Browsing Tag

Cooking

Bless Your Heart by Cindy Colley

The Right Folks in Your Corner–Your Kitchen Corner.

I had a happy and busy kitchen going on the night before Thanksgiving. My dear friend, Diane, was there and she really wanted to help me. So I gave her all the ingredients for the chai mix. “I make a huge batch for holiday company and Christmas giving,” I told her. “So just follow the recipe—times 8. Here’s a measuring cup.” 

Well, she barely got the first two ingredients mixed together before that 5 gallon container I gave her was overflowing. What in the world was happening over there on the chai counter while I was over on the potato salad counter? ”This seems like a lot of chai that’s coming together. I’m going to have to get you a bigger container.” 

“Well,” Diane answered…”I just put eight of these in and it just makes a lot.” 

“Oh wait,” I said. “You do know the measuring cup I gave you is a two-cupper?”

“Oh no!” she exclaimed. “I have put 16 cups of powdered milk in this thing (instead of just eight) and now I have mixed 16 cups of French vanilla creamer in there!”

“O dear!” I said “Now you’re going to have to do the whole recipe—times 16! Do I even have that much cinnamon and ginger and cardamom? That will be my life savings in cardamom. And the sugar! Oh, that will be 40 cups of sugar! Do I even have 40 cups of sugar?! It’s 10 p.m. Is the corner market open?”   I got out my grandmother’s old porcelain washtub and we were making enough chai for serving at the king’s coronation. We stirred until our arms felt like we’d been lifting in an Olympic trial. And where do you even store that much chai? 

We really didn’t have a pan big enough to keep adding the ratios of ingredients we needed, so we just added instant milk and tea, till it kind of “looked right.” Glenn was our guinea pig and he said “ I believe this is better than usual!”

Then it was the evening of our “Christmas at the Colleys”. That’s the night the whole church is invited over for supper, along with a whole bunch of other people. We have an amazing time with our favorite family…God’s family. Another best friend, Jennifer, really was so very kind to persist in offering to come help me the day of the party. She helped me put up wreaths and tie bows and assemble cocoa servers and all kinds of things. But the main thing I saved out for Jennifer to do was to make three large cherry dump cakes. Here’s the complex ingredient list. I was doing it times three.

  • 1 (30-ounce) can cherry pie filling
  • 1 box yellow cake mix
  • 1 stick salted butter.

So you pour in the cake mix. Then you dump the cherry pie filling on top of that. Then you cut up the stick of butter on top and you put it in the oven for about 45 minutes. 

I just said “Here you go,” to Jennifer and handed her all the ingredients. She said “I’m just going to do one at the time.” 

“No, No,” I insisted. “I never do that. Just do them all at once.”  I got her three 9X13 Pyrex dishes and let her go. I should have taken pause when she wanted a huge mixing bowl. But I missed that cue. I went upstairs to clean up a mess around Eliza’s dollhouse. We had about an hour-and-a-half before the house would be teeming with people. All was well. 

…Until I came back down and Jennifer said “Come see if this is the right consistency.” Ummm… how do you miss the consistency of a dump cake?

Jennifer was holding a heavy, mammoth bowl of dark pink pudding-like yum,-yum.  Its contents were three cake mixes, three giant cans of cherry pie filling and three sticks of butter. It looked like we were having a cherry jubilee pudding festival. It really looked like we were going for the Guinness Book of World Records—largest pudding. But it was so pretty. 

“What on earth did you do?” 

“You said a dump cake, so I dumped.” 

It’s true. I did not say “layer.” I said “dump.” 

Now Jennifer and I have been through a few adventures together and I could not stop laughing. But I had to stop laughing… and think. A hundred-plus people are coming over for supper in an hour. I have a pecan pie, a few little cookies, and a strawberry cake. “But what is that among so many (Jn. 6:8)?”

“I’ll go to the store really quickly and we will start all over….I know, I’ll get one of my friends who lives over by the bakery to stop and pick up some cakes. Or maybe Glenn, who is outside stringing lights could just hurry up and go shopping with my list.” 

Jennifer, ever the resourceful one, said, “Let’s add some milk and just put one of these in the oven and see what happens and then panic later.” 

Forty-five minutes later, and just in time for the wonderful shoulder-to-shoulder fellowship, this Christmas  dish came out of the oven.  And if Lucy and Ethel didn’t come up with the prettiest cherry soufflé ( I mean, eventually, three of them) that you have ever seen! 

