Oh my. Decadence on a plate. No counting calories on this one; just so you know . . .

It isn’t until I get home from a cooking class and enter a recipe into my software, MasterCook, that I glance at the calories and/or fat, or carbs for any dish. Tarla Fallgatter prepared this at a class a month or so ago, and everyone swooned over it. Me included. The torte is so soft, tender, melt-in-your-mouth chocolaty, and hits all the buttons for tasty. It’s so tender that it sinks in the middle – hence you can see the far right end of the cake has almost completely collapsed. Oh, but that didn’t detract one single calorie from enjoying it. Someone in the class asked if this was a chocolate lava cake, and Tarla said no, it wasn’t, although one could think so.

Tarla oftens does chocolate tortes, cakes, etc. That particular cooking class group loves chocolate too. Tarla loves chocolate, I’m guessing, although she never eats a bite of anything she fixes at the cooking classes, unless it’s to check for seasonings. This torte contains some apricot puree in the cake itself, and she served it with some additional on the plate, along with a scoop of sweetened whipped cream. There’s a chocolate ganache frosting on top, then toasted almonds sprinkled on top of that. It does have to be surrounded in foil (the springform pan, in a single sheet so water can’t permeate) and then baked in a water bath. Not hard, but requires a few extra steps and minutes. Do use a pan (for the water bath) that is much bigger than the springform pan because you need to steam to escape. Tarla baked this in a round pan that wasn’t too much bigger, and the cake took much longer to bake. Just so you know . . .

Serve this when you’re having a very light dinner – not at the end of a multi-course heavy meal as it’s very rich.

What’s GOOD: I hate to say this, but everything about this torte was delicious. Fantastic, really. I ate every smidgen. Will I actually make it? Maybe, but as I suggested above, not to serve after a heavy dinner.

What’s NOT: nothing except the excess of calories! Oh, and maybe the requirement to bake this in a foil covered base and in a water bath. Kind of a nuisance.

printer-friendly PDF and MasterCook 15/16 file (click link to open recipe)

Tweet

What a lovely day and lovely event!

Months ago I signed up in my PEO chapter to host an event here at my home. A wine tasting (all wines contributed from my cellar) with food pairing. Two other gals agreed to co-host with me, and it was 2 days ago, on Sunday afternoon. What a nice time we had. Just wonderful food, and about 14 bottles of wine from my cellar. Each person paid $35 apiece (toward a charity within PEO) and the 3 of us coordinated the tasting of a bunch of lovely food. I worked hard at finding the right kind of combination of food to go with each of the wine courses.

As the folks were gathering on my patio, we served Trader Joe’s Secco Peach Bellini (pictured). It’s a very light sparkling wine with a bit of peach puree in it – it’s $4.99 at Trader Joe’s. We had some honey chevre out with crackers to go with that. We also had some delish hummus with pita bread too, although I don’t know that hummus necessarily goes well with peach Bellini, but one of my co-hostesses had a friend prepare the home made stuff and really wanted to bring it. It was very good and disappeared quickly enough.

Then we moved on to Chardonnay. Two different bottles were brought out from my cellar, and we had a cute Belgian Endive spear filled with a chicken salad with mango. Perfect with the dry, oaky chardonnay. (I don’t drink chardonnay, but I had two bottles in the cellar. There’s only one more bottle of chard in the cellar.) We also had some spinach turnovers to serve with the Chardonnay.

Next was sherry. I really enjoy Sherry, and hadn’t had any for years! It’s not much of a popular drink. I researched a bit about the bottles I had. Did you know that the dry, fino sherry should be consumed within 2 weeks, once opened? I sure didn’t. But then, I didn’t have any fino anyway. I had medium sherry, 3 different types, and we tried them all. Also had two dulce or sweet sherries too, which also got sampled along with almonds and Manchego cheese and crackers. I asked everyone to roll the wine on their tongues, then take a taste of the Manchego to taste the difference. Same thing with the almonds. Many of my guests were surprised they enjoyed sherry so much. The winner of the evening was Osborne Medium, in case you’re interested. I preferred Savory & James Amontillado (a medium). Most of the bottles I had on hand (all opened) were just fine – they tasted great, even though they’ve been there for years and years. Sweeter sherries have a stable shelf life even once opened. Except for one bottle, all the sherries were imported from Spain.

