You know it’s Christmas when you have leftover dip, hambone pickings and Clodhoppers for breakfast, lunch and dinner.
We had an amazing afternoon with Tagyn and Diego at A Christmas Carol – Diego, whom I drove crazy asking to say “dulce de leche” and “Feliz Navidad” about 50 times (he’s 7 and speaks Spanish) brought me a batch of homemade shoe soles – like small, oval, sweet pancakes native to Mexico, with a ketchup-shaped bottle of – something I’ve forgotten the name of and just realized the bottle is on the back seat of the car, and I’m in my PJs and it’s a hundred below outside – it’s like dulce de leche, only darker and better, with a cooler name. We dipped into the stash when the lights went down and squirted caramel on our shoe soles and tried to eat them without getting busted.
Up to that point, you understand I had eaten exactly this: leftover biscuits toasted with butter and mandarin jam, nut balls, ham pickings, Clodhoppers and coffee. We dragged our feet on the way back to pick W up from Mike’s Mom’s (his first time staying there with both his Mom & sister – he requires a team effort) and so stopped at Beano to get a cafe mocha, just because we could.
Which was delicious, but didn’t make us feel much better. After some chaotic Christmas gift returns (that’s what you get for being on the ball and buying stuff early – it ends up being broken) and a stop at the grocery store for my segments (4!) on BT tomorrow morning, we got home at close to 8 more wanting something that didn’t resemble chocolate than actually being hungry. We had leftover edamame walnut dip and mini lamb burgers with tzatziki while I made stuff for tomorrow.
Mini Lamb Burgers in Mini Pitas with Tzatziki
These would make great full-sized burgers too, but the rich lamb and feta is perfect for nibbling.
1 lb. ground lamb
1/2 cup bread crumbs
1/2 cup crumbled feta
1/4 cup currants
1 egg
1-2 Tbsp. chopped fresh mint
1 tsp. dried oregano
salt & pepper
mini pitas, cut in half crosswise
spring greens
Tzatziki (below)
Roll them into meatball-sized balls, and flatten them a little into tiny patties. (If you are doing a lot, put them all on a rimmed baking sheet and then squish them down by pressing another sheet on top of them.) If you like, you could freeze them at this point and bake them from frozen. Otherwise they could be frozen after they are baked.
Bake at 425°F for about 10 minutes, until they are cooked through.
To serve, stuff into half a mini pita with a few leaves from a box of spring greens and a glop of tzatziki.
Tzatziki
Regular yogurt, preferably thick Greek yogurt, is far superior to the runny low fat or fat free varieties that are most commonly found at the grocery store. Even ‘full fat’ yogurts generally only contain about 3 grams per half cup, and it’s much more delicious and satisfying. If you like, strain the yogurt through some cheesecloth for several hours to thicken it. (Save the drained-off liquid to use in pancake or muffin batter.)
1 small cucumber, peeled if necessary
1 – 2 cloves garlic, crushed
2 cups good quality plain yogurt, preferably Balkan-style
Salt & pepper to taste
Grate the cucumber with a box grater onto a double thickness of paper towel. Gather up the cucumber in the towel and squeeze out as much excess water as you can.
Combine cucumber, garlic, yogurt, salt and pepper in a bowl and stir until well blended. If you like, add a squeeze or lemon. The garlic flavor will intensify the longer it sits. Makes 2 1/2 – 3 cups.
Per 1/3 cup: 45 calories, 1 g total fat (0.6 g saturated fat, 0.3 g monounsaturated fat, 0.1 g polyunsaturated fat), 3.5 g protein, 5.6 g carbohydrate, 3.7 mg cholesterol, 0.3 g fiber. 20% calories from fat
Instead of cookies today I’m offering up another small sweet (and only because you got two cookies yesterday) – Mike is a huge fan of maple fudge. And fortunately my friend Marty Curtis, who owns Marty’s Cafe in Muskoka, has a maple fudge recipe in his new(ish) book, Marty’s World Famous Cookbook. (In it, his World Famous Butter Tart recipe, which is not allowed to be reprinted. Sorry. But trust me, people come from all over for these – they even won the Toronto Star’s best butter tart competition.) Digging up a link to that mandarin jam recipe, I just stumbled upon a muscovado fudge recipe that looks pretty damn heavenly too. Mike just may find both in his stocking. He has been pretty good this year, don’t you think?
Muskoka Maple Fudge
From Marty’s World Famous Cookbook. This is also good with nuts – add about 1/4 cup chopped walnuts while creaming the fudge.
2 cups (pure!) maple syrup
3/4 cup 10% cream (that’s half & half)
2 Tbsp. butter
Grease an 8″x8″ pan.
In a saucepan over high heat, combine all the ingredients and bring them to a boil. (Do not cover.) Bring the temperature to between 235F and 240F on a candy thermometer, and then drop a little in cold water – it should form a soft ball. Remove the heat and monitor the temperature until it drops to 110F. Beat with a wooden spoon or heat proof spatula until creamy. Pour into the pan and cool, then cut into squares.
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December 21 2008 | appetizers and lamb and sweet stuff | 8 Comments »
We had our Christmas party tonight – something we generally do the Saturday before Christmas – and tried to keep it smallish so that it wasn’t a revolving door of people that at the end of the night I didn’t really even get to talk to. We kept it simple with a ham (easy to cook, keeps well on the buffet and tastes just as good cold) and biscuits, antipasto, chips and dip, mini lamb burgers in mini pita halves with tzatziki, and a savoury pear and squash crumble.
