caramel rolls

Caramel rolls:

Start with one package Rhodes brand frozen caramel rolls . (Check out this link for information about Herbert C. Rhodes, the highly inventive founder of Rhodes Bake N Serv frozen bread.)

Before baking the frozen rolls, remove them from the pan.

Spread the prepackaged caramel on the bottom of the foil pan.

Sprinkle 1/2 cup chopped pecans on top of the caramel.

Arrange frozen rolls on top of the pecans and caramel.

Bake according to package directions.

Enjoy!

sweet potato pie

Sweet potato pie is delightfully easy to make and serves well -- warm or chilled.

Requires no extra sweetening, but . . . if you like sugar . . . maple syrup (or equivalent) can be added as topping.

I started with a recipe memorized from a cooking magazine -- maybe Rachel Ray's?

Ingredients:

4 pounds sweet potatoes
4 cups milk
6 eggs

Bake sweet potatoes in 350 degree Fahrenheit oven for and hour, or until done.

Take baked sweet potatoes out of oven and allow to cool (about 30 minutes).

Remove skins.

Mash the cooled, sweet potato pulp.

Mix in milk and eggs.

Season with cinnamon.

Pour into greased 11 x 17" baking dish

Bake at 350 degrees Fahrenheit until done -- about an hour.

Optional: After about 35 minutes of baking, place strips of refrigerator pie crust across top of pie. Return to oven and finish baking until pie is done and the crust is browned.

Heddy's frozen pumpkin pie

Delicious! The best tasting (and simplest to throw together) frozen pumpkin pie!

For 1 (* or maybe two) pie(s):

1/2 gallon New York vanilla ice cream
1 can pumpkin (normal size can)
1/2 cup brown sugar (to give that molasses-y flavor)
2 Tablespoons pumpkin pie seasoning
1 purchased graham cracker crust in a foil pan for one mountainous pie (*or divide this recipe between two graham cracker crusts for two prairie-style pies!)

First, take ice cream out of package and soften in a bowl until it can be stirred.

Stir in the canned pumpkin, pumpkin seasoning, and brown sugar.

Mix with a large spoon to the best of your ability without melting the ice cream entirely.

Put mixture in graham cracker crust.

Cover and freeze.

Enjoy!

surprise pie

Last summer we put up lots and lots of gallons of sliced, fresh peaches from our peach tree.
Lots.

Today, I pulled the first gallon bag of frozen, sliced peaches from the freezer.
Surprise Pie was in my mind.

First, I peeled off the plastic bag and threw it out. (Microwaving plastic can release harmful chemicals into food, I understand.)

Then, I washed out the largest Pyrex bowl and placed the block of frozen sliced peaches in it.














Next I microwaved the peaches. For several minutes. Then several more minutes. Hmmmmmmm. Still frozen solid.

So I improvised an ice pick with a table knife and drove it with a wooden rolling pin as a mallet. Drove the table knife into the frozen fruit, . . . sort of, not really.

Kelly came to the rescue with a blow dryer.














After about ten minutes of serious blow drying, I could finally break the gallon of frozen peaches into smaller chunks. That was good enough to pile into pie tins lined with frozen pie crust.











After cooking about 14 minutes in the oven, the pie tins looked like they were about to overflow with excess pie liquid.

So we got out a large glass baking dish and turned the Surprise Pies upside down into it.

We made lunch, ate lunch, and cleaned up afterward while waiting for the Surprise Pie to finish cooking. About the time everyone else had forgotten about it, I remembered to glance in the oven. Looks good!











Baked at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for 1 hour 40 minutes (or until the crust is brown and juice thickened.)

***

Review:

5 forks -- All the fun is in making the pie (actually, a peach cobbler in the end). Tastes good, too.

chocolate sundae

A summertime classic --

In a cute dish, scoop out some ice cream.

• Cover with Hersheys chocolate syrup.
  

(Click the Hersheys link to learn about the school benefiting needy children which is the biggest shareholder of Hersheys.)

• Sprinkle with granola or graham cracker crumbs or nuts, if you wish.

• Serve the ice cream sundaes to your famished diners immediately!

Ice cream soda

This is mega easy!

• Put your favorite ice cream into soda fountain glasses. (I used New York Vanilla.

• Add flavoring, if you wish. (Vanilla, chocolate syrup, fresh fruit, jelly or jam.)

• Pour club soda into glass until it is full

• Serve immediately!

