings as I am full-out nostalgic this week thinking about my mother’s recipes, the movie got me to thinking about my mother’s life as a young woman. She was married by age 21, and had her first child 12 months later. Kaboom. Welcome to life as a homemaker with no grace period. I wonder if she ever thought about a different kind of life, or did all girls in post-WWII just assume their role in life would be as a wife and mother.

And, in the famous words of Jerry Seinfeld, “Not that there’s anything wrong with that.”

My mother’s life turned out to be a bit different than the typical wife and mother of the 50s and 60s, however. Because she and Dad had their own business, much of her time was required away from home. She made good use of our wonderful grandmother, who often watched us as Mom worked in the bakery. And when my sister was old enough, she cooked breakfast for the rest of us if Mom had to leave for work a bit early. Still, she had a home-cooked meal on the table every night. Like most women, she worked hard.

In 1980, when I had my son, I felt as though the pendulum had swung in the other direction. If a woman had a college degree, people considered it odd if you quit your job to stay home with your children. Perhaps that limitation was self-imposed, but I definitely felt that way. I’m happy that the options are much more plentiful today, or at least they appear to be to these almost-60 eyes. That’s a good thing.

But on to my meal of the day. Breaded pork chops are what my sister Jennifer would have my mom cook for her magical come-back-to-earth-for-a-day meal. And I’m pretty sure that if she were to invite my father, he would be very happy to oblige. He loved them.

As with many of my mom’s meals, she had no recipe for breaded pork chops. So I Googled it, and came up with a recipe from allrecipes.com that seemed close. Most of the recipes I saw called for thick pork chops. Money was never plentiful in my family, though we lived a very comfortable life. But, though my mother was a good cook, she was also an economical cook. The pork chops in her recipe were the inexpensive thin-cut chops. So that’s how we like them.

One final note, my grandmother, and then my mother, always served breaded pork chops with macaroni and cheese made with Swiss cheese. My mother would grate the Swiss cheese and then place it in the cupboard so that our busy little hands wouldn’t snitch all of the cheese before she was ready to make the macaroni. In deference to her, I always put my grated cheese in the cupboard until I’m ready for it.

Breaded Pork Chops

Ingredients
4 pork loin chops
2 T all-purpose flour
½ t. salt
½ t. paprika
1/8 t pepper
1 egg, slightly beaten
1 t Worcestershire sauce
½ c dry bread crumbs
1 T vegetable oil

Process

In a small bowl, combine flour, salt, paprika and pepper. In another small bowl, combine egg and Worcestershire sauce. Coat chops with seasoned flour; dip in egg mixture, and coat with crumbs. In large skillet, heat oil over medium-high heat. Brown chops on one side until golden brown (about 4 min); turn and continue cooking for another 4 min. Serve hot.

Nana’s Notes: I am pretty sure there was no Worcestershire sauce or paprika in my mom’s recipe, but I thought it sounded like a nice addition to flavor them up. Also, I would be willing to bet that my mom didn’t dip the chops in flour. I suspect she simply dipped them in egg and bread crumbs. Also, according to my sister who chose this recipe, after the chops were browned, Mom would put a little bit of water in the pan, cover it, and let the chops cook a bit to get more tender. That’s what I did. Finally, we all remembered that Mom would bring home bread crumbs from the bakery that she gathered from the bread slicing machine. No store-bought bread crumbs necessary!

Memories and Meals

Posted in Meat Dishes, Recipes by

A few weeks ago, when Bill and I were still in Arizona, my brother David and I were sitting outside late in the afternoon. Talk turned towards our childhood, as it often does whenever any combination of the siblings gathers.

I think we all agree that we had a wonderful childhood. None of us ever doubted that our parents loved us. Times were different, however. There wasn’t a lot of “I love you’s” tossed around though we knew they did. A term you hear thrown around these days is “helicopter parent.” You know, the parent who hovers around their child making sure no harm ever comes to little Junior or Juniorette. I think it’s safe to say that neither my mother nor my father would ever have been accused of being a helicopter parent.