And because I wasn’t fully satisfied by my Fanny Farmer Fruitcake experience, and I couldn’t rightly have a Christmas party without fruitcake, I made the real thing, the dark fruitcake from Joy I know and love. You know how some foods just aren’t the same when they aren’t made with the exact right recipe? So I made one, and instead of dividing the cake into several small and oddly shaped cake tins from the basement (including little square ones with removable bottoms), I scraped it all into one well-sprayed Bundt pan.
It didn’t survive re-entry. (As J put it when he saw it.)
I could tell it was holding on, but stubbornly tried to shake it out. I’m used to having a chunk stay in the pan, which is easy enough to stick back without anyone noticing, but not half the cake - upon further inspection the cake was pretty overdone – something I’ve not done in recent memory, so I blame my own inattention to the cake in the oven while I got ready for the party and we took Lou to the dog park to try to get his yayas out. The recipe does warn that it will look like it is darkening quickly and will look done before it actually is, and to please ignore this – this time I shouldn’t have. I preemptively put a sheet of foil overtop because I knew it would darken too quickly.. I think this fruitcake died of neglect. Also, using a regular, straight-sided tube pan would have allowed me to slide a thin knife around the edges and along the bottom to coax it out.
So I’m making fruitcake trifle for Christmas dinner. I don’t want to waste all those fruits and nuts! And really, I adore trifle and always want to make it for Christmas dinner, but fruit, custard and whipped cream seems too far removed from plum pudding. Maybe this is the answer, the overbaked fruitcake mess a serendipidous accident – I’m thinking layers of crumbled dark fruitcake with custard, sauteed apples and pears, and cream? In fact, the crumbled chunks might make a brilliant bread pudding for Christmas breakfast too – all fruitcake would be too heavy, but perhaps interspersed with torn raisin bread?
(Sorry, I still haven’t made the light fruitcake - the first was in the oven for 3 1/2 hours, and I couldn’t afford another 3 1/2 for the light coconut version. I will make it soon!)
And it was R’s birthday, too. This mess would not make an adequately celebratory vehicle for candles. But I did not freak out. I went and had a lie-down. And as I lay there trying to catch a half hour of sleep (and of course not), I remembered a recipe stuck to my bullitin board that I’ve been dying to try – Laurie Colwin’s Happy Winter Fudge Cake from More Home Cooking. I didn’t get around to it last winter, and now it’s winter again, and what could be better for a birthday cake than happy winter fudge? And it called for plain yogurt, which I had a ton of to use up.
I was a little late with my photo. It looked exactly like a chocolate Bundt cake, which I sprinkled with icing sugar so it looked sort of snowy and I didn’t need to bother with icing.
Laurie Colwin’s Happy Winter Fudge Cake
adapted from More Home Cooking – I rearranged the method a bit and increased the cocoa – I’m sure Laurie wouldn’t mind.
3 oz. semisweet chocolate (or about 2/3 cup chocolate chips)
1/4 cup butter
2 large eggs
1 1/2 cups plain yogurt
1 tsp. vanilla
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup cocoa
1 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
1 cup chocolate chips
Preheat the oven to 350F and spray a Bundt pan well with nonstick spray. In a small pan, melt the chocolate and butter. In a large bowl, stir together the eggs, yogurt and vanilla. Cool the chocolate mixture slightly and stir into the yogurt mixture.
In a small bowl, stir together the flour, sugar, cocoa, baking powder and baking soda; stir into the wet ingredients, then stir in the chocolate chips (nuts would be good too). Scrape into the Bundt pan and bake for 40-45 minutes, until the top is cracked and springy to the touch. Let cool for a few minutes, then turn out onto a wire rack (do this while it’s still warm – it will come out easier) to cool.
Mike made Stroopwafels filled with Nutella – a new holiday tradition he gets right into. I also made Hello Dollies – besides my Mom’s Nut Balls these are the absolute holiday must-have, from the Uncommon Cookbook put out by the Art Gallery of Windsor at least 20 years ago. (They are also known in some circles as Magic Bars – a recipe put out by the sweetened condensed milk people wherein you layer graham crumbs, coconut, chocolate and pecans, topped with a can of S.C. milk.)
Did I really never post a recipe for my Mom’s Nut Balls?? How could that be? OK, two cookies for today:
Mom’s Nut Balls
1 cup butter
1/3 cup icing sugar
1 tsp. vanilla
1 cup finely chopped or ground pecans, hazelnuts, or a combination
1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
extra icing sugar for rolling
Preheat oven to 325F. Beat the butter, sugar and vanilla with an electric mixer for a few minutes, until pale and creamy. Beat in the nuts and flour. Roll into walnut-sized balls and place an inch or so apart on an ungreased cookie sheet. Bake for 20-25 minutes, until pale golden on the bottoms. Meanwhile, put some icing sugar into a shallow dish; when the cookies come out of the oven, roll them in icing sugar to coat while still warm. (The icing sugar mingles with the butter in the cookie, coating them with a sort of buttery, nutty icing.) Makes 2 1/2 dozen cookies.
(This photo was taken just after my sister stopped by, and we dug into them while they were still warm – quality control is important – they cut much more cleanly when completely cool.)
Hello Dollies
1 cup graham crumbs
1/4 cup butter, melted
1 cup shredded coconut
1 cup chocolate chips
1 cup chopped pecans
1 can sweetened condensed milk
Preheat oven to 325F. Mix the crumbs and butter and press into the bottom of an 8″x8″ or 9″x9″ baking pan that has been sprayed with nontstick spray. Sprinkle the coconut evenly overtop, then the chocolate chips and pecans, and pour a can of sweetened condensed milk overtop. Bake for about 30 minutes, until golden and bubbly around the edges. Cool competely before cutting. Makes 16 (or more) bars.
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December 21 2008 | appetizers and cookies & squares and snacks | 16 Comments »
