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For as long as I can remember, Mom made “Mrs. Cheney’s Apple Cake”, or a variant thereof.

Mr. Cheney owned and operated Cheney Orchards in Brimfield Massachusetts. I grew up in the adjacent town, Monson, but Dad grew up in Brimfield, and at one time or another, worked in the orchard for Mr. Cheney.

Mrs. Cheney, his clever wife, was a college-educated (nearly scandalous at the time) home-economics teacher in Brimfield. My Aunt Joann had her as a teacher. Well, Mrs. Cheney was the author of a number of (oddly, apple-related) recipes, and I can remember seeing printed recipes for the taking at the orchard when we visited in the fall.

Herewith, Mrs. Cheney’s Apple Cake (one of many variants):

5 apples, pared & sliced (Macintosh preferably)
½ c. sugar
1 ½ tsp. cinnamon

Mix together and set aside.

3 c. flour
2 c. sugar
1 tsp. soda
2 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. salt
4 eggs
1 c. oil
1/3 c. orange juice
2 tsp. Vanilla

Mix all ingredients together well.

Grease and flour a bundt pan.

Alternate layers of batter and apples, beginning and ending with batter.

Bake at 350 degrees for 90 minutes (1 ½ hours) or until a toothpick comes out clean.

Peggy is allowing me to make cranberry sauce for dinner at my sister Jackie’s Thanksgiving.

She even found a recipe for me. Most recipes on the web contain cranberries, sugar, orange juice and either ginger, vanilla, nutmeg or something like that.

The recipe was gleaned from the www.jocooks.com website and it’s listed as the world’s best cranberry sauce. We will see and report.

(Later that same day)

Preliminary results are excellent! This is some very tasty sauce!

Thanks, Jo!

Followup: I neglected to add the vanilla called for, and the sauce was none the worse for it. I can’t even think that vanilla would be necessary.

Insofar as we left all of the leftover sauce at my sister’s house, I made a new batch on Friday to appease the spousal unit for whom this blog is named. I measured only the sugar (3/4C) this time, using a 12-ounce bag of cranberries, the zest, juice and pulp of one navel orange, and 1/8 t of nutmeg. No vanilla. The pulp, I opine, adds a bit more flavor and texture to the mix.

We’ll see what the boss says…

Following up in 2020. Everything was great, and I’ve been instructed to make this again! Well, requested, but I know what she meant…

I chased down the connection to Jo Cooks, and found a bad link, depending on your browser, so I’ll put the recipe here, but with FULL CREDIT to Jo Cooks (jocooks.com) for the recipe.

• 12 oz cranberries (1 bag), rinsed
• 1/2 C orange juice, fresh or store-bought
• 3/4 C sugar
• 1/8 tsp ground nutmeg
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 2 Tbs orange zest

Assemble all ingredients in small saucepan. Bring to a boil on medium-high heat, stirring occasionally

Reduce to medium heat and boil for ten minutes, watching in delight as the cranberries pop (OK, my flair on the recipe…)

Cool and serve at room temperature.

Stores up to two weeks in fridge, six month in freezer.

Not so much a recipe as a story. This is take two of my adventure. My first pass resulted in giant lifeless (yet tasty) masses of dough.

This time I did better, not the least of which is that I only used two apples. I bought a package of Pepperidge Farms puff pastry dough. I rolled the squares out to about ten inches, then cut those into quarters. I put some apple mixture in the middle of the squares. Wet two edges with water, and folded one corner over to form a triangle. I did not do a good job sealing, and was glad to have used parchment!

I also used an egg wash.

Baked at 400F for about 12 minutes.

The apple mixture was two peeled and pared Macintosh apples, about 1/3 C sugar, a dash each of cinnamon and nutmeg, and half a dash of ground clove, mixed well to coat the apples.

I’m blown away by how easy this can be. I had been making small batches of bread pudding over the past year, I suppose, using mostly day-old loaves of the indigenous Market Basket Cinnamon-Raisin Swirl Bread (which is also awesome as French Toast, BTW…).

Serves 4-6

Preheat the oven to 350F.

Ingredients:

• One apple (Macintosh works wonderfully)
• Two large eggs
• 1 1/2 C milk
• 1/2 C sugar
• 1/4 t cinnamon
• 1/4 t nutmeg
• 1 t vanilla extract
• 5-6 slices of cinnamon-Raisin swirl bread
• 1 T butter

Cut the bread into cubes about the thickness of one slice. Peel and core the apple, and pare into thin (1/8″) slices. Dredge the apple slice in sugar, cinnamon, and nutmeg.

Whisk the eggs until well blended, add vanilla and milk, and mix well.

Butter a 1 1/2 Qt ovenproof dish well. The remaining butter is dolloped onto the bottom of the dish. Fill the dish with the bread cubes, top with the egg mixture, taking care not to overfill. Push the bread down into the egg mixture.

Bake for 50-60 minutes at 350F. Pudding should spring back when depressed, and very little, if any, liquid remaining. Bake another 5-10 minutes as necessary.

Let it cool for a bit – it very much resembles lava when it comes out of the oven. It’s absolutely delightful with vanilla ice cream.

Here’s a photo of a batch last week (#coronavirus #self-quarantine) using a Cortland apple.

Mom always made chocolate bread pudding, so I suppose I was at least 35 or 40 before I had anything else. Peg once ordered “regular” bread pudding in a restaurant and offered a taste. Doh! For all these years I’ve eschewed this delightful stuff?

Now, many years later, I’ve made many a batch of bread pudding, but wanted a small one to avoid wasting leftovers.