Here’s an example: My mother was a very sound sleeper. Because of this, it really took a lot of guts for any of us to wake her up in the middle of the night. We knew it would involve a lot of shaking of her shoulders. Eventually, she would leap up in bed with a loud, “What is it?” Gulp. It had better be good because by this time Dad was awake.

For me, it was either “I’m going to throw up,” or “I can’t sleep.” If I was going to throw up, she was liable to ask me why I was telling her this in her bedroom instead of leaning over the toilet in the bathroom. And the “I can’t sleep”, well, that just got on her very last nerve.

Her answer to that particular complaint, without exception, was (say it with me Siblings), “Nobody ever died from a lack of sleep. Go back to bed.” I have no recollection of her ever getting out of her bed to tuck me back into my bed.

By the way, as an adult, I can certainly see, clear as day, just how silly it is to awaken someone to tell them that you can’t sleep. But for some reason it made perfect sense to me as a 7-year-old.

On the other hand, it wasn’t a good idea for anyone to bring harm or even angst to any of her children. Do so, and out came the Mother Lion. I clearly remember when a neighbor boy who was a year or so older than me and a bully before people became concerned about bullies chased me down, held me to the ground, and kissed me on the lips. I was probably 7 or 8 years old. I broke free and ran to my mother in tears. I vividly remember that she went to her closet, got the broom, and chased him all the way back to his house. She may not have caught him, but I’m sure he felt the bristles on the back of his neck.

But back to David and my conversation that day. We were talking about Mom’s good cooking. He told me his favorite meal and I told him mine. It got me to thinking about her cooking, so this week I asked all my siblings what meal they would have Mom make if she could come back to cook one dinner for them.

My sister Beckie’s response: Mom’s fried chicken. My mom, by the way, always claimed that she couldn’t cook a lick when she got married. All of her cooking skills were learned from her mother-in-law. I’m sure that’s true as my mom was the youngest of 13 kids, and her mom died before my mom was married, and sick for much longer than that. Not in a position to teach my mom to cook. So Mom’s fried chicken is actually my grandmother’s fried chicken, and now my fried chicken. Don’t confuse this chicken with southern-style because it isn’t crunchy. Instead, it is tender and flavorful.

My Family’s Fried Chicken

Ingredients
1 frying chicken, cut into 10 pieces (my mother always cut each breast into two pieces}
1-2 c. flour, well-seasoned with salt and pepper
Butter and vegetable oil, half and half, deep enough to fill a pan to a depth of about a quarter of an inch

Process
Preheat the butter and oil in the fry pan until it’s hot enough to sizzle if you flick a drop of water into the pan. Dredge the chicken pieces in the flour, shaking off the excess. Lay the pieces skin-side-down into the hot oil. Cook until it’s nicely brown, 5-6 minutes. Turn over and do the same on the other side. It doesn’t have to be cooked all the way through. Only fry a few pieces at a time or your shortening will cool down too much and your chicken pieces won’t brown nicely.

As you remove the chicken pieces from the pan, place them into a roasting pan. (Conversely, you can place them temporarily on a plate and return all of the pieces to the pan to finish. Make sure your pan is oven-proof and has a lid if you choose this option.) Cover the roasting pan with aluminum foil and place into a preheated 350 degree oven for an hour or so until the chicken is cooked through and falls off the bone.

Nana’s Notes: Personally, I believe a cast iron skillet is imperative to make good fried chicken. Having said this, I must say I don’t believe my mother used a cast iron skillet. Still, you would have to pry my lovely well-seasoned iron skillet out of my hand to make me fry chicken in a regular skillet. I used to fry the chicken, place the pieces on a plate until finished, pour out most of the grease, return the chicken to that pan, cover and finish cooking it in the oven. Now, however, I fry the chicken and put the pieces into a toss-away aluminum roasting pan, cover it with tin foil and finish it in the oven. There is no getting around it. Frying chicken is messy business. Also, I add a bit of cayenne pepper to my seasoned flour. Don’t tell my mother.