***

Review:

There is no way to review a recipe that disappears instantantly

Chocolate chip pecan cookies

Okay, . . . these are really great cookies by one great cookie chef: Boo. She claims to have made at least fifty batches of these infamous cookies within recent history, all to grand applause.

She more-or-less follows the recipe on the back of the Nestle Tollhouse Chocolate Chip package. But i think her great secret is in the timing of the cooking process: not too long and not too short.

The end result is a firm cookie, but not at all crisp. The innards are soft and the chocolate is gooey. The pecans were sort of tossed in as an almost afterthought. I thought they added a lot!

Review:
5 forks for excellent flavor
1 fork for presentation (Who cares how they are presented? These are chocolate chip cookies we're talking about! Dig in!)

better cherry cobbler

This is a redo on the fresh fruit cobbler fiasco of a few days ago.

Pretty simple.

Take the stems and stones out of about

• 1 quart (4 cups) fresh cherries.

Mix with

• 1/3 cup small pearl tapioca

sprinkle with

• 1/3 cup granulated or brown sugar

Mix all the ingredients thoroughly together.

The hard part (for impatient cooks like me):

• Let stand for 15 minutes so the tapioca can start absorbing some of the cherry juice.

Pour into pie plate.

Cover with pie crust from box mix. (I didn't have sufficient counter space to roll out the dough, so I patted it out between my hands and assembled an air-tight crust --in pieces.)

Cook in pre-heated 350 degree F oven until crust is golden brown.

Tasted pretty good.

oatmeal raisin cookies

Kelly made delicious oatmeal raisin cookies the other day -- the old fashioned way. She used the recipe on the top of the Quaker brand Rolled Oats box (cylinder).

I sort of like the Quaker huge cylinder packaging. It reminds me of the enormous grain elevators Quaker Oats has at its plant in Cedar Rapids, IA.

Okay, now I am really conflicted: Quaker Oats, which I associate with healthy wholesome living is owned by PepsiCo in their Food and Beverage division. PepsiCo is primarily a soft drink, to my way of thinking. Certainly not your good-for-the-physique kind of food . . .Well, I will definitely take some time getting used to the bigger picture of Quaker Oats.

Anyway, Kelly used a familiar, tried-and-true recipe and whipped up some delicious cookies!
We tried to make them last, but the whole 4 dozen were gone . . . gone . . . gone in no time at all.

peach cobbler redefined

I got off to a good start. Fixed a fresh peach cobbler in a clear glass pie plate.

It was simple:
3 or 4 peaches sliced,
a little water,
a little brown sugar,
cinnamon

Topped with pie crust from a box, patted flat between my hands. I arranged the crust on top of the filing and put the pie in the carefully pre-heated 350 degree F oven.

While we ate sandwiches for lunch, I checked on the cobbler. Definitely looking good! Needs fifteen more minutes, I told myself.

So I went back to graphic design on my computer in the basement. And forgot about the cobbler. Really. Didn't think about it again for two hours -- when I went upstairs for something and smelled a very sweet smell.

The cobbler was burnt to a blackened crisp. Nothing left worth photographing.

"Well, at least it smells good!" said Boo.

Which reminds me, didn't I say the aroma of good food cooking fills me up as much as eating the food?

Guess it is true . . .

Small unsweetened fruit pies

Fruit pie in the summer is always a big hit around here. Last night's pies were cooked in pot pie foil pans, making individual servings.

First:
I used a boxed pie crust, adding water to the dry ingredients and mixing in a bowl, per the box instructions.

• 
  

Then I rolled out two small pie crusts for each pie -- enough to make five little two-crust pies. It turned out that I had enough pie crust mix for one extra round for a crust. That round became our only turnover. (Eleven pie crusts rounds total.)

Meanwhile, Guy sliced:
2 apples
1 peach
15 seedless red grapes (approximately)

He mixed them in a bowl with:
2 or 3 tablespoons tapioca
powdered cinnamon to taste
powdered allspice to taste
a splash of lemon juice

Then he divided the fruit mixture evenly amongst

the 6 small pie pans lined with a bottom crust.

I put on the top crusts, trimming off the excess crust overhanging the edge of the pie pans, and cut two slashes in the top of each pie for steam to escape.

• 

The sixth pie, with only one crust ,was treated like a turnover. After the fruit was added to the single crust lining the pan,I folded the excess crust back over the top of the filling -- sort of wrapping it up.

We cooked the pies on a cookie sheet in a 350 degree F oven.

When they start smelling great and turning brown, the pies are done -- about 20 -30 minutes, I guess.


Review:

5 forks for delicious taste and creating demand for more fruit pies!