And being as I’m a cheap Yankee, using hamburger buns left over from the ham radio club picnic yesterday seemed a good idea.

• 3 hamburger buns
• 1/4 C raisins
• 1/4 C sugar
• Sprinkle of nutmeg
• Sprinkle of cinnamon
• 1 C milk
• 1 egg
• 1t vanilla extract

I coarsely cubed the bread, added the raisins and spices. I mixed the egg and sugar, added the milk and vanilla, then mixed all ingredients.

I used a muffin tin, filling all six cavities, then baked for 30 minutes. The puddings came out of the oven all puffed up, and collapsed as I wrote this.

Always good with a bit of creme anglaise, too. I just have to post a recipe.

I was at the market just as the snow from the latest Nor’Easter was starting to fly in earnest. I was ostensibly there just for bread, but saw this beautiful crown of broccoli in the produce aisle, and one of Peg’s favorites, Cream of Broccoli soup, came to mind.

1 large crown of broccoli, cut into 2″ pieces
1 small onion, quartered
2 C water
1T Chicken base
1C Sour cream
1C half & half
salt, pepper, nutmeg to taste

Peel the broccoli stems if necessary. The fiber does not break down nicely.

After cutting the broccoli and onion, put them in a stock pot with the water. Cover and bring to a boil. Lower the heat and simmer for 10 minutes or until broccoli is tender. The onion will be tender by that point as well.

I used an immersion blender to break down the vegetables, then added the chicken base, salt and pepper, then let the mixture cook for a while longer.

When ready to serve, stir in the sour cream and half & half. Add very little nutmeg – just enough so you can almost taste it. Adjust salt & pepper.

Ladle into bowls and serve (grilled cheese sandwiches come to mind…)

Yes, this is different from the other recipe – simpler and easier to make.

2# yellow potatoes, peeled and diced 1/2″
1 small onion, finely diced
1# bag of frozen corn
4-5 oz ham, diced 1/2″
2T Butter
3T Flour
2C Milk
2C Water
Salt
Pepper

Looking at the lead times of ingredient preparation, I usually start with the potatoes. Peeled and diced to about 1/2″, the potatoes are put on to just boil – we want them tender, but not already cooked through.

While the potatoes are cooking, dice the onion and ham. The ham should be about 1/2″ dice as well.

When the potatoes are ready, drain them in a colander and put the pot back on the burner.

Melt the butter and saute the onions until just tender, then stir in the flour and mix thoroughly, and cook this roux for about two minutes.

Whisk in the water, then mix in the corn and ham. Bring this mixture to a boil for two minutes, then add the milk and potatoes, season with salt and pepper to taste. Simmer until the potatoes are fully tender.

Serve with oyster crackers or Saltines.

I find that the other recipe, with red bell pepper, really bests this version, but I didn’t have any peppers last night. And this was pretty good.

Have fun cooking!

Thanksgiving was a small affair this year, just Peg (the blog’s namesake) and me. Ordinarily I’d have helped out with a pie or something, but I did the whole shebang today. Turkey, mashed potatoes, stuffing, gravy, roasted brussels sprouts, cranberry sauce, and pecan pie. All very straightforward, most I’ve done before, but I managed to pull it all together, mostly on time.

The turkey was a 12 pound Jenny-O, roasted according to the package instructions (325F for about 3 hours and a bit).

Four potatoes (about 1.5# were peeled, roughly cubed, and boiled until done (tender by fork and tasted “done”) with 2 T of butter and a splash of milk.

I cheated on the stuffing and got Pepperidge Farm Country Style, which is really easy and really good. That was prepared with 4T butter, one can of chicken broth, and about a teaspoon of dried onion. Melted the butter, heated the broth, mixed in the stuffing, and put it all in a casserole which went into the oven a few minutes before the turkey came out.

Brussels sprouts I made according to a recipe I found here( and of course I bookmarked it!). I did eliminate the garlic because it’s not Peg’s favorite. This turned out great, by the way!

The pecan pie was made according to the classic Karo Syrup recipe which turns out to be the “family secret” after years of everybody raving over my Aunt Glenna’s Pecan Pie. I did forget to include the butter, but it turned out great just the same, making me think the butter isn’t really needed. The pie shell stuck in the Fiestaware pie plate though, so next time it will get sprayed. It doesn’t matter, but I used the dark syrup. The web site says either will do, and I’ve used both to good effect in past years (and of course I claim the recipe is a “family secret”).

Cranberry sauce? Ocean Spray, of course. What else could we serve in Massachusetts?

And the gravy was dead straightforward. There was about a cup of drippings in the turkey pan, with hardly any fat. I melted 2T of butter in a saucepan, added 3T of flour, and made a relatively dark roux, then added the drippings and one cup of milk, with a little salt and pepper, and cooked that until it was thickened a bit.

It turned out lovely.

Thanks and Happy Thanksgiving!

John

I just noticed that I hadn’t visited here since June. There’s a good reason. Look at the recipe for Dutch Oven Chicken, for example. You end up with a whole chicken! Peg and I both had bariatric surgery, she at the end of June, and me in the middle of July. This surgery hugely impacts the amount of food we can eat, though not so much what we can eat. I tend to still have protein shakes for breakfast and lunch, but “regular” food for dinner.

But we can eat only a fraction of what we used to eat. This whole chicken, for example, would be meals for two, maybe three nights. Now, one whole chicken can last us a week! I might have one chicken leg and a cup of spinach, say, for dinner, and the next night a thigh and a cup of green beans.

That said, I am working on some recipes that produce smaller servings, and fewer of them.

In a positive vein, Peg has lost more weight than me, and I’m down nearly 70 pounds.

Be well,
John