Next up was both Riesling and Gewürztraminer. I had a few bottles of each in the cellar, so chose the older vintages. Everyone was offered some of both wines to drink with some delicious pea, yogurt and lemon crostini (recipe will be up in a few weeks). I’d made that dish over Easter and felt it was a great success, so I asked one of my co-hostesses to make it. She did. It went really well with both wines.

Then we moved on to reds. My cellar has mostly red wine, so there was a big conundrum as to which ones to choose. I finally decided on pinot noir and cabernet. With the Pinot Noir we served a beautiful platter of home cold smoked salmon with crème fraiche, capers and fresh dill. I served Stephen Ross Pinot Noir (a really wonderful vintner in California). One was a 2004 and the other 2005. Both stellar bottles.

Next was Cabernet Sauvignon, a favorite of mine, though I think it needs to be drunk with food. I’d not ever sip a Cab before dinner – it’s too heavy and needs food to go with it. With that I grilled some sausages on my nearby grill (Polish sausage and some chicken Italian sausage). I cut them up into small bite-sized pieces and passed them, hot with toothpicks, as folks sipped the wine. And one of my co-hostesses had a friend prepare Tabbouleh, which was really great with the Cab. It was made the way it’s supposed to be – mostly parsley and very little cracked wheat. It was wonderful.

While all that wine and food settled, I went into the kitchen and started on the dessert. The recipe won’t be up here on my blog for awhile (June – I’m that far ahead with posts) but it’s a real winner and super-easy. It was a Raspberry Brown Sugar Gratin (find the recipe on Smitten Kitchen if you’re anxious to try it). I asked everyone to save a bit of the red wine in their glasses and we passed a platter of Humboldt Fog. That cheese is just to-die-for, in my opinion, and is such a winner to eat with a complex red wine. Most of my guests had never had Humboldt Fog, and I think everyone was a convert!

Then came the dessert – to serve with after-dinner wines. I had two half-bottles, one a French Sauternes, (a 2001 Chateau Lamothe), and I had a bottle of something called Chocolate Splash. It’s a red wine impregnated with chocolate. It’s very unusual – from Narrow Gate Vineyards, in case you’re interested. With THAT wine we served some milk and dark chocolate, just a bite for each person. The dessert was served with the Sauternes. Both winners – the dessert and that wine. I have about half a cup left of that in the bottle. I’ll enjoy it in coming days.

Lastly, I served coffee. It was a very warm evening and was surprised anyone wanted coffee, but several did! A lovely evening from beginning to end. I expected that some of the bottles I opened might have been “over the hill,” but every bottle was exceptionally good. I’m so glad. I certainly hope that my DH, Dave, happily in heaven, liked the fact that I contributed some of his wine collection to the event.

Tweet

Ever get a craving? I seem to mention them more frequently, of late. Banana bread was my craving.

If I didn’t buy bananas – for them to get extra ripe – with black spots all over them – then there would never be a need for a banana bread. Right? I don’t eat many bananas – this goes back to when my DH Dave was alive and as a diabetic, he knew bananas were not very good for him – all carbs and lots of sugar. Not good for a Type 1 diabetic. SO I didn’t buy them very often – really only if I planned to bake with them. I’d read a story somewhere on the ‘net at one of the blogs I follow, about a banana bread, and in the post they mentioned the Kona Inn. Memories drifted back. Hmmm. Yes, I think I remember having had banana bread at the Kona Inn. Oh no, it was at the Willows in Honolulu. But never mind . . . it was banana bread that sparked the interest. And there was a mention of baking such banana bread with or WITHOUT pineapple. Well, I decided then and there that it needed to have pineapple.

