I love Stove Top Stuffing. If I had my choice, it would be considered a main dish. Alas, my family does not agree with me. So, the next best thing is to stuff something with Stove Top. I’ve had this recipe for sausage stuffed peppers since I was married almost 23 years ago and it’s…
My Italian grandmother made pasta e fagioli with fatback (picture a giant slice of bacon without the meat), kidney beans and pasta. Nothing more, nothing less. Matter of fact, she made most of her meals with fatback: scungilli and fatback, swiss chard and fatback pieces, chicken fried in fatback, fatback cooked in fatback. It was…
My cranberry craze continues! Only this time, I’ve added some hooch. Refrigerate overnight or let it sit for a few weeks to mellow. Either way, it produces quite a kick! Please enjoy responsibly – too much moonshine can make the toughest of men lose what sense God gave them. Just like the time I found…
Cranberries and Christmas. ‘Tis the season. This is one of my favorite recipes to serve at holiday dinners. You’ll never serve that store bought, can-shaped, jiggly cranberry stuff again!
The wild apples trees on the farm are flush with fruit. The old timer up the road says that’s a bad sign – lots of apples means a long, harsh winter. He also says women shouldn’t be allowed to drive and that moonshine will cure the flu. But I digress… This jam is autumn at…
My husband’s grandmother used to make “roast-a-beef” every Sunday. She would boil the roast with some salt and pepper. The result was a grey, tough lump of meat that needed to be cut with a chainsaw. Never in my life did I ever hear of someone boiling meat! She also ate raw onion sandwiches and…
Take the wonderful deliciousness of baked beans and the spicy heartiness of chili, simmer them together and the result is Baked Bean Chili. Enjoy!
The autumn olive (or autumnberry) bush is a double-edged sword. In my area, it can be found along just about any country road or fence row. Unfortunately, just like Japanese knotweed and multiflora rose, it’s considered an invasive species. However, recently, it’s been discovered that the autumn olive berry contains high amounts of Lycopene –…
Most folks I know have never heard of pickled green tomatoes. It’s one of those recipes that was born out of the desire to not waste anything. The old timer up the road gave me the recipe years ago after a strong storm blew over most of my cherry tomato plants before they had a…
Confession… I am an over-canner. I love, love, LOVE to can. So when my friend, who owns a farm market, said he had couple of plums for me, I thought, “oh goody, I’ll make some plum jam.” Unbeknownst to me, a couple of plums turned out to be twenty-four quarts of plums. Never one to shy away…
The wonderful aroma from this sauce, as it’s bubbling on the stove, brings me right back to my Gramma Josephine’s kitchen. She would make this simple sauce and pour it over everything, from pasta to gnocchi, chicken and even fish. It’s a great sauce to can, but it also freezes well.
There’s not much to say about this recipe, except that it’s delicious. DAMN delicious. It’s one of those desserts that makes you sneak away with the last piece and hide in the closet so you don’t have to share (yes, I’ve done that – I’m not ashamed. I refer you to the Tastykake Chocolate Junior…
My grandfather pickled garlic scapes long before they were a “trendy” food. He was an Italian who grew up in the depression and nothing went to waste in his household. As a kid, opening the refrigerator door and finding pickled pigs feet was not surprising to me. Tripe, smelt, head cheese (yes, it is what…
I L.O.V.E. pie. Bake me a good apple pie and I’ll be your friend forever. This recipe contains the unusual step of partially cooking the apples before they’re put into the pie. But that’s the secret. The apples are always perfectly done – no half-cooked or mushy apples here. Another perk of this recipe – the…
While spending a few days in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, I happened upon a little farm stand, on a back road, in the middle of nowhere. Among the usual jars of chow-chow, blueberry jam and apple butter, I spied a small jar of violet jelly. After striking up a conversation with the lovely Amish woman who made…
The Farmers in the Dell 