This Dame Cooks A Collection of Recipes from Alaska to the South Pacific and Caribbean

This is last night’s dinner:  small chicken stuffed with limes, rosemary and onion roasted over chunks of sweet potato and wedges of more onion.  Gravy from the pan drippings had all the flavors of the lime, rosemary and onion.  The side dish was buttered peas with hazelnuts and tarragon.  What a treat for a mid-week meal and it only took a few minutes to prepare, the oven did the rest.  The chicken was juicy and tender, the sweet potatoes caramelized just slightly on the bottom as were the onions on the bottom of the pan.  The 90 minutes of roasting was enough time to have a drink, put my feet up and relax.  I love simple and tasty meals that are fabulous and comforting the first night and yield leftovers for soup, pasta or quiche the next day.  Do try this one, you won’t be disappointed.

Ingredients:

• 3 pound whole chicken, rinsed under cold running water, and drained on paper toweling
• 1 lime, rinsed and halved
• 1/2 onion, peeled and sliced in half
• 1/2 onion, peeled and sliced into 4 wedges
• 2 sprigs of fresh rosemary
• salt and pepper
• 1 large sweet potato, scrubbed and cut crosswise into 4 thick rounds (or 2 small potatoes cut lengthwise)

Method:

1. Place 4 wedges of onion in the center of a shallow roasting pan.
2. Top onion wedges with the sweet potato rounds.
3. Liberally salt and pepper the inside of the chicken. With the chicken breast-side up, stuff the chicken with the lime halves, rosemary sprigs and the remaining onion half.
4. Fold the skin flaps over the opening and skewer or tie the legs together.
5. Tuck the wings under the back and place the chicken ontop of the sweet potatoes.
6. Liberally salt and pepper the outside of the chicken.
7. Place in 350° F. oven for 30 minutes or until golden brown on outside.  Tent with foil and continue roasting for 1 hour.  Check for doneness with a thermometer or prick the skin between the leg and breast and if the juices run clear, its done.
8. Remove the chicken to a platter and allow to rest for 15-20 minutes.  Place the vegetables on a serving platter. 
9.  Pour any juices not absorbed by the chicken back into the roasting pan for gravy if desired.  Move the chicken to the craving block or serving platter for presentation.

Lumpless gravy everytime:

1. To 1 cup of cold water, add 2 heaping Tbsp of flour and whisk until smooth.
2. Add stock, water or wine to pan drippings, scraping the bottom of the pan.
3. Bring to a boil and whisk in the cold flour water.  Cook until thickened. 
4. For thicker gravy, increase the amount of flour in step 1. 
5. Be sure to check your gravy for salt and pepper before serving.

The year is winding down and will be highlighted with crowd pleasing party nibbles to go with popular drinks.  Try these out this New Year’s Eve.  What resolutions will you make for the coming year?  After all this feasting and drinking I’ll be going on a diet – this one is guaranteed to make you lose 10 pounds a week.  After 60 I fear that”s optimistic but we shall see.  Salsa dancing and walking helps take pounds off too and I’ll be dancing up a storm on New Year’s Eve.  Hope you do too.

Its time to break out the heirloom candy and cookie recipes for the holidays and add one or two new ones to your repetoire.  One of my favorite Christmas cookies is a Spritz.  The flavor varieties (lemon, almond, peppermint, orange, banana, chocolate, etc.) and decorating options have no limits.   I’ve actually made heirloom vintage hatboxes filled with Spritz cookies in years past.  Everyone loved the novelty of the hatboxes and of-course the cookies.  This year I’m giving boxes with a variety of cookies… Spritz, Rum Balls, Pecan Sandies and Chinese Sesame Buttons.

My Rum Ball recipe is from Katy Custer, an old friend from my years in Alaska.  She made these every year and had to hide them under her bed so her boys wouldn’t eat them all before they aged the appropriate time.  Pecan Sandies are from my childhood.  They just melt in your mouth and since they have no eggs they’re fairly close to being a tender bite of shortbread.  Chinese Sesame Buttons were my stand-by cookies in Tonga because they held up so well to the humidity in the islands and all the ingredients were easy to come by.  They’re nutty, crisp and buttery.  The local Chinese use lard in their cookies for Chinese New Year but I like the taste of butter in mine.