Scanning through my many recipes – and remembering my own favorite banana bread and also one that is a prize winning banana bread. also a favorite of mine too, I wanted one with pineapple. I could have adapted one of the two mentioned, but hey, I write a food blog – I need new ideas. Always! I hunted on the ‘net and found this one. It makes 2 loaves – albeit kind of shallow loaves, but still 2 loaves. It’s got lots of bananas, and it has an 8-ounce can of canned drained pineapple. And cinnamon. I added a jot of nutmeg and allspice. Just because. Otherwise it’s identical to the recipe I found at Taste of Home. It was very easy to mix up – one bowl for the dry ingredients, and another for the wet ingredients. They’re combined and poured into 2 loaf pans. Baked for an hour and it’s done. No frosting needed.

What’s GOOD: definitely good banana and pineapple flavor. And cloaked in a really moist batter. Use a napkin or a paper towel to eat it because your fingers will be a bit oily. Guess that’s what makes it so good!

What’s NOT: nary a thing – unless it’s waiting for the bananas to get extra ripe.

printer-friendly PDF and MasterCook 15/16 file (click link to open recipe)

Tweet

Have you joined the sheet pan dinner craze? I have to admit, until this dish, I hadn’t tried it. I’m now a convert if this recipe is any indication!

My friend Linda is such a good cook. She is a single person and cooks most nights. Maybe she has a few leftovers now and then, but she believes in a good, varied, veggie enhanced meals. And without shortcuts necessarily. She and I were working on a MasterCook issue she was having – her program had “lost” her special format for printing her recipes (the way my recipes look when you print out the pdf here). So she emailed me a couple of recipes with “the problem.” This recipe from Food52 was one of them, and she happened to mention that it was really delicious. So good that she could hardly keep her fork out of the sheet pan after she’d eaten her dinner. That kind of praise merited me trying this one myself.

From the gold and brown photo above, you might not be able to tell there’s a chicken thigh in the foreground (boneless, skinless), and what’s behind it are kind of bedraggled combo (but over the top in flavor) of cabbage wedges and some slivers of onion. All of this overlaid with a delish “dressing,” or vinaigrette with an oil (see next paragraph), rice vinegar, sesame oil, soy sauce and sriracha. It’s drizzled on the chicken and the veggies before baking. The chicken is baked for 10 minutes all by itself, then the vegetables are added to the pan, to nestle in and around the chicken, and it continues to bake for another 20-25 minutes. And bingo, it’s done. Depending on the size of the cabbage, it may need another 15 minutes or so of baking. Mine didn’t – it was done after the 20-25. If you cook it further, you remove the chicken from the sheet pan and keep it warm while the cabbage continues to roast.

The original recipe calls for coconut oil. Which is a congealed fat, and it’s difficult to make a dressing out of it – like trying to mix shortening into a salad dressing. A no-go. I heated it up so it would mix, but as soon as it cooled to room temp, the coconut oil congealed again. I think next time I’d use olive oil, which is optional in the original recipe. I couldn’t taste the coconut oil at all.

What’s GOOD: This dinner was SO easy, and so off the charts delicious. But then, I love chicken thighs. I love cabbage (especially roasted like this) and I added onion just to give it a bit more flavor. The dressing was easy enough to mix up – I guessed as I poured in the ingredients. A winner of a recipe. If you are sensitive to chile-heat, reduce the amount of sriracha. I thought it was perfect just the way it is. Make twice what you’ll eat the first time and you’ll have a second complete dinner (I did).

What’s NOT: Nary a thing – everything about this dish was great. Next time I will cover the sheet pan with foil first – kind of a messy cleanup, but it’s really just one pan . . . plus one bowl to mix up the dressing and toss the chicken, then the veggies.

printer-friendly PDF and MasterCook 15/16 file (click link to open recipe)

Tweet

Oh my goodness, is this cake just off the charts. And it has a story (not mine – on food52).

