Courage in the Kitchen

“How do they come up with these names?” I asked myself as I was going through one of my mother’s recipe boxes. On a yellowed sheet of six by eight-inch letter paper, the kind you used to get in pads for a dime or fifteen cents at the five and dime, Mom had written “Mrs. Elwick’s Oatmeal Cake good.”

When I unfolded the sheet, inside was the recipe for “Lazy Daisy Oatmeal Cake” that my mother had written out, probably at Mrs. Elwick’s kitchen table. Neither my sisters nor I can remember a Mrs. Elwick, but Mom had a wide circle of friends and a lot of them were pretty good cooks.

Why should a cake made with oatmeal be called “lazy daisy,” I wondered. When I searched that fount of all wisdom for “lazy daisy,” Google returned over four million results in less than a third of a second. There are lazy daisy cafes, boutique restaurants, quilting companies, ceramics shops, gift stores, women’s clothing stores, spas, pet grooming services, and even a Lazy Daisy company offering “Antenatal and Baby Classes.” And who knows what else?

Besides oatmeal cake, I mean. There are dozens of pages with recipes for lazy daisy oatmeal cakes. It’s just the rhyme, I decided, but the fact that Mom had judged the cake good persuaded me to try it. As usual, she was right.

You have to wait a few minutes while the oatmeal is hydrating, but otherwise this is a quick and easy cake to make.

INGREDIENTS:

For the cake:

1 cup uncooked rolled oats (quick-cooking or old-fashioned)
1 1/4 cups water
1/2 cup butter
1 cup granulated sugar
1 cup brown sugar
2 large eggs
1 tsp. vanilla
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
3/4 tsp. cinnamon
1/4 tsp nutmeg

For the icing:

1/4 cup butter
1/2 cup brown sugar
3 T cream, half and half or whole milk
3/4 cup flaked coconut
1/3 cup chopped nuts

PROCEDURE:

Let two eggs and a half cup of butter come to room temperature. Heat some water to boiling. Put a cup of rolled oats into a small bowl and stir in a cup and one-quarter of boiling water. Cover the bowl and let it stand for twenty minutes.

Preheat the oven to 350º. Grease and flour a nine by thirteen-inch cake pan.

Cream the butter and sugar in a large mixing bowl and beat in the eggs and vanilla. Blend the warm oats into the egg and sugar mixture and stir thoroughly.

Sift the flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon and nutmeg together and add the dry ingredients to the creamed mixture. Beat well and pour the batter into the cake pan. Bake on a center rack for forty-five to fifty-five minutes. Test for doneness with a toothpick at forty-five minutes. If it comes out clean, the cake is done.

Make the icing while the cake is in the oven. Cream the butter and sugar together in a small bowl. Stir in the cream, half and half or milk and blend in the nuts and coconut.

Leave the cake in the pan and spread the icing while the cake is still hot. Broil just until the icing starts to bubble and turn golden.

NOTES: Mom noted that you can serve this cake warm or cold. Her recipe called for “regular” oatmeal, which is now called “old-fashioned.” I have made this cake only with old-fashioned oatmeal, and it was delicious.

You don’t really have to broil the icing if the cake is good and hot when you spread it on.

This is the kind of macaroni and cheese that my mother made with a creamy cheese sauce. She started by making a white sauce, that wonderful French “mother sauce” named after the Marquis de Béchemel. I never heard her say she was making a Béchemel sauce, but that is what she was doing.

In fact she was making an American version of Mornay sauce, which is Béchemel sauce with cheese added. It is that creamy cheese sauce that makes macaroni and cheese one of the most popular foods in the United States.

Mornay sauce is traditionally made with Gruyère and Parmesan cheeses, but people from Wisconsin know that the best macaroni and cheese is made with good aged Wisconsin Cheddar.

When you make macaroni and cheese from scratch, you may find that the cheese sauce is not as yellow as what you usually get when preparing a batch from a box. That’s because the manufacturers add artificial color or annatto to produce that bright yellow. I suppose you could do the same, but a good sharp Cheddar gives a lovely soft yellow that contrasts nicely with a barbecued rib on your plate.

