Shoo-Fly Pie

Recently I made a Shoo-Fly Pie to bring with me to the September meeting of my book club. I wanted something that reminded me of early fall and this molasses dessert seemed perfect.

I remember my mother serving this pie once or twice when I was a child. I don't remember where I picked up this particular recipe. The copy I have is typed on a typewriter and has no name. I've had it for years.

Shoo-Fly Pie

(One 9" pie)

This pie has a "damp zone" next to the crust. It is sometimes referred to as the "wet-bottom shoo-fly." Most people prefer this one above the others.

Ingredients:
1 Pastry shell, unbaked
1 egg yolk
1/2 cup molasses
3/4 cup boiling water
1 tsp. baking soda
1 cup flour
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/8 tsp nutmeg
1/8 tsp ginger
1/8 tsp cloves
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 tsp salt
2 TBS shortening (butter or margarine)

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 400°F.
2. Beat the egg yolk in a small bowl.
3. Blend in the molasses.
4. Add baking soda to boiling water and let it dissolve.
5. Add water/baking soda mix to molasses mixture. Set aside.


6. Combine dry ingredients with shortening and work into crumbs with fingers.


7. Pour liquid into pastry shell.

8. Top with crumbs.

9. Bake in 400°F oven for 10 minutes. Then reduce heat to 325°F and bake 35 minutes longer.


Serve warm or cooled.

*** GLUTEN-FREE***
When I've made this pie in the past I've used normal wheat flour, but since several of the ladies in my club have gluten allergies I obtained some gluten-free pie crust mix and proceeded to make the pie gluten free. If you would like to try and make this recipe gluten-free I should point out that the topping ALSO includes flour (just a cup), so it's important to obtain some gluten-free flour in addition to the flour used in the pie crust (or the pie crust mix). Having tried this pie both with and without gluten flour I declare it delicious!

Here are some tips should you decide to try this pie gluten-free.

Tip 1. If you've never made a gluten-free pie before (or are a novice when it comes to pie crusts) I highly encourage you to try a box mix. I found a mix at a local health food store, but more and more general and specialized grocery stores are starting to carry gluten-free mixes and flour. I chose a mix because I'd never made a gluten-free pie before and had no time to experiment.

Tip 2. Although they don't taste much different than regular wheat flour crusts, gluten-free pie crusts are not the same consistency. They are STICKY! It's best to use plastic wrap on the bottom and top of the cr ust when you roll it out. This will also make transferring it to the pie pan much easier and will help prevent breakage and crumbling.

For more information about the history of Shoo-Fly Pie check out the article on Wikipedia or What's Cooking America

Other versions of Shoo-Fly Pie.

Heirloom Food

My grandpa's funeral is this week. He lived 93 full and interesting years and it was his time to pass. However, I feel like I've lost a valuable link to history - he was born during World War I, grew up during the depression, joined the Navy during WWII... it is astonishing to consider the events and eras he lived though.

I can't experience life the way my grandparents lived when they were my age, so I really enjoy making recipes that they ate, enabling me to both smell and taste some history. This is a recipe my grandma made, and everyone who tries it loves it. So put on your fabulous 50's dress, pearls, and heels and whip some up for yourself!

OATMEAL CARMELLETES

Caramel Filling

32 caramels
5 Tablespoons light cream or evaporated milk (or regular milk, or heavy cream)

Melt the caramels and milk together. If you use a pan on the stove, stir constantly. If you use a microwave, stir every two minutes at first, and then every minute until caramels are melted.

Bars

1 cup flour
1 cup oatmeal
¾ cup brown sugar
¾ cup melted butter
½ tsp. baking soda
¼ tsp. salt

1 cup chocolate chips

Mix together flour, oatmeal, brown sugar, butter, soda and salt and divide in half. Press half into bottom of 9x9 pan. Bake 10 minutes at 350F. Remove from oven; immediately sprinkle 1 cup chocolate chips on hot crust. Drizzle caramel filling over chips; cover with remaining oatmeal mixture. Bake 15-20 minutes at 325F. Allow to cool before cutting.

BONUS: for a quick and tasty dessert, you can pour a can of cherry, blueberry OR apple pie filling OR put fresh apples, peeled, cored, sliced, and shaken with 1/4 cup flour in a 9x9 pan. Shake some cinnamon sugar over the fruit and top with the bar mixture. Bake at 350F for about 25-30 minutes and voila – apple/cherry/blueberry crisp! I serve it hot with ice cream. (Obviously, you leave out the chocolate and caramels)

P.S. - S. Mehrens - I promise I prepared for this post before I saw your post! I guess it is Grandparents Week here at Cooking! Everyone else, did you have a favorite recipe from a grandparent?