A couple of weeks ago I was reading a post at food52, and this carrot cake story was just so sweet. About Mary Catherine Tee’s grandmother “Mom Mom’s” 3-layer carrot cake. And how the grandchildren made the cake for her in her last days, when she was suffering from advanced Alzheimer’s, confined to a nursing home. And about the smile it brought to her face. It was such an unusual story, I had to send the post to my friend Linda T (many recipes here on my blog are from her recipe files), who has been making a more traditional 9×13 carrot cake for decades. That recipe is here on my blog too. Hers had been my go-to recipe for as long as I’ve had it; at least 30 years. Until now. Until this cake.

Recently, Linda, my friend Cherrie, another mutual friend Yvette and I met for lunch in Carlsbad. At a very hot new restaurant called Campfire. Quite a place – lots of grilled items, fabulous breads, sandwiches, unusual sauces or spreads on bread, or something different on most everything on the menu. It was close to Yvette’s birthday, and because Linda and I had talked a lot about this cake, she made it and brought it to the restaurant (they didn’t charge us for the use of extra plates). Carrot cake happens to be Yvette’s husband Joe’s favorite, Cherrie’s husband Bud’s favorite, and was my DH’s favorite as well. Linda let us split up the remaining cake between us, to take home. What a treat. The birthday girl in the photo at right with the cake in the shade in front of her.

What’s different about this cake? It’s lighter in texture – MUCH lighter. Hard to believe since it contains so much shredded carrot, but it IS. It’s a more tender cake – I guess that’s what I mean when I say “lighter.” It still has some cream cheese in the frosting, but it’s not a thick frosting (that part I really liked). It uses pecans – but in the frosting. The ONLY thing I’d try next time, is to add some pineapple into the frosting. Crushed (canned) pineapple that had been squeezed completely dry and squeezed in paper towels too – so it wouldn’t dilute the frosting with any liquid. I haven’t tried this – so I can’t make any promises about it, but I think it would be a lovely enhancement to the cake. At least I’d try it. I’d use an 8-ounce can, drained well, then squeezed dry as mentioned.

What’s GOOD: I think this cake is fantastic. Not that I make 3-layer cakes often – and I didn’t make this one, but since my friend Linda has now made it twice, and was planning to make it again the same week, I’d say it’s been truly tested well. Do read my notes about possibly adding crushed pineapple to the frosting. Linda did not frost the outside of the cake – it was supposed to be enough, but Linda just thought it would be better to leave the frosting off the sides. I’d definitely do it that way again too.

What’s NOT: only that you have to make/bake 3 layers. Not hard, really. A bit time consuming. But, you’ll hear raves. I just know it.

printer-friendly PDF and MasterCook 15/16 file (click link to open recipe)

Tweet

Polenta usually is made with cornmeal only. This one veers off the grid and uses mostly kabocha squash and some cornmeal. It has a very similar consistency, but maybe more healthy for us!

Polenta is really, really good stuff. And I just wish it weren’t so heavy in carbs. In this version, made with kabocha squash (which is a winter squash and a carb) it has all the benefits of flavor, but maybe because of the squash, it might be a bit healthier. Just sayin’. A serving of this has 44 grams of carbs. That’s a lot, but oh gosh, was it ever good with the Sicilian Chicken Stew. My downfall is that once I have a serving of polenta, I want more. It’s kind of like popcorn at the movies – I don’t EVER buy it, because I can’t stop eating it once I start!

Do you know kabocha squash? It’s mostly credited to Japan (but it isn’t, really). Like the photo at left (from Trader Joe’s), they’re round, globe-like, sometimes more squat that this one shows. They’re very nutritious and have lots of good flavor.

