Tag: vegetarian

Rhubarb Bread Pudding

As I have mentioned elsewhere, I have learned to trust Jerri’s judgements about recipes. Not that I always follow her recommendations, but sometimes I like to live a little recklessly and once in a while, my intuition proves right.

Like me, Jerri hates to throw away food, so she was as interested as I in Jane Marsh Dieckmann’s Use it All: The Leftovers Cook Book where I found the recipe for calabacitas last month. Jerri put a bookmark at the the page for this recipe and suggested I try it.

I did and we both liked it. The rhubarb and lemon juice flavor the rather bland sweetness of the bread and custard and the custard smooths the taste of the rhubarb. If you like either rhubarb or bread pudding, chances are good that you will enjoy it too, especially if it’s warm and topped with a scoop of vanilla ice cream.

INGREDIENTS:

2 cups diced rhubarb
1/2 cup plus 2 T sugar
2 cups dried bread cubes
1/2 to 1 T lemon zest
1 1/2 T lemon juice
1 cup milk
1 large egg

PROCEDURE:

Clean and chop the rhubarb into a quarter to half-inch dice. Cut the dried bread into half-inch cubes. Wash and grate the yellow zest from a lemon and squeeze the juice from the fruit.

Preheat the oven to 375º and grease a one to one and a half-quart casserole or soufflé dish. Put a pan with an inch of hot water into the oven.

Mix the rhubarb and bread cubes in a large bowl. Stir in the sugar and lemon zest, then dribble the lemon juice over the mixture and mix everything thoroughly.

In a smaller bowl, beat the egg until it is lemon yellow, add the milk and beat them together. Pour the milk over the rhubarb and bread mixture and stir it well. Put the pudding into the casserole and smooth the top with a spatula.

Carefully set the casserole into the pan of hot water and bake the pudding for about an hour and fifteen minutes. Check for doneness with a knife inserted near the center of the pudding. It should come out nearly clean.

NOTES: Dieckmann’s recipe calls for only a half-cup of sugar, but we thought that the pudding was a little too tart. Feel free to try it with just a half cup and adjust the sugar the next time you make the pudding if you agree with us.

Jerri thought that the lemon zest overpowered the flavor of the rhubarb. “I like the flavor of rhubarb,” says she, so I adjusted the recipe to give you the choice of using less zest.

Whole milk works best for making custards and puddings. If you have only reduced fat milk in the refrigerator but do have some cream or half and half, add a couple of tablespoons of either to the cup before you fill it with milk.

Fluffy Buttermilk Pancakes

“Oh Chuckie, your pancakes are always so fluffy,” exclaimed my mother one morning at the cabin.

When I read this sentence to Jerri, she asked, “Did she really?” and I replied honestly, “I don’t remember if she said that exactly, but it’s the sort of thing she would have said. She was always very complimentary about my cooking.”

Maybe that’s why I like to cook. My mother went out of her way to praise all of us kids if we tried to make something in the kitchen. Serve her burned toast, and she would say, “I like crispy toast.” Offer some salty soup or really greasy gravy and she would show us how to make it edible.

Even Dad, who was not much of a cook, would chime in, “Burned toast makes for rosy cheeks,”he would say, or “When I was in the logging camp, the cook used to put more potatoes in the soup when he dumped in too much salt.”

I do recall my mother telling me that my pancakes were nice and light, and I remember saying that it was just because I beat the egg whites separately. That is the truth, and you can make pancakes that are like them–tender, light and delicious–if you follow this simple recipe.

INGREDIENTS:

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp. salt
4 1/2 T sugar
1 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
2 large eggs
2 1/3 cups buttermilk
4 T butter

PROCEDURE:

For the best pancakes, have the eggs and buttermilk at room temperature. You can warm the eggs by putting them into a small bowl of warm (not hot!) water for three or four minutes and heat the milk for a few seconds in the microwave.

Melt the butter and begin heating your skillet or griddle.

Sift the flour, salt, sugar, baking powder and soda into a mixing bowl. Separate the eggs by putting the yolks into a one quart mixing bowl and the whites into another. Beat the yolks with a fork until they turn a bright yellow, then stir in the buttermilk

Beat the egg whites until they form stiff peaks.

Fluffy buttermilk pancake batterAdd the buttermilk to the dry ingredients and stir with a fork until you have a smooth
but moderately thick batter. Stir in the melted butter, then fold in the beaten egg whites. Don’t worry if some small globs of egg white remain in the batter. They will help lighten the cakes.

Bake them on a griddle set to 350º or in a skillet over medium heat. I spoon enough batter to make four inch cakes, let them cook until bubbles appear across the cake and the edges bcome a little dry, then turn them and let them finish baking for another two or three minutes.

Serve them hot from the griddle with butter and maple syrup

NOTES: Be conservative when you add the buttermilk. Start by stirring in about two cups and add more until you have the right consistency.

This recipe makes about two dozen four inch cakes. Store leftover cakes in the refrigerator and warm them in the microwave for a quick snack or breakfast. They won’t be as light and fluffy, but they will taste pretty good.