Strawberry Shortcake: Hot Milk Cake

This past weekend my family and I were heading to some friends for dinner. I needed to pull together a quick dessert and I wanted to keep it light and yet sweet. In the end a sale on strawberries at my local grocery store (I know out of season, but BOGOF can't be beat) helped me to decide. I made strawberry shortcake -- a hot milk cake with fresh strawberries and whipped cream. The dessert was everything I hoped - light, fluffy, sweet, and fruity.

Here's the recipe I used. It's not original I copied it years ago from something my mother had -- I think a cookbook, but I don't remember now. My apologies to the original author, I'd give credit if I knew where to give it.

Hot Milk Cake (a.k.a Hot Milk Sponge Cake)

Ingredients:
2 eggs
1 cup sugar
1 cup flour (Whole Wheat flour tends to weigh cake down, if used proportion to 1/3 cup WW to 2/3 All-Purpose)
1 tsp baking powder
1 TBS butter
1/2 cup of hot milk

Directions:
1. Beat eggs until light and thick
2. Add sugar
3. Heat milk and add butter to milk, set aside
4. Gently fold dry ingredients into wet
5. Add milk (buttered fully melted), fold into batter
6. Pour into lightly greased cake pan (9x9)
7. Bake at 350 for 30 minutes.

Serve with fresh strawberries and whipped cream or chopped peaches.

Chocolate Haystacks

With Autumn fast upon us I have been looking for some fun cooking activities that I can share with my daughter on those cold rainy fall days. I came upon this recipe on KRAFT's website and although it could be messy, it does look delicious and fun, especially if you have a child (or children) in the home... or are a child at heart. I've yet to try it, but wanted to post it anyway.

Chocolate Haystacks
by KRAFT
prep time: 10 min
total time: 1 hr 10 min
makes: 3-1/2 doz. or 21 servings, 2 haystacks each

Ingredients:
4 squares BAKER'S Semi-Sweet Chocolate
1 cup Butterscotch chips
2 cups Chow mein noodles
2 cups JET-PUFFED Miniature Marshmallows
1/2 cup PLANTERS COCKTAIL Peanuts

Directions:
MICROWAVE chocolate and butterscotch chips in medium microwaveable bowl on HIGH 2 to 3 min. or until almost melted, stirring after 1-1/2 min. Stir until completely melted.

ADD remaining ingredients; stir until evenly coated.

DROP tablespoonfuls of chocolate mixture onto waxed paper-covered baking sheet. Refrigerate 1 hour or until firm.

Substitutes:
Substitute1 cup BAKER'S Semi-Sweet Chocolate Chunks for the chocolate squares.

How to Store:
Store in airtight container in refrigerator.

Cherry Crisp

This is a quick and easy dessert (other than pitting the cherries) that is a big hit.

6 cups pitted cherries
2 tablespoons brown sugar
1 tablespoon all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
2/3 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 cup regular oats
3/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
4 1/2 tablespoons chilled butter, cut into small pieces

Preheat oven to 375°.
Combine first 4 ingredients in a medium bowl; spoon into an 11 x 7-inch baking dish. Lightly spoon flour into a dry measuring cup, and level with a knife. Combine 2/3 cup flour, 1/2 cup brown sugar, oats, and cinnamon, and cut in the butter with a pastry blender or 2 knives until the mixture resembles coarse meal. (Or do it in the food processor.) Sprinkle over the blueberry mixture. Bake at 375° for 30 minutes or until bubbly.

Kids Cooking

• Thanks so much for keeping this site alive (if barely). I love y'all's ideas!
  
  First off, let me say that I think the whole idea of making warm memories by letting your kids cook with you is highly overrated. I'm a fairly low-key person, but Addie and Stuart can have me chewing on my Pampered Chef rubber spatula within five minutes.
  
  BUT, they enjoy it. As long as I view it as Good Training instead of a Good Time, we do fine.
  
  Here are two things they enjoy making:
  
  Parfaits
  
  
  
  This is an old kid-friendly standby: fruit and yogurt. I have a safety knife that they can use to cut up the fruit, which makes it even more fun for them. But the real deal with these parfaits is that we add chocolate graham crackers or, on occasion, crumbled cookies. Forget the granola. Put in a little bit of junk, and they'll love the whole thing!
  