According to Wikipedia, Portuguese sailors introduced kabocha to Japan in 1541, bringing it with them from Cambodia. The squash claims a whole lot of beta-carotene.

In any case, they’re tasty things. At the cooking class, Chef Caroline said that she usually cooks the kabocha for about about 20 minutes (at 425°F) BEFORE she tries to cut it open. It has a pretty hard shell. Once cooled a bit, she cuts it in half crosswise, then puts the squash, cut side down onto a parchment-lined baking sheet and roasts it for about 35 minutes. At that point the flesh is totally soft and scoops out easily. As with regular polenta, the cornmeal is slowly added to simmering vegetable broth and in this case, some milk, and then cooked gently for about 5 minutes. Then you add some salt, butter and the mashed up squash – which gives the polenta a more orange color. Taste for seasonings. Serve while it’s HOT.

What’s GOOD: loved the added flavor from the kabocha – an unexpected treat. Still tastes like polenta, but perhaps more nutritious.

What’s NOT: maybe just the nuisance of having to bake the squash – not difficult, just a bit time consuming, plus having to cut it. Winter squashes are sometimes really hard to handle – and cut.

printer-friendly PDF and MasterCook 15/16 file (click link to open recipe)

Tweet

How many thousands of ways can there be to cook chicken? I never seem to run out of ideas (from recipes) to make it different and tasty.

Seems like I’ve been to a lot of cooking classes of late. My friend Cherrie and I really enjoy the ones given at a French restaurant in San Clemente, Antoine’s. The restaurant isn’t open for dinner (only breakfast and lunch). Chef Caroline always does a varied menu; sometimes it’s French, or some part of it, and she always has interesting stories to go along with them.

This chicken dish she whipped up right in front of our eyes on one of those free-standing single-burner induction cooktops. This is a one-dish chicken stew. In the photo, you can see polenta at the top right – that one is made with cornmeal but also with kabocha squash in it. LOVED it. That recipe will be up next.

First you sauté onion and carrots in some EVOO, then add 2 1/2 pounds of chopped up chicken thigh meat (boneless, skinless), along with oregano, basil and garlic. Red wine deglazes the pan; some raisins are added in and the dish is simmered another 20 minutes. Oh, there’s marinara sauce added, and a big bunch of pimiento stuffed olives (halved). It’s something like a spaghetti sauce (and you probably could serve it with pasta) but made with chicken, not beef or pork. The olives add a nice piquant flavor to the dish. I’m sure this dish would be better if you made it the day ahead – nearly every stewed dish is, including soups. It was delicious as-is, though.

What’s GOOD: the sauce is just wonderful – rich with flavor – and enhanced with the halved pimiento-stuffed olives in it. I like chicken thighs anyway (more flavor), so it was a no-brainer that I’d like this dish. It’s easy to make too.

What’s NOT: nothing at all – you do have to make something to go with this – a carb of some sort, but with a green salad, that would be dinner for sure.

printer-friendly PDF and MasterCook 15/16 (click link to open recipe)

Tweet

This recipe has such an interesting story, I just had to post it. Have leftover chicken? This makes a nice (and different) way to serve it, and get in a bunch of veggies.

Having mentioned before that I’m in P.E.O., a women’s organization, I’ve probably also mentioned that our chapter does very fun small-group fund-raising events. We, as an organization, help an all-women’s college in Missouri (Cottey College). We support a variety of other charitable causes as well, but each year every P.E.O. chapter is asked to donate money to the school. Our chapter’s method is to have small gatherings of our members (everything from a tour of some museum, or historic home, to lunch in someone’s home, or a game with lunch, or a wine-tasting, for example) and our members bid on attending. The money raised goes to Cottey College (we generally raise about $2000 a year for that). So, all that said, one of my other P.E.O. members (sisters, we call one another) had an event at her house – a lunch and a talk about George Washington (we love it when our events are educational). These gatherings are some of the most fun things we do, IMHO.

