Pumpkin Bread

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2    PUMPKIN BREAD

       2 cups canned or prepared  pumpkin

·         3 cups sugar

·         1 cup water

·         1 cup vegetable oil

·         4 eggs

·         3 1/3 cups all-purpose flour

·         2 teaspoons baking soda

·         2 teaspoons cinnamon

·         1 teaspoon salt

·         1 teaspoon baking powder

·         1/2 teaspoon nutmeg

·         3/4 teaspoon ground cloves (optional)

Heat the oven to 350. In a large mixing bowl, combine the pumpkin, sugar, water, vegetable oil and eggs. Beat until well mixed. Measure the flour, baking soda, cinnamon, salt, baking powder, nutmeg and ground cloves into a separate bowl, then stir until combined (great job for the kids). Slowly add the dry ingredients to the pumpkin mixture, beating until smooth.

Grease two 9- by 5-inch loaf pans and dust them with flour. Evenly divide the batter between them. Bake for 60 to 70 minutes or until toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Cool for 10 to 15 minutes. Remove from pans by inverting them into a rack and tapping the bottoms. Slice and serve plain, buttered, or with cream cheese.

Bethany’s Cornbread Dressing

Bethany’s Cornbread Dressing

My dear Nanny Kimble passed away about 20 years ago.  Upon her passing I was relegated as the official "dressin'" maker for Thanksgiving and Christmas. The problem is that my mother and other family folk are seeking a dressing that could only be achieved if Nanny were to pop down from Heaven and whip up a batch herself. A further problem is that even when Nanny made her dressing -God rest her sweet little soul - it was great some years, OK other years and virtually inedible on occasion. Of course the expectation is that I make it as good as Nanny did....when she did it well! SO, I have failed to meet the challenge thus far. I've tried all sorts of recipes, tweaked things, sought out the advice of really old people, added fun things like cranberries and even butternut squash to NO AVAIL! This year...Thanksgiving 2010...let it be known that I have officially nailed down the "Nanny Kimble" dressing! Yay! Here it is so I can't lose it!

I’ve been tweaking this one for several years! I’ve definitely realized that it’s better if you prep it 1-2 days in advance if possible. The flavors meld together much better! 

• Options: bake veggies in the cornbread, run all breads through a food processor
• 1 pint chicken livers
• 2 round pan yellow corn bread
• 1 round pan white corn bread
• 12 rounds toasted French bread (narrow loaf)
• Salt & pepper
• 1-3 teaspoon rubbed sage
• 1 tsp dried poultry seasoning
• 2 packages fresh sage (chopped)
• 3 eggs
• 2 large onions, diced
• 3 stalks celery, thinly chopped
• 1 stick unsalted butter- cut length wise in half, flip and cut length wise again. Then slice. You should now have small cubes of butter
• 1 can cream of chicken soup
• 6 cups chicken stock (make it with chicken flavored better than bouillon- not pre-canned)
• 2 sprigs rosemary. Chop up the leaves and throw away the stems.

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Preheat oven to 350 (have the cornbread already made up per the package directions- use milk not water)
2. Make up 6 cups of stock with better than bouillon.l in a pitcher. I add enough to where the stock tastes like chicken soup.
3. Make up Drain & wash livers. Place in small pot and add enough stock to cover them. Add one pack of chopped up sage leaves. Add chopped rosemary. Add cracked pepper and salt to taste. Bring to a boil then simmer for 20 min.
4. Remove livers from stock. Pull out 2-3 livers and mush them up. Add mushed livers back to the pot and stir. Either eat or discard the rest of livers. Add the liver stock back to the pitcher of chicken stock.
5. Crumble cornbread and toasted French bread into a large bowl. Add pepper, onion, celery, butter cubes, cream of chicken soup, remaining chopped sage, and a few cups of the chicken stock. Stir until well-combined. Taste it. Add poultry seasoning and rubbed sage until it tastes the way you want it. Don’t add too much additional salt because the butter has salt and it’s not melted in yet. Add more stock until its kind of soupy but not liquid. You should be able to stir it with a spoon and it not slosh around. I usually end up using the remainder of the stock. **At this point, you can refrigerate for 1-2 days ahead of time**
6. Do a final taste test then mix in the 3 eggs
7. Pour dressing into a 9x13 baking dish and bake covered for about 30 - 45 minutes. Take off foil and bake another 30/34 min until top is browned and the whole thing jiggles. To test doneness, shake casserole dish lightly. If the center of the dressing moves more than the rest , then the dressing is not cooked through in the center. Continue to bake until the dressing is set throughout.

Communion Bread Loaf (EASY!)- Good for dinner too!

This is a recipe from Luther Seminary for communion bread. Not the little tasteless wafers... this stuff is worthy to be served with a meal. The reason it's good for comunion is that it doesn't crumble and it doesn't have yeast (per tradition.) I did have to buy a sifter from Amazon but $10 isn't a bad price for a kitchen utinsil I should have owned anyway :)

Sift dry ingredients (important!) together three times:

2 c whole wheat flour
1 c white flour
1 & 1/4 tsp baking powder
1 & 1/4 tsp salt

Stir in 4 tsp oil. Set aside.
Mix wet ingredients together until dissolved:

3/4 cup + 2 Tbsp very hot water (minimum of 180 degrees F)
3 Tbsp honey
3 Tbsp molasses

Add wet ingredients to dry ingredients and mix well. Dough should be slightly sticky. Do not knead.
Divide into four balls and flatten each into a 1/4 inch thick disk.