Theology and 5-Yr.Olds

Posted in Main Course, Meat Dishes, Recipes by

Our oldest granddaughter will be moving on to middle school next year (nooooooo, say it isn’t so!). It used to be so easy knowing which school your child will be attending, but now the multitude of options leads to the need for much more consideration about where to go. There are math magnets and science magnets and music and arts magnets, for example. There is also the neighborhood school where it is likely that most of her classmates will go.

Anyhoo, Addie spent much of yesterday shadowing a middle school student at the neighborhood school as part of her consideration process. In the morning, her mom and dad attended a parents’ meeting. That left the other three kids without rides to school, so Nana and Papa to the rescue! Bill took the two middle kids to their nearby school, and I took the little one, along with a neighborhood friend, to their kindergarten class which is a ways away.

Let me tell you, if you are in a bad mood, just drive two exceptionally bright 5-year-old girls to school and listen to their conversation. You will undoubtedly be smiling when you drop them off. At one point, my granddaughter was telling her friend about skiing Mt. Kilarest. Hmmm. Mt. Kilarest might be a mountain with the height and majesty of Mt. Everest and the volcanoes of Mt. Kilimanjaro. Perhaps it’s located somewhere in Nepal? I don’t remember her being gone for that long. But she said it with such conviction that I certainly believed her.

I especially liked our theological conversation. My little Maggie tells me, “Nana, I have a dad who will never die.” I asked her to explain. “God,” she said, ever the good little church-going Presbyterian. Her little friend, not to be undone, says, “And Mary is our mother.” I nod enthusiastically, happy that they are absorbing their Sunday school lessons. Then Maggie’s friend asks me, “Nana Kris, is Mary dead?”

Now, I was in no mood to get into Catholic vs. Protestant theology. (As you may know, Catholics believe that Mary did not die, but instead was assumed body and soul into heaven.) “Well,” I said, “I am sure she is in heaven because she was the mother of Jesus. Now, Molly, have you ever skied Mt. Kilarest?” I am the master at changing the subject with kids.

Later in the day, Bill and I had a late breakfast at a neighborhood restaurant, where I had a rather pleasant experience. As we walked in, the hostess, who looked to be no older than 25 or so, greeted us with “Just the two of us?” Now, I am a big fan of vocal jazz, and one of my favorite songs is Just the Two of Us. Quite obviously, Bill Withers isn’t a big star amongst the 20-something age group (or really any age group, except those of us who like vocal jazz). Before thinking (which I am wont to do), I sang the first line of that song: “Just the two of us, we can make it if we try.” Much to my surprise, the young woman completed the next line: “Just the two of us, you and I.”

“Well,” I said. “I am surprised that you know that song. Are you a fan of Bill Withers?” She told me that she grew up in Iowa, and her mother would take her out for breakfast, at which she would invariably sing “Just the two of us, we can make it if we try…..” Her story seriously made me tear up. Here’s why. As parents or grandparents, we are never sure which of the things we say to our children or grandchildren have an impact. But it seems to me that it is usually those things that seem absolutely unimportant at the time. My new friend’s mother likely had no idea that her singing that song would be such a pleasant, and obviously lifelong, memory to her daughter.

It made me think back to my conversation with the two little girls in the car that morning. I rather doubt that anything I said will change their lives. But I must not forget that it’s the little things that my grandkids are going to remember about me, and they’d better be good.

And speaking of memories, one of my favorite memories is my mother making her delicious meat loaf. I am a big fan of the meat loaf, but this recipe is different than most meat loaf recipes. Perhaps the biggest difference is NO KETCHUP. That is in the plus column for me. I don’t particularly dislike ketchup, but I’m not nuts about it as part of my meat loaf.

I wouldn’t be surprised if many of you reading this blog have a favorite meat loaf recipe. Share it with me via comments! Even if it has ketchup.

Mom’s Onion Gravy Meatloaf

Ingredients
1 lb. ground beef
1 slice bread, torn into small pieces
1 c. milk
1/8 t. celery salt
1 pkg. onion gravy mix
1 egg, beaten

Process
Place the bread in a small bowl and pour the milk over it. Add the package of onion gravy mix. Let it sit for 15-30 min., until the bread has absorbed most of the milk. Add the ground beef and the beaten egg, and mix just until combined.