People said “What is this stuff? It’s not cake. It’s not really pie. It’s not pudding. But it’s good.”  Scotty said “This tastes kinda’ like dump cake, but it’s not that….The texture is off.” It was even pretty. When I turned the leftover one out of the fluted-edged pan, it retained the shape. It’s in the freezer and it might be a layer of a pretty holiday mousse dessert in a few days. 

And then there was the broccoli rice casserole that Han made for me to feed the kids while she was working last week. “Mom, it’s been a little hectic here and I wasn’t paying attention and I put potato flakes on top of this instead of potato chips. So I really don’t know what you’ll want to do with this. But here’s some ham. I didn’t mess that up.”  

Well, adding milk seems to solve pretty much all the ingredient assembly cooking “fails” lately. I’ll do that. So I poured a little milk over the top of that casserole and it became a wonderful broccoli-cheddar shepherd’s pie. Those kids and I ate every bite. 

But what in the world is happening on every kitchen counter behind which I step? And what is happening to my every kitchen helper? And what is the magic of milk? And how can I keep laughing this hard? 

Well, I’ve pretty much decided that there’s always a fix to any cooking mess, if I have the right folks in my corner and if I have milk. Here are a few pithy truths from the kitchen faux pas.

  • Sometimes, some pretty good things can come about as a result of mistakes.
  • Often, the things that make you panic most feverishly, also make you laugh the hardest.
  • If your husband is willing to be your guinea pig, you are most blessed.
  • A recipe is not just about having all the right stuff. It’s also about following directions. Life’s  recipe for success is like that, too.
  • Milk is sometimes the answer. The sincere milk of the word is always the answer. We should desire it (1 Peter 2:2).
  • Every messed-up dish in my world is heartier and better than any dish I’ve ever tasted in any 3rd world country. 

Having pondered these dishes that didn’t turn out like I’d planned, I am thankful for my kitchen and even for my kitchen fails. I’m thankful for great and voluntary kitchen hands—sisters who  pull me on through the mistakes and flops, large and small. I thank Him for my kitchen because it’s a great place to grow closer to each other and from which to serve with sisters.

Bless Your Heart by Cindy Colley

Mama’s K.I.S.S. #65– “You Cook” Night

As you know, if you’ve been reading, for quite some time, I’ve occasionally been running little installments called “Mama’s K.I.S.S.” I know that lots of readers could give many more and far more creative ideas than I can offer, but these installments are just a few tried and true and mostly old-fashioned ideas for putting service hearts in our kids.  This is number 57  of a list of one hundred ways we train our kids to serve. K.I.S.S. is an acronym for “Kids In Service Suggestions”.

 

This one’s a real keepers-ar-home training night as, each time you do it, your daughter will become more proficient in the kitchen, and, pretty soon, you will be able to depend on her at any time, to step in and cook for the family. Start simply, the first time, even using a pre-packaged entree that just goes in and out of the oven. Show her how to add some mozzarella at the last minute to the freezer lasagna or how to add a half block of cream cheese to the Kraft macaroni and cheese to make it more like homemade. That’s how it starts, but next time you can teach her to boil her own noodles and add all the ingredients . The crock pot is you friend while you teach a young girl to cook. Easy layer desserts and dump cakes will seem like magic to a six-year-old!

Then, when it’s time for the family to come to the table, don’t forget what is, at first, the most important part. Make a big deal about how “Sis cooked the whole meal!” Brag about the taste of every dish you try and even have her take a bow when you’re all done.

Next go-around,  have her set the table while the food is cooking, teaching her the lost art of fork, knife, spoon and napkin placement. Maybe even have some yard flowers she can arrange for a centerpiece. Have her make the tea from scratch. And this time, brag even bigger.

I know this all seems intuitive, but I recently attended a retreat for women who aspire to be Biblical keepers at hime in the Titus 2 way. I was a little taken aback by how much of the intuitive-ness of keeping at home we have lost somewhere along the path of America’s journey of feminism. I was amazed that some sisters had never learned to sew on a replacement button or tack up a hem. This gathering showed me two things: (1) Titus 2 needs to be a “thing” again in our Bible classes and women’s workshops, and (2) Women are willing to bunk in cabins and get up early to strive to be what God has divinely called them to be in Titus 2. That realization instigated a little party in my heart!