INGREDIENTS:

2 cups uncooked elbow macaroni
4 T butter
4 T all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. white pepper
Dash of freshly ground black pepper
1/4 tsp. ground mustard
1/4 tsp. Worcestershire sauce
2 cups whole milk
2 cups shredded medium or sharp Cheddar cheese
Dash of hot sauce (optional)

PROCEDURE:

Start heating the water for the macaroni and preheat the oven to 350º. Grate the cheese. Heat the milk to about 140º in a saucepan or microwavable dish.

Cook the macaroni according to instructions on the package just to al dente. Do not overcook it as it will continue to cook in the oven. Drain the macaroni and return it to the cooking pot.

Melt the butter in a three-quart saucepan over medium low heat. Blend the flour, salt, peppers, mustard and Worcestershire sauce into the butter. You are making a white roux. Keep stirring with a wooden spoon and cook until you have a smooth bubbly mixture. Once the roux is bubbling, cook it for a minute then add the hot milk and heat it to boiling. The sauce will thicken as the roux cooks.

After the sauce has thickened and is bubbling again, keep stirring for another minute or so. Reduce the heat to very low and stir in the cheese until you have a smooth sauce.

Pour the sauce over the macaroni and mix it gently with the pasta. Put the mixture into an ungreased two-quart casserole and bake uncovered for about twenty minutes until it begins to bubble.

NOTES: If you wish, feel free to use a little more cheese. You also might want to add a dash of hot sauce once you have stirred the cheese into the sauce. It adds complexity to the flavor, and at least to our taste, does not make it too spicy.

Macaroni and cheese has been around for a long time. At least 700 years ago, Italian cooks were layering pasta and cheese and baking it into a tasty casserole. By the time Thomas Jefferson settled down for some good eating and drinking in Paris as the Minister to France representing the newly founded United States, French chefs had perfected a recipe for macaroni and cheese.

Clearly Jefferson enjoyed it, for he sketched the pasta and described the extrusion process used to make it. He bought a machine for making it and later imported both macaroni and Parmesan cheese, which was the cheese used for the recipe at that time. In 1802, when he was President, Jefferson served a “macaroni pie” at a state dinner.

Early in the 19th century, Jefferson’s young granddaughter, Virginia Randolph, copied the recipes Jefferson brought back from France along with many of those he enjoyed at Monticello and in the White House. In the late 1930‘s this handwritten book was given to the Thomas Jefferson Memorial Foundation by Jefferson’s great-great granddaughter. The foundation gave permission to the historian Marie Kimball to publish the collection as Thomas Jefferson’s Cookbook.

The cookbook includes a recipe for “Macaroni” and another for “Macaroni Pudding.” Here is the one simply called “Macaroni.” If the quantities were increased to serve the ten or twelve guests usually invited to such affairs, this may well be the dish served at the state dinner.

“Break macaroni in small pieces, there should be 2 cupfuls, and boil in salted water until tender. Grate 1/4 pound of cheese and mix with the same amount of butter. Stir into macaroni and bake like polenta.” (The polenta recipe says to “Bake in a moderate oven until the cheese is thoroughly melted.”) This recipe, which does not use any sauce, is like the one for Gus Gauch’s Macaroni and Cheese.

Jefferson was clearly fond of dessert puddings, as there are dozens in the cookbook. “Macaroni Pudding” is one of them.

“Cook macaroni in milk until tender. Two ounces to a pint of milk will make a good-sized pudding. Add five eggs, 3/4 cup of sugar, flavor with lemon or rose water and bake one hour.”

Jerri says it sounds good. I am not sure, but I would be willing to try it.

We bought our copy of Thomas Jefferson’s Cookbook years ago in Virginia, but your local bookseller can get you a copy in case you want to explore the cuisine of one of our greatest Presidents.