Mom's Coffee Cake Recipe

It is interesting the memories that we have surrounding the sounds, smells, and of course sights of cooking and baking from when we were children.....I have never made my mom's coffee cake recipe before but I know I have always loved it....as I was baking it in the oven last night the smell of brown sugar and cinnamon melting into a rich moist batter filled the air........I was reminded of a time when my mom would have a few of her friends over to watch Dallas together.....as we got off to bed the sweet smell of cinnamon would fill the house.  Of course, I can still remember laying in bed as a child hearing the theme song and laughter of women....the coffee was on and the chatter was always fun to try and make out what they were saying.....of course until the show came on....I always knew when the commercials were over as silence would fall....and soon I would be off to dream land.....

  What makes this coffee cake kind of special is the fact that I have the same pan my mom used to bake her coffee cake in!  I love old kitchen tools....but I have to admit that although this sweet treat is heavenly.....my mom makes it way better!  Check out the recipe on my blog about baking: Apron Worthy

Here's to an extra day of summer!

Tomorrow is the first day of school and I am oh so excited about all of the changes and I wanted to somehow celebrate the wonderful day at work!  So in my apron I got......this what it resulted in....

 Here's what was on tonight's menu:

Carrots & Green Peppers
Spicy Turkey Meatballs in a Chili Sauce Reduction
Basmati Rice topped with Spinach Surprise


  Where to start....it all began a few days ago when I sent my husband to buy some meat....it sounds odd and a little hunter-gatherer-ish I know, but all we had was shrimp in the freezer, the Donna Reed of 1950's would be so ashamed of such a thing..at any rate, he picked up two packages of ground turkey.....what else was I to do....

  I cooked the meatballs in extra virgin olive oil...it makes a ton of meals....I only used 1/3 of them in tonight's dinner and we have enough left over for 2 more servings....you do that math....it's worth it.....in the back of my mind I wonder if it is Donna Reed's Dollar Menu worthy?

Take the 2 packages and add them to a large bowl....add in the following spices.....

seasoned salt
ginger
red pepper flakes
cumin
coriander
freshly ground black pepper

  Mix well....call me crazy but I love to have these on hand for these sort of kitchen tasks.....for some reason I can never get the smell of raw meat of my hands

.....or maybe it's just the science teacher in me that likes to wear rubber gloves!  I scooped the meat out with a soup spoon, I find that the best way to make them uniform size.....before I did this, I think I would get lazy and the last meatball was the size of a hamburger.....it was just wrong. 

p.s. I under-cook the meatballs

  I then took the first batch of meatballs and added them to a pot to simmer* with some of my mom's Homemade Sweet Chili Sauce .....it is the greatest sauce and I believe one of my great grandmothers recipes, my nanny has made chili sauce, my mom has made chili sauce......but this jar of chili sauce was made by the both of them working together......imagine the magic in that jar!....It is also wonderful also over a pork roast....but back to the balls.....I let the sauce reduce and that imparts a little sweetness which compliments the earthy warmth of the spices in the seasoned meat.....it really is something special.....I need to learn how to make that sauce!

The carrots were a lot of fun and super simple.....just peel the carrots....discard the outside......and then keep on peeling to get something like this....

...I then diced up one green pepper and sauteed it in the frying pan....woohoo one less dish to wash.....I ended up adding salt and turmeric....my recently discovered spice....it is a brilliant yellow.  You should check it out, or even better yet....tell me how you use it!

Put that to the side and then in the same pan (unwashed!) I added in the spinach and a little extra virgin olive oil, sea salt, and freshly ground black pepper.  I decided to serve this over the basmati rice...which was also cooked in the frying pan ...........let it crisp up just a little bit on the outside.

 It was a simple delicious dinner.....

Enjoy!




*(this is why I had under-cook them....if not they would be over done or dry out....also this way they are perfectly cooked when you use them as a starter for leftovers....as the remaining meatballs go in the freezer)

Chicken Fried Steak.....

.... never thought I would see the day that something like this would not only be cooked in my kitchen but made by me as well!

  Chicken fried steak is actually steak (cube steak - it's pounded down so it is rather thin) that is battered and then shallow fried in a pan.....my husband was the one who bought all the ingredients for this one....I on the other hand had always thought that there was just something wrong with chicken fried steak....boy was I wrong....it was sinfully delicious!

 For sides I went with something simple.....asparagus and turnip & carrots.....for the asparagus I just took some of the water that had the carrots and turnip boiling in it and then added a cap full of lemon juice and simply let the asparagus simmer.....what I love about cooking it this way is the green color in the asparagus just pops....it's a beautiful thing!  Then to serve I just added a little parmesan cheese....