Here’s a sampling of some first recipes from our house:

Hannah’s Signature Recipes:

Chocolate Chip Cookie Dessert

1 pkg. Chips Ahoy Cookies

1 medium tub of Cool Whip

1 cup milk

Pour the milk in a bowl and dip enough of the cookies to cover the bottom of your serving dish. Cover this with a layer of cool whip. Repeat till all used up (ending with cool whip) except a couple of cookies. Crumble these cookies and sprinkle on top. YUM!

Hannah’s Macaroni and Cheese

4 c. cooked and drained macaroni noodles

½ c. milk

3 TBSP butter

½ c. cream cheese

1 ½ c. shredded cheddar cheese

3 TBSP sour cream

salt and pepper to taste

Mix all these ingredients in a big bowl while the cooked noodles are still piping hot. You can put it in the oven and bake for a few minutes if you want, BUT my favorite right from the bowl I mixed all this in!

Caleb’s Signature Recipes:

Monkey Bread

¾ c. sugar

2-3 tsp cinnamon

2 large cans biscuits

1 stick butter

Cut biscuits into quarters. Combine sugar and cinnamon in bowl. Add quartered biscuits and shake till well coated. Drop in grease round pan and add 1 stick of melted butter on top. Bake at 350 for 45 minutes or till golden brown. (Caleb made this in a Bundt type pan and so it came out as a wreath. He then would sprinkle green sugar or red and green sprinkles on the top and make a wreath to take to people at Christmas time. Sometimes he would put red hots and a green sprig at the bottom for a bow. You could do this, of course, any time of year using candy corn for fall or jellybeans for spring, etc…)

Honey’s Peanut Butter Cookies

½  cup peanut butter

1 stick margarine

½ cup brown sugar

½ c. white sugar

1 beaten egg

1 cup flour

½ tsp. baking powder

pinch of salt

 

Cream first four ingredients. Then add the rest. Chill this dough (or not, if you can’t wait!). Roll dough in marble sized balls. Mash with bottom of glass that has been dipped in sugar. (350 for 10-12 minutes)

Bless Your Heart by Cindy Colley

Crockpot Christmas CONTEST!

 

unknownEvery December The Colley House has a fun contest and give-away. This year’s contest is unabashedly self-serving for me.  Perhaps it will be helpful to someone else who’s got a lot going on this Christmas, as well. Since I’ve got at least four Christmas dinners for which I’m preparing all or a significant amount of the food, I’m asking for your best and most SIMPLE holiday recipes.  Who’s in? Just send me your favorite holiday crock-pot recipe OR a simple tried and true recipe that your family loves around the Christmas table. It can be anything from appetizers to desserts or any dish in between. It can be for your football game gatherings during the holidays or even the cookies you leave for Santa. The key is simplicity! I want recipes that I can make quickly AND that will be popular with the family. (Popular food makes the cook popular, too!)  You can enter as many times as you like and the top three winners will get to choose any two Colley House products at no cost! (There are four new Colley House books published in 2016, so you might want to check those out.) I’ll publish the best of the recipes and I’ll think of you all while I’m cooking those holiday meals. (I know I could go to Pinterest, but I love sister recipes because they’re sort of a like a long distance potluck!) Deadline is December 16th at noon. You can email the recipes to byhcontest@gmail.com. So hurry and send me a taste of your holiday! Blessings and much holiday happiness to you and yours!

P.S. I’ll share first. Here’s the recipe for Caramel Popcorn Balls, the traditional tree-trimming snack at the Colley house:

1 box brown sugar–1/2 cup butter–1/2 cup light corn syrup–1 T water–1 t. salt
Mix all that up (you don’t have to melt the butter. Just throw it in there) Microwave all that for 10 minutes. But after five of those ten minutes, take it out and stir it and add 2 tsp. of baking soda.) Then finish microwaving. Then pour over or mix in 3 quarts of popped corn and 1 cup of peanuts. (We leave out the nuts and just add a little more corn, because Hannah doesn’t like nuts) Spread on foil or waxed paper to cool or form balls. (We like the balls and to do this I spread butter on a piece of wax paper and hold this in my hand while I “squish” the ball together. You need something in your hand, because it is very hot when you mold them.) We love these! (The original recipe says microwave 12 minutes, but my microwave burns the caramel at 12 minutes, so I guess you kind of have to play with that!) They are so yum. Ezra left little sticky “Ock-corns” all over the house! He went crazy over them!15250781_961064418549_1488882612686999350_o