Chris searched for some recipes online that would have been in George Washington’s time. She came across this chicken pudding recipe from Colonial Williamsburg, Virginia. She made the dish according to the online recipe, and served it with a light chicken gravy (not in the original recipe, but she thought it needed something on it). When I quizzed her about the dish, she thought maybe next time she’d spice it up a little more (cooks back in those days didn’t have many herbs and spices – they were quite dear), and she thought some veggies added into it would be a good enhancement.

The recipe just sounded so different – a chicken pudding? Really? If you do a search online you’ll find many, all somewhat similar.  I thought veggies in it sounded good too. I added in some onion, celery and carrots, thickened it, then made a chicken gravy as well. BUT, I thought the dish needed something more colorful on top (the carrots in the pudding weren’t all that visible), so at the very last minute, I added in some frozen green peas to the gravy. Voilà.

The night of the Oscars, I invited 2 friends over. With my remote control in hand (we muted nearly all the acceptance speeches because we didn’t want to hear political vitriol – thankfully there wasn’t much of that this year). Anyway, I set up TV trays, served this with a salad provided by Judy, and later dessert provided by Nancy. We had a fun evening.

What’s GOOD: this is a different way to use up cooked chicken – it helps a small amount go a long way. Even though I used some spices, I think it could be spiced up even more. Thyme and parsley were about it. The gravy is simple enough to do – just be sure to add the peas during the last minute of cooking so they stay bright green. This dish isn’t going to bring “wows” to the dinner table talk – it’s a simple dish. Nice enough, though.

What’s NOT: There are several steps to making this, but none is hard, just time consuming. It probably took about 30-40 minutes to do all the prep and cooking of both parts, pudding and gravy, then about 50 minutes for the pudding to bake. I did most of it ahead of time, left them on the stove and reheated them every half an hour to keep bacteria at bay. Next time I’d make the pudding just before baking it, and make the gravy while the pudding was cooking.

printer-friendly PDF and MasterCook 15/16 file (click link to open recipe)

Tweet

Cauliflower isn’t exactly at the top of my vegetable “like” list. Not that I dislike it. That’s not it. It just doesn’t have all that much flavor – to me anyway. I know it’s good for me, though. I’d probably never have made this dish except it was served to me. It’s wonderful. Really delicious.

At the moment, cauliflower is the new “IN” vegetable. There’s cauliflower everywhere, including the new riced cauliflower at Trader Joe’s and Costco. When I’m served that ubiquitous mixed vegetable at a restaurant – with broccoli, maybe a red pepper strip or two, and some zucchini, perhaps, if there is cauliflower I may scoot it around my plate, thinking I’m going to eat it, but often I don’t. Steamed cauliflower just holds zero interest to my palate. I like cauliflower mashed to resemble mashed potatoes – with all kinds of good stuff in it like butter and sour cream. And I don’t dislike roasted cauliflower on occasion – the roasting (caramelization) makes it much more interesting and edible to me. And one of my very favorite green salads (Garlic VIP Dressing) has some tiny cauliflower florets (and toasted, sliced almonds too) in it. Coated with salad dressing, I love cauliflower. I think I prefer raw cauliflower, as long as it’s cut into fairly small bites.

If you like to make an appetizer, and you’d like it to be a bit more healthy, try this one. Normally a tapenade is olives – mostly olives. This has some, but it’s mostly cauliflower. You might be able to taste the cauliflower, or not. Surely people will ask you what it is. It does not look like hummus. It’s kind of light dirty brown (from the Mediterranean olives in it).

The cauliflower is tossed with some olive oil and a spice rub of some kind (Tarla used a blackened seasoning rub on it), then roasted until the tops were crispy brown. They they were combined with some pitted black and green olives, green onions, lemon juice, S & P. And more olive oil to make it smooth. Tarla used some olive bread (large baguette shape) and toasted the slices, then she scooped some of the cauliflower tapenade on top and served it with a salad. It could be served that way, or also as an appetizer. It’s also sprinkled with some smoked paprika on top – it wouldn’t be necessary to do that, but the smoked paprika adds a lovely little smoky taste to it.