Spritz Cookies

Ingredients for 40 cookies:

•  1 cup butter
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 egg
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 2-1/2 cups flour

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 350° F.
2. Cream butter and sugar until fluffy.  Add egg, vanilla extract and salt, beat until smooth.
3. Add flour gradually until all is incorporated. 
4. Fill cookie press or pastry bag with dough.  Press onto ungreased cookie sheet 1-inch apart.  Decorate with sprinkles, jam, etc.
5. Bake 10 to 12 minutes just until the edges turn barely brown and the dough has set.
6. Remove from sheet pan to cooling rack.  Ice as desired.
7. Store in airtight tin.  May be frozen.

Notes:

1. Substitute cardamon seeds or vanilla seeds,  or extracts such as peppermint, almond, orange, banana, or lemon or liqueur of choice for the vanilla extract.
2. Add 2 Tbsp cocoa powder and 1 tsp Kahlua to the dough for moca spritz, omit the vanilla extract.
3. To color dough add 3 or 4 drops of food coloring to the finished dough. 
4. Divide dough in half or more then color and flavor each portion separately. 

Katy’s No-Bake Rum Balls

Ingredients for 2 dozen:

• 2–1/2 cups crushed vanilla wafers
• 2 Tbsp. cocoa powder plus more for coating
• 1 cup powdered sugar plus more for coating
• 1 cup chopped walnuts
• 3 Tbsp. white corn syrup (Karo brand)
• 1/4 cup dark rum (bourbon or brandy if desired)

Method:

1. Mix all dry ingredients together.  Add wet ingredients and stir until combined.
2. Roll dough into 1-inch balls. 
3. Roll each ball into powdered sugar or cocoa powder.
4. Place balls in a ziplock bag or plastic storage box with tight lid.
5. Let age in a cool, dark place for 1 week.  Re-roll in powdered sugar or cocoa powder before serving if desired. 

Pecan Sandies

Ingredients for 3 dozen:

• 1 cup butter
• 1/3 cup sugar
• 2 tsp water
• 2 tsp vanilla extract 
• 2 cups sifted flour
• 1 cup chopped pecans

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 325° F.
2. Cream together the butter, sugar, water and vanilla.
3. Mix in the flour and pecans.
4. Chill dough for 3 or 4 hours.  Shape into balls, crescents or fingers.
5. Bake on an ungreased cookie sheet for 20 minutes. Remove to cooling rack.
6. When completely cool roll in powdered sugar.
7. Store in airtight tin.  May be frozen.  Roll in additional powdered sugar before serving.

Chinese Sesame Buttons

Ingredients for 100 cookies:

• 1 pound butter
• 3/4 cup brown sugar
• 1-1/2 cups granulated sugar
• 1-1/2 Tbsp powdered milk (low-fat or skim milk works well)
• 1 Tbsp ice water
• 2 eggs
• 3 tsp baking soda
• 5 tsp cream of tartar
• 5-1/2 cups flour
• 2 cups raw sesame seeds

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 350° F.
2. Cream butter, sugars, milk powder, water and eggs until fluffy.
3. Mix together flour, baking soda, and cream of tartar.  Gradually add flour mixture to creamed mixture just until dough holds together.
4. Roll dough into walnut sized balls then roll each ball in sesame seeds.
5. Place on an ungreased cookie sheet 2-inches apart.
6. Bake for 15 minutes or until cookies have cracks on the surface.
7. Remove to cooking rack.  Store in airtight tin.  May be frozen.

There is nothing quite like mornings in the center of Rincon, Puerto Rico.  The neighbor is singing in the shower, some romantic Latin tune, the sun is shining, the birds are chirping, people are passing on their way home to enjoy coffee and pastry from the panaderias.   Breakfast on the veranda with eggs Benedict, fresh papaya with a squeeze of lime and a cup of robust Puerto Rican coffee simply adds deliciousness to the morning.

Living on an island, with logistics such as they are, make imported specialty breads rather expensive.  This is not the first island I’ve lived on and having weathered several years in the South Pacific where even less was available, I enjoy “cooking from scratch.”  So long as the basic ingredients are available or suitable substitutes, just about anything is possible to make from scratch. 

This recipe is one I used in my restaurant on Tongatapu.  It’s super easy and makes about 12 4-inch muffins.  I use a food processor but you can use a mixer with dough hook or mix by hand.