With a knife, score the top of each loaf into eight pie-shaped sections, so that the sections can be more easily broken off while serving. Alternatively, you could score a cross onto the loaf.
Lay the loaves on a baking sheet. Bake at 350 degrees for 10 minutes. Remove from oven and brush the tops of the loaves with oil. Bake an additional 5-8 minutes. Let cool.
Yield: four 8 oz. loaves. Each loaf serves 60-70 people, depending upon the size of the piece given. The loaves freeze well.

Yeast Rolls

I found this recipe online. Supposedly it's the recipe for "back in the day" school yeast rolls.

1 pkg dry yeast
1/4 cup warm water
1 cup milk scalded
1/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup shortening
1 teaspoon salt
3 1/2 cups sifted all purpose flour
1 egg

Dissolve dry yeast in (110 degree) warm water. Let stand for 4-5 minutes. Add the shortening, sugar, salt, flour, to the scalded milk, and beat/mix until milk cools to warm. Then, I add the egg to keep it from cooking in the hot liquid. Mix for 1 minute on low speed. Add dissolved yeast and mix for 2 minutes on low speed. Knead dough on medium speed for 8 minutes, or until dough is smooth and elastic. Place dough in warm area (about 90 degrees F) for 45-60 minutes. Punch down dough to remove air bubbles. Form rolls from dough by pinching off 2 oz. pieces and shaping into balls. Place rolls in rows on sheet pans lightly coated with cooking spray. Place in a warm area (about 90 degrees F) until double in size, 30-50 minutes. Bake until lightly browned in oven at 400 degrees F for 18-20 min. They are great.

Susan's Cheddar Fritto Biscuits - Great with chili

We served these with Chili on Christmas eve and got awesome reviews!

1 pack small canned biscuits

Cheddar cheese cubes

bowl with melted butter

Frittos corn chips - crushed

Flatten out each biscuit and wrap it around a cube of cheese. Make sure that the biscuit is sealed around the cheese. Dip the biscuits in butter then roll around in crushed frittos. Bake according to the biscuit instructions - may require a few extra minutes...

Salt Dough Ornaments

Our friend Donna told me about a year when their family made salt dough ornaments as favors for a Holiday party. It sounded like something the kids would really enjoy so we did it. The adults had a lot of fun too! It's really easy to do and "no-fail" !




Ingredients/Supplies

• 4 cups of flour
• 1 cup of salt
• 1 1/2 cups warm water
• Paper Clips
• Craft Paint
• Clear Coat Paint (buy a gallon...I'll explain why later)

Directions

Pre-heat oven to 325. Cut paper clips in half so that you have two round ends from each clip. These will be the loops for hangers. Mix the salt and flour and then gradually stir in the warm water. Mix as well as you can with a wooden spoon and then finish it off by kneading with your hands until the dough is consistent. Roll it out a batch at a time to about 1/8th inch thick. It's ok if it's a little thicker but don't make them more than 1/2 inch. Use cookie cutters to cut out your shapes. Insert a hanger loop at the top of each ornament and bake for 45 min-1 hour.
Let them cool and then paint them. Let the paint dry and then seal them in clear coat paint.

*Here is why you need a gallon of clear coat*

It would take forever to paint them all with clear coat so we opened a gallon of clear coat and proceeded to dip each ornament in the clear coat and then hang it on a makeshift cloths line between two chairs. We put garbage bags under the line so they could drip. We let them dry overnight and they were good to hang the next morning.

*Note* They were still a little spongy feeling for several days but after about a week they were hard as rocks!

Savory Monkey Bread

This one is a favorite to bring to pot lucks! It won a homemade bread contest at church once! I was impressed given that I was competing with a bunch of elderly women who had probably spent all day working hard on their "real" bread and fighting with yeast etc. You can alter the ingredients- add more things or take out things you don't like!

4 cans of 10 pack biscuits (the small kind)- quarter them with scissors
2 Sticks of butter
1/2 pound fried bacon -crumbled
3/4 cup red pepper-chopped
3/4 cup green pepper-chopped
3/4 cup vidalia onion-chopped
1/2 cup shredded cheddar

Mix all ingredients in a bowl with a wooden spoon (the mixture wont stick to the wood)
Dump it all in a bundt pan and bake till done. Should be about 30 minutes @ 350

Yummy Rosemary...Bread & Pork Loin

OMG Dinner was FABULOUS tonight! First the main course...

-Marinate a pork loin in orange juice, cranberry sauce, Grey Poupon mustard, orange marmalade, salt, pepper, and fresh rosemary (all to taste)

-Fix the grill up for indirect heat. Set a pan of water in the middle of the coal wrack. Put a pile of coals on each side of the pan. Get the coals nice and hot. Place the loins over the pan of water until they reach about 145 degrees. The- coast them with the glaze (below) and flip them until internal temp is 155+

-Glaze: mix same ingredients as marinade. Bring to a boil. Simmer for about 30 min.

Let the loin sit for a few then carve it and pour some more glaze over it. Serve with BREAD.....

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This is a recipe I found online that is the same as the bread at Macaroni Grill but you can do it in the bread machine. It REALLY DOES taste just like it!!!!
http://http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Jos-Rosemary-Bread/Detail.aspx