Bake in a loaf pan for one hour at 350 degrees.

Nana’s Note: The resulting meat loaf is more moist than your typical meat loaf. I have played around with the recipe, decreasing the amount of milk, using bread crumbs instead of cubed bread, etc. I have never been satisfied, because it then doesn’t taste like the meat loaf my mommy made. I serve it with mashed potatoes and additional gravy.

Blood, Sweat and Prayers

Posted in Main Course, Meat Dishes, Recipes by

Bill and I are pretty religious about going to 24 Hour Fitness three times a week. We both do interval training on a treadmill for about 45 minutes or thereabouts. Neither one of us like to exercise. We often point out that we NEVER look forward to going to the gym and we NEVER enjoy the time during which we are working out. In fact, the only time we feel content is when our time is up – likely a combination of endorphins and knowing we don’t have to face the treadmill for another 48 hours.

But we have pretty good motivation. In 2009, Bill was diagnosed with Parkinson’s Disease. PD has no known cause or cure as of yet. Surprisingly little is understood about it except that it just sucks to have it. Research is showing, however, that aerobic exercise can slow progression. So Bill and I faithfully exercise.

And I pray. I pray and pray and pray. Every morning I ask for Bill to be cured of his affliction. While doing so, I recognize there is no cure as of yet. Still, all three of Sunday’s Mass scripture readings remind us to pray relentlessly. In the Old Testament reading, you had the Israelites winning the war against the Amaleks as long as Moses’ hands were raised in prayer. St. Paul’s second letter to Timothy reminded him (and us) to “be persistent whether it is convenient or inconvenient….” And finally, and most obviously, in Luke’s Gospel, Jesus uses the parable of the nagging widow and the judge to remind us to never stop asking God to answer our prayers. When I heard that, I thought, “Hey, if there is one thing I am good at, it’s nagging!”

A number of years ago I came across a quote about prayer that I never forget. Here it is: God answers all of our prayers in one of three ways – yes, not now, or I have a better idea. I will continue to nag, I mean, pray, and God will answer my prayer. In fact, I remind myself that he answers my prayer every day by making Bill’s progression blessedly slow. We help out by exercising.

On a side note, I recently was working out very hard on the treadmill, scarcely noticing who was on the treadmill next to me. I finished one of my fast intervals, and my neighbor says, “My, you really work hard, don’t you?” I looked over to see a really pretty white-haired woman. I’m bad at ages, but I took her to be a minimum of 80 years old. We began chatting about the importance of exercise. She told me she works out three times a week on the treadmill for a half hour, and then goes to a seniors’ weight class for an hour. I glanced down to see that she was walking at a speed of 3 mph. (For reference, my intervals are at 4 and 6 mph.) I complimented her on her diligence and she informed me that she was 92 years old.

Now that’s inspiration!

Recently Bill asked me to make pasta with Bolognese. I love cooking this sauce, first, because it’s yummy, and second, because it takes several hours to cook and I love the way the house smells while the sauce perks away. As always, when I make anything Italian, I bring out one of my old, red-sauce-stained Lidia cookbooks. Lidia Bastianich is my favorite Italian chef, and maybe my favorite anything chef, of all time. That’s why my Lidia cookbooks are wrinkled and stained. A sign that a cookbook is loved.

Meat Sauce Bolognese

Directions
3 T. olive oil
1 medium yellow onion, minced (about 1 c.)
1 medium carrot, peeled and finely shredded (about ½ c.)
½ c. minced celery, with leaves
Salt
1 lb. ground beef
1 lb. ground pork
½ c. dry red wine
1 T tomato paste
3 . canned Italian plum tomatoes, with their liquid, crushed
3 bay leaves
Freshly ground black pepper
4 c. hot water, or as needed

Process
Heat the olive oil in a wide 3-4 qt. pan or Dutch oven over medium heat. Stir in the onion, carrot, and celery, season them lightly with salt, and cook, stirring, until the onion is translucent, about 4 min. Crumble in the ground beef and pork and continue cooking, stirring to break up the meat, until all the liquid the meat has given off is evaporated and the meat is lightly browned, about 10 min. Pour in the wine and cook, scraping the bottom of the pan, until the wine is evaporated, 3-4 min. Stir in the tomato paste and cook a few minutes. Pour in the tomatoes, toss in the bay leaves, and season lightly with salt and pepper.