  We layer:
  
  * Vanilla yogurt
  
  * Strawberries, blueberries, or bananas
  
  * Chocolate graham crackers or some other yummy crunchy sweet
  
  

It makes a good breakfast or a side dish at supper. If Stuart will eat it, you know it's kid-friendly.


Chicken Smorgasbord

Take two chicken breasts and cut them into four pieces. Make a "bowl" of aluminum foil for each piece. Season each one differently: barbecue sauce, Italian dressing, basil and oregano, cinnamon and ginger, dill, etc. Drizzle with a little olive oil to keep it moist. Put the "bowls" into a casserole dish and bake at 350 or 375 for, oh, half an hour (until the chicken is at 180). When it's done, you have four different flavors of chicken to choose from, plus really yummy broth.

Addie and Stuart love choosing their seasonings. My job is mostly to say things like, "Um, that's enough dill!" or "No, no, don't put basil with cinnamon. Probably won't taste good." This dish is especially good with couscous.

-- SJ

Pear Clafouti

This is our new favorite dessert. It is quick, easy, relatively low-fat, with minimal sugar. And it is fabulous comfort food.

Pear Clafouti
originally from Cooking Light (but I've made some changes)

The keys to a successful clafouti (cla-foo-TEE) are minimal use of flour and a hot oven in which to cook it quickly. As one of the national desserts of France, it's quite versatile.

Ingredients
Cooking spray
1 teaspoon all-purpose flour
2 cubed peeled pears
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon nutmeg
1/8 teaspoon cardamom (optional)
2 cups milk, divided (use 1% or 2% over non-fat)
3 large eggs, lightly beaten
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

Preparation
Preheat oven to 375°.
Coat a 9 to 10-inch deep-dish pie plate with cooking spray, and dust plate with 1 teaspoon flour. Arrange the pear cubes in the bottom of prepared dish, and set aside.
Combine 3/4 cup flour, salt, and nutmeg in a bowl. Gradually add 1 cup milk, stirring with a whisk until well-blended. Add 1 cup milk, eggs, sugar, and vanilla extract, stirring until smooth. Pour batter over pear cubes. Bake mixture at 375° for 35 minutes or until set. I always have to bake it longer than 35 minutes; usually 45. You could also try baking hotter. My next attempt I'm going to try 390 or so.

6 servings (serving size: 1 wedge)

Pumpkin Cheesecake

Looking for a new dessert for the Thanksgiving buffet? I made this for my MIL's birthday and it got rave reviews! Plus, it's easy!

2 (8 ounce) packages cream cheese, softened
1/2 cup white sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 eggs
1 (9 inch) prepared graham cracker crust
1/2 cup pumpkin puree
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 pinch ground cloves
1 pinch ground nutmeg
1/2 cup whipped topping, thawed

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. In a large bowl, combine cream cheese, sugar and vanilla. Beat until smooth. Blend in eggs one at a time. Remove 1 cup of batter and spread into bottom of crust; set aside. Add pumpkin, cinnamon, cloves and nutmeg to the remaining batter and stir gently until well blended. Carefully spread over the batter in the crust. Bake in preheated oven for 35 to 40 minutes, or until center is almost set. Allow to cool, then refrigerate for 3 hours or overnight. Cover with whipped topping before serving.

Apple Crumb Coffee Cake

This dish has quickly risen to prominence in our home since its discovery two months ago, inspired by some marked-down apples that had to be used up immediately. It's quick to whip up, keeps for several days, uses fairly basic and cheap ingredients (at least in my stripped-down version), is pretty nutritious, and makes a simple, easy, yet filling breakfast food.

Apple Crumb Coffee Cake

1 Tbl. dry bread crumbs
2 cups flour (I used half whole wheat and half white until I realised that the cinnamon and apples are going to turn it brown anyway)
1 cup plus 2 Tbl. sugar (I just use one cup)
1 tsp. salt
10 Tbl. (1 1/4 sticks) butter, softened (I use half of this, or maybe 1 stick, depending on how much I have out on the butter dish. I use less butter not only because it's healthier but also cheaper, since I always use real butter in baking. Maybe the texture or taste would be better with more butter, but since I've never tried it, I don't know what I'm missing!)
1 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
3/4 cup buttermilk or low-fat (not nonfat) plain yogurt, room temperature (I make my own buttermilk using the following formula: 1 Tbl. vinegar plus enough milk to make one cup = one cup of buttermilk)
1 large egg, room temperature (but I usually use a medium egg because that's what I have on hand)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 medium-large Granny Smith apples, peeled, cored, and chopped (I've used one sometimes)
3/4 cup walnuts or pecans, chopped (I never use this much)
1/2 cup dark brown sugar