  Ever since I made the zucchini canoes with the parsnip filling my husband as been begging me to make them again......never in a million years did I think my husband would be begging for me to cook parsnip!  Fred Astaire sang is best..."Heaven, I'm in Heaven"

  I decided to keep it simple and for color also added in some carrots.....so, start by peeling the parsnip and then cutting it into chunks.....add to boiling salted water and start to cook....I also did the same thing with the carrots but added them later as the parsnip takes longer to cook.....then I drained them.....but I thought about the water - basically vegetable stock....and I didn't want to waste it so I used it to boil up some lentils that I will use for something tonight.....then I used a potato masher.....but since my energy was focused on the meat so much the parsnip and carrots weren't cooked!  So, I added them back to the burner - added a TBSP of butter, salt and pepper, and some milk....crushed it up as much as I could and just let it cook....it ended up tasting delicious so no one is the wiser.....I channeled Tim Gunn and made it work!


 I have to admit that since Chicken Fried Steak falls under the category to me as something that my husband used to enjoy as a kid (much like grits and biscuits and gravy) I thought it best to use a lifeline and call an expert.....so one call to my mother-in-law resulted in me learning that chicken fried steak is usually served with gravy.......oh the fear! 

 Side note about gravy....I love it more than the next person and usually indulge in the warm deliciousness of it at Christmas slathered all over the potatoes and meat....and of course then use the warm buns to soak up the remains on your plate....but making gravy is a different story.....I have really only attempted it once, but the results have encouraged me from that moment on to only buy gravy from a jar....for shame I know, a 1950s housewife much like myself buying gravy!  However, with direction from my mother-in-law and the peace of mind knowing that she was going to keep her cell phone on just in case....I decided to give it a try....

  Now I realize that it looks like mushroom soup....but I can tell you it tastes like heaven....after shallow frying the steak I turned the burner down low and added in some flour....watching flour fry is amazing......what a great chemical reaction....the whole time I was doing this I thought about how fun it would be to teach a food science course!  I kept mixing it up with a fork to get all the lumps out and scrape the flavor off the bottom of the pan....hence the speckled appearance of the gravy....I didn't care I wanted flavor not aesthetics.......then I slowly added milk (cold milk) and it started to clump up and then my continually mixing it came to the perfect texture (lump free!).  I now have gravy confidence and a date with a treadmill!

Finally, the chicken fried steak.....I started by busting out all 3 of my pie plates....they needed to be washed anyway as the pie baking contest is coming up soon!  I added flour to one, 3 eggs (whisked with S&P) to one, and the breading to another......now this was more of a 1980s housewife dish as the breading was from a box.....what can I say....my husband bought it....don't blame me!  But on a side note...the seasoning wasn't too bad!.....next time it's from scratch!.......So, it's flour, egg, then coating, then frying pan......I used canola oil....make sure you get the pan hot...a few minutes on each side and you are done!

  I always used to make fun of my husband for this and comment that it was just wrong....well I am here to tell you that I was just wrong...this for me is the ultimate comfort food.....some people have a thing for macaroni and cheese, or tomato soup and grilled cheese, or even something else from their childhood.....but my adult comfort food is now chicken fried steak!

Enjoy!

Not Quite Sure What To Call This One...

  Yes it looks like a pizza, and yes it is cut like a pizza, and cooked on a pizza pan.....but it's focaccia!  I was not quite sure what in the heck I was going to make for dinner last night....all I knew was that the ground turkey that was defrosted needed to be used....and the last time I made pizza I used the focaccia recipe.....I thought it worked out well so I was daring enough to try it again....except this time I baked it in the oven as oppose to the grill....to me this is a good version of a thicker crust pizza....and the crust had so much flavor that I thought something simple on top would do it....so I sauteed up an onion (of course) and then cooked the ground turkey in the same pan...then I added some shredded parmesan cheese and a jar of arrabiata sauce.....which I just learned is Italian for the word angry....so maybe I should call this angry pizza!  I also found out that sometimes basil is used in this recipe which is just perfect....as I added some fresh basil from the garden as I was cooking the meat....it reminded me of spinach the way it wilted.....man did it smell good!  So, basically I made a loaf of focaccia - spread it out like pizza dough and then made a mean....or should I say angry meat pasta sauce and put the two together.....topped it off with some mozarella and dinner is done....it took about 45 minutes in the oven.....30 minutes at 400 degrees and then finish off the last 15 minutes at 350 degrees.....

Enjoy!