Bring to a boil, then lower the heat so the sauce is at a lively simmer. Cook, stirring occasionally, until the sauce is dense but juicy and a rich dark-red color. Most likely a noticeable layer of oil will float to the top toward the end of cooking. This will take about 2-3 hours – the longer you cook it, the better it will become. While the sauce is cooking, add hot water as necessary to keep the meat and vegetables covered. The oil can be removed with a spoon or reincorporated in the sauce, which is what is done traditionally.

Makes 6 c., enough to dress about 1-1/2 lbs. dried pasta

Nana’s Notes: Traditionally, a long, flat pasta is used, such as tagliolini. I frequently use spaghetti, but used penne this time and it worked very well. Also, I cut the recipe in half, and it worked great for the two of us. I had some left over that won’t go to waste! Just try not tasting it throughout the afternoon. I dare you.

Football Blues

Posted in Main Course, Meat Dishes, Recipes by

Don’t talk to me. I’m in a bad mood. My Broncos lost their first game ofthis season and I’m not happy about it. I guess pretty much everyone in Colorado is crabby today. For one thing, we got to bed late.

Well, actually, I didn’t get to bed late. I got to bed on time. In fact, I have to sort of shamefully admit that I didn’t even watch the second half of the game. I couldn’t stand myself and decided I would be better off upstairs tucked into my bed with my book in hand. I was reminding myself of my mother.

I loved my mother (still do, though she died too young in 1995 and I miss her every single day), but I absolutely HATED watching a football game with her. To begin with, she went into it with a bad attitude. “Well, we are going to lose this game for sure,” she would invariably predict, even if her team (which was either the Nebraska Cornhuskers or the Denver Broncos) was playing St. Bridget’s Girl School for Quilting.

And then, during the game, well, oh my heavens. The refereeing was bad, the announcers were biased, the opposing players were cheating, her own players were stinking it up, and on and on and on until you wanted to take a walk instead of watching the game. Which is what my father often did. Watching his team (also either the Huskers or the Broncos) play a close game drove him nuts. I don’t think he ever saw the end of a Nebraska/Oklahoma game because he was either walking or in the kitchen playing solitaire.

Anyway, I heard my mother’s words coming out of my mouth and I empathized with poor Bill who was simply trying to enjoy the game. So I went upstairs, figuring the Broncos would win or lose whether or not I was paying attention.

And what they did was lose, and the world hasn’t ended. Next week we play the Washington Redskins and I’m sure we’re going to lose that game because RGIII seems to be coming on strong. (Mom, you would be proud of me.)

This week I’m going to provide a few recipes for dishes that I have been making for many years. What they have in common is that all of them are dishes that my husband has been asking me to make lately. Bill tends to eat dinner so that he can then have dessert. The main meal is simply a path to what he really enjoys – a chocolate something-or-other. But there are a few dishes he enjoys a lot. These tender pork chops are his personal favorite, and a snap to make on a weekend night.

The recipe comes from a book my husband bought many years ago at a political fundraiser. It is called The Congressional Club Cookbook, and was a compilation of recipes from Congressmen and Congresswomen serving at that time (which was 1998).

Golden Pork Chops

Ingredients
4 thick pork chops
Lemon pepper
Salt
Cooking oil
1 10-3/4 oz. can Golden Mushroom Soup
White wine
Fresh mushrooms

Process
Sprinkle chops with salt and lemon pepper, then brown slightly in oil. Put chops in covered casserole. Cover with soup and a little white wine (or chicken broth). Top with sliced fresh mushrooms. Bake at 300 for 3 hours or longer.

Nana’s Note: The recipe doesn’t call for an amount of white wine, but put more than you think since it cooks in the oven so long. The resulting gravy is delicious on potatoes, rice, or noodles. And this time I didn’t have any white wine on hand, so I used chicken broth instead and it was still good.