Ingredients:

• 1 cup hot water
• 1/2 cup cold milk
• 2 tsp sugar
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 Tbsp yeast (1 envelope)
• 4 cups bread flour, divided
• 3 Tbsp butter, melted
• 2 Tbsp cornmeal

Method:

1. In the bowl of a mixer or food processor, pour water and milk, add sugar, salt and yeast.  Stir and let yeast proof for 10 minutes.
2. Add 2 cups of flour and beat for 5 minutes.  
3. Cover the bowl with a clean kitchen towel and let rise for 1 hour or more until double in volume. (this is the sponge)
4. Add remaining 2 cups of flour and butter.  Beat until a ball of dough forms.
5. Turn out on a floured board, knead a few times and shape into a ball. Let rest 10 minutes.
6. Lightly roll out dough to 1/2-inch thickness.  Flour a 3 or 4-inch cutter and cut out muffins.
7. Place muffins on a baking sheet dusted with cornmeal and let proof about 20 minutes.
8. Heat a non-stick skillet over medium high heat, add 1 tsp of oil to coat bottom, spread it around and remove excess with a paper towel.
9. Carefully place proofed muffins, 3 or 4 at a time, into skillet.   Cook until lightly toasted on both sides, moving or twirling each muffin frequently.  Remove to a cooling rack.
10. Muffins may be frozen in ziplock bags once cooled completely.

English Muffins

Beach near apartment

I don’t know of anyone who has not suffered some calamity in their kitchen…either a dish that bombed or an appliance that failed in an untimely moment.  It doesn’t matter if you’re a career chef or Susie Homemaker, stuff happens, some funny and some downright scary.  Do you stay cool, or, do you pout and throw a tantrum?

Since moving to Rincon on the Western side of Puerto Rico I have spent 2 two weeks getting the gas company to fix the leak in my gas line and replace the bottle of gas wasted.  Fortunately for me the gas bottle is outside on the side of the apartment where my spare bedroom is located so I didn’t smell the gas.  Unfortunately, it was my neighbors who suffered headaches and the gas smell.  Of-course I had to turn off the gas lest we all succumb or are blown to smithereens.  It was tedious to eat meals prepared in the microwave but the alternative was much more grave.

There is also no oven in this lovely little apartment so I had to buy an oven.

Finally, all appliances safely in working order I began to think about Christmas goodies for gift baskets.
The Barefoot Contessa just aired a program with orange marmalade so thought I’d give it a try. The recipe called for simmering the oranges for 2 hours and then boiling for 30 minutes more. I followed the recipe to the T and ended up with rock candy, the color of molasses.  Apparently the low temperature on my range is more like medium and that means I need a recipe that cooks a lot faster or wait for the gasman to come and adjust the range.  Back to the cookbooks…I know I had another recipe for orange marmalade that worked perfectly…I think it was in Better Homes & Garden…a wedding gift from my mother back in 1967. 

Apt on Plaza de Rincon

I’ve been dying for homemade bread since the local bread shops only make a white bread called pan de agua, sort of like white Wonder Bread. You know, the squishy kind that kids like.  Some panaderias (bakeries) make a French style loaf but there aren’t any artisan breads made in panaderias de Rincon.  I also haven’t seen any rye flour or whole wheat flour in the local supermarket.  For serious bread supplies, I’ll have to make a  trip to the big city of Mayaguez or Aguadilla.    At any rate, to break-in my new oven I decided to make my standby Italian bread recipe.  So with the oven preheated to 375° F. and the timer set for 45 minutes, I threw a couple ice-cubes onto the floor of the oven for humidity, then watched as my perfectly gorgeous round of Italian bread mushroomed and began browning. At 25 minutes it looked like the top was way too brown but the bread could not possibly be done inside so I moved the pan to a lower rack and lowered the temperature just a smidgen. Silly me, I didn’t have any foil to tent the bread and prevent it from burning on top. Well, it definitely looked done at 40 minutes and sounded done when I thumped it on the bottom so I set the round on my cooling rack, waited a few minutes, and cut a slice. 

I could not believe it…the inside was not done. And, on top of that the bread had no discernable flavor.  It just tasted flat.  I reviewed the recipe and ticked off every ingredient, there’s only 5 ingredients for Pete’s sake, I know I put the salt and olive oil into the bowl.   What a disappointment.  I so looked forward to a hot slice of Italian slathered with butter.  It simply was not my day in the kitchen.   My mood was totally deflated.

You know what they say, “when life gives you lemons, make lemonade.”  That bread was fine this morning as French Toast and the marmalade nay rock-candy ended up in the syrup bottle after a bit of water and vanilla was added.
I have a new novel to bury myself in today.  Meanwhile, the ghosts of yesterday’s bombs can take a hike.  After all, I will cook again and it will be a blue-ribbon entry, just you wait and see!