 

Bless Your Heart by Cindy Colley

Mama’s K.I.S.S. #43–Cooking Times Four

Portrait of happy mother and her daughter cooking in the kitchen

As you know, if you’ve been reading, for quite some time, I’ve occasionally been running little installments called “Mama’s K.I.S.S.” I know that lots of readers could give many more and far more creative ideas than I can offer, but these installments are just a few tried and true and mostly old-fashioned ideas for putting service hearts in our kids.  This is number 43 of a list of one hundred ways we train our kids to serve. K.I.S.S. is an acronym for “Kids In Service Suggestions”.

I’m sure you’ve thought of doing this with your kids, but it’s been a real benefit to ministry on several occasions for this family. Every time I make a casserole, a cobbler or a soup of any kind, I multiply all ingredient amounts by four, prepare the ingredients, and then spoon them out into 4-6 casserole dishes (depending on dish sizes), cover them well with heavy-duty foil, and freeze all of them except the one we are having for supper. I usually place the wrapped dishes in individual giant zippy bags to help guard them from freezer burn. I also label the bags with the name of the dish and the instructions for cooking or re-heating the dish. The casseroles and pies are almost always placed in the freezer before the baking, so you can just grab them from the freezer, thaw them and bake according to directions. Soups only need reheating. This is great math for upper-elementary kids, as they multiply the fractions of cups and teaspoons, and it’s great hospitality and benevolence planning for kids (especially daughters) of any age.

I know I don’t need to explain the benefits of this, but here goes. It’s cheaper to buy ingredients in bulk.  It greatly reduces cooking time because it only takes a few more minutes to make four casseroles than it takes to make one. When you do four meals at the time, you have one mess to clean up instead of four. 

But the biggest plus for me is being able to take a dish to a grieving family on the spur of the moment or to enjoy time with visiting family or friends instead of spending all my time cooking and cleaning the kitchen. It’s great to be able to have food on hand for Sunday dinners or fellowship meals. It’s great to be able to take a meal to someone who has just gotten home from the hospital or to someone who has a sick child. Best of all, your kids are watching and absorbing this active freezer ministry which just becomes a part of your family’s routine. It would be worth the price of my deep freezer many times over just for the consistency of hospitality and benevolence that it afforded our family. Of course we were still not even close to thorough or perfect as we took advantage of having a deep freezer. But still, it was/is a very helpful tool. 

Here are some dishes that work particularly well in the freezer. I’ve included the most recent recipe that I prepared and froze as well. It was very good! Thanks to Diana Shafer in Collierville, TN for sharing! It has already gone to a couple of octogenarians in their home in Tennessee and  to a visiting preacher-student family around our table.

These work well: 

Any kind of soup

Chili

Lasagne

Poppy seed chicken casseroles

Chicken, broccoli and rice casseroles

Most pasta dishes (especially if they are creamy)

Ground beef and vegetable casseroles

Dumpling dishes

Cobblers of any kind 

Dump cakes

Enchilada casseroles

Casseroles with crescent roll type crusts/toppings

Homemade Bread (Wrap well in a couple of layers of heavy duty foil or plastic wrap.)

(If a casserole calls for a cracker or potato chip or corn chip topping, add this after you remove it from the freezer.) 

                                                                                  Creamy Chicken

Ingredients:

4-8 chicken breasts or 1 chicken

1 pt. sour cream

1 can cream of chicken soup

1 8 oz. package Pepperidge Farm dressing mix (may use more)… (Also, I think I used a store brand and it was yum.)

1/4 c.milk

1 can cream of mushroom soup

Directions:

Cook chicken (boil or cook in microwave). Cool. Remove skin and cut into bite-size pieces. Line 9×13 dish with chicken. (But you can really use any size dishes. cc) Sprinkle with salt. Combine soups, sour cream and milk. Spread this over chicken.Prepare dressing mix according to directions on package. Margarine may be omitted if you do not like rich dressing. Use broth from chicken or chicken bouillon for liquid required in dressing mix. Spread dressing on top of soup mixture. Cover with foil. Bake at 350 degrees F for about 45 minutes. May be frozen before baking.  (This is easy and so very good!)