What’s GOOD: it’s sort of healthy (though it has a goodly amount of olive oil in it) and you’ll get in a small portion of veggies when you serve it. It’s really delish.

What’s NOT: only that you do have to roast the cauliflower (about 15 minutes or so) first. Otherwise, it’s very easy to do. Do buy pitted olives if possible!

printer-friendly PDF and MasterCook 15/16 file (click link to open recipe)

Tweet

Casseroles are so comforting. This one is especially delicious – made with ground turkey, a bit of corn, tomato puree, oodles of grated cheese, and an unusual bottom “crust.”

I really do love casseroles. I wish they’d come back into fashion. In some circles, they’ve never gone “out.” When I serve them, I always get raves. This one will be a repeater on my menu whenever I feel the urge to make a casserole for friends or family.

Occasionally my evening bible study group gathers for dinner – this one was a potluck, and everyone brought other things to round out the menu. The dish serves 12 – I made two of those pies like you see in the above photo – and every single, solitary bite of it was gone. It served exactly 12, though a couple of my guests went back for seconds.

I don’t remember how or where I acquired this recipe – but it won a chili contest in 1988, so the story goes, and the home cook who made it won $25,000. Does that give you a clue as to how good this is? It’s a Texas recipe, and when the one friend in our group who is from East Texas had some, his wife said, yes, this was very much like a lot of Texas casseroles.

A couple of days ahead of bake-day, I made the meat sauce.  It begins with chopped red onion and red bell pepper, then jalapeno minced up, a bunch of garlic and parsley. The recipe calls for parsley flakes – well, I used fresh. The ground turkey is added in, along with paprika, chili powder, ground cumin, a bay leaf, some dry mustard, a little jot of unsweetened cocoa powder, beef broth and tomato puree (I used tomato sauce). Here, though. is where I veered off the recipe just a little bit – I meant to buy a bottle of Mexican beer at the store – I forgot – and I wasn’t about to make a special trip just for that. It tasted fine without it, I thought. You can use your own judgment – however – if you do add the beer, you’ll need to cook off the fluid so it’s a thick sauce. There’s also some corn in it, a tiny jot of honey too.

There’s the casserole just before I slid it into the oven.

Meanwhile, you “make” the crust. THIS is what intrigued me – the crust. You mix up some crushed saltine crackers, cornmeal, a little vegetable oil, some Jack cheese shredded and a whole cup of water. Once the water is absorbed, this mixture is just plain odd. It’s not really a dough, although the original recipe called it that. You divide it between two deep pie dishes and kind of spread it around as evenly as possible. It gets baked for 15 minutes until golden brown. It cools slightly, then you add a bit of grated Jack cheese on top of the “crust,” then scoop in the hot turkey filling. Lastly, Jack and cheddar cheese is sprinkled all over the top. Into the oven it goes to get hot and the cheese gets a bit golden brown. DO let it rest for about 5-10 minutes before serving – it would burn your mouth!!

With a green salad, this is a complete meal. We had a slaw salad, a veggie-rich green salad, a kale salad and a Jell-O salad – all wonderful with this. The green salad went with it the best, I think. The recipe can easily be halved to serve 6.

What’s GOOD: it’s just a delicious, comforting meal – the turkey mixture is full of flavor, and you can pick up on the different texture of the “crust.” It’s delicious – almost has a tamale pie familiarity, although nothing like the thick cornmeal type casseroles my mother used to make. The crust in this is super-thin. Altogether wonderful and easy to make. Don’t fill the pies until you’re ready to put them in the oven, though. I think it would soften the crust on the bottom.

What’s NOT: can’t think of a thing. It was wonderful.

printer-friendly PDF and MasterCook 15/16 file (click link to open recipe)

Tweet