-Preheat oven to 350. Butter a 9x13 pan and shake breadcrumbs over to coat. Tap out extra crumbs.
-Whisk flour, sugar, and salt in large mixing bowl. Add butter and cut in with pastry knife until mixture resembles coarse crumbs; remove 1 cup to separate bowl and reserve.
-Whisk baking powder, soda, and cinnamon into flour mixture in bowl. Add buttermilk or yogurt, egg, and vanilla; whisk until smooth and frostinglike, 1 1/2 to 2 minutes.
-Stir in apples.
-Pour into pan and smooth top.
-Add nuts and brown sugar to reserved cup of flour mixture. Stir until blended and spread over cake batter, pressing lightly so it adheres.
-Bake cake until center is firm and cake tester comes out clean, 50 to 55 minutes.
-Enjoy!

Cheesecake

Cheesecake


.....And with cherries on top

For as long as I can remember this has been my mom's company dessert. (She got the recipe from her mom, Carol) She always made it with blueberries on top. Mmmm! I can still remember crushing graham crackers when I was little and graduating to baking the whole thing. Now I'm married to someone who loves cherries so we do cherries. Which by the way, the particular cheesecake pictured was for his birthday. Enjoy!

Filling Ingredients:

8oz. cream cheese

1/2 c. sugar

2 eggs beaten

Crust Ingredients:

1/4 lb. butter, melted

1/4 lb. graham crackers, crushed

1/4 c. sugar

Topping:

Any canned or fresh fruit topping.

Blend filling ingredients until smooth.

Mix crust ingredients in separate bowl. Press mixture evenly into pie plate.

Pour filling into crust.

Bake at 325 for 25 min. Or until slightly browned on top and filling is set.

Cool and top with your choice of fruit or other topping. Best when served chilled through.

Does anyone have...

a recipe for haystacks?

At least, I think that's what they are called. I'm referring to those chow mein noodle things, usually butterscotch, sometimes chocolate. At worst, I can just melt some butterscotch chips and dump chow mein noodles in, but I'm sure there's more to it than that.

Any help would be much appreciated!

Quicky, but tasty dessert

Brownie Pudding

Preheat Oven: 350°

Mix together:
1 Cup Flour
3/4 Cup of sugar (or 1/2 Cup of brown sugar)
2 Tbs. Cocoa
2 tsp. Baking powder
1/2 tsp. Salt

In a separate bowl mix:
1/2 Cup Milk
2 Tbs. Veg oil
1 tsp. Vanilla

Add wet ingredients to dry ingredients. For the nut lovers now is the time to add 3/4 cup of chopped walnuts, but they are optional, so for those of you who hate nuts just skip this step.

Next our mixture into a greased 8x8 pan.

In another bowl mix:
3/4 Cup of Sugar
1/4 Cup of Cocoa
1 3/4 Cup of hot water

Pour over batter, which is already in the greased pan. It will flood the brownie mixture, but that's ok.

Bake 45 minutes. Take out and let cool. At first the liquid might be very runny underneath the brownie, but once it is cooled it will gel up into a nice pudding.

Scoop out with a spoon and serve with vanilla ice cream or alone.

It's delicious! :)
~ SEM

More With Avacados

Avacados being high in both fat and price, this recipe isn't exactly *useful.* But it makes a great dessert, rather different from the usual sort.

Our friend Peter gave us this recipe after he served the dessert at our All Saints' Day Party. He got it from http://www.sallys-place.com/food/ethnic_cusine/brazil.htm, although his directions are written in, um, slightly different form. Enjoy!

***
Crème de Abacate (Mushy Green Stuff)

Ingredients:

2 medium Avocados
2 tablespoons lime juice
4 tablespoons granulated sugar
1/4 cup ice water

Peel and slice the avocado, discarding the whopping huge pit, or saving it because they look really cool and would be useful for... um, something. Someday. Maybe.

With the blender on "liquefy", throw the avocados, lime juice, and sugar in from 10 feet away... or, place all three ingredients into the blender, firmly place the top on, and then press "liquefy"... the choice is yours.

Puree until completely smooth, adding water if the puree is stiff (I tried several different batches, and found that adding the water with the other ingredients produced the best results for pouring. Otherwise, you will have a stiffer product, though the avocado whip makes for a decent greasing agent if WD-40 is unavailable).

If the product is lumpy, or resembles some gosh-awful concoction from the Star Wars Cantina, force through a wire strainer with electric cattle prods. It might still look like something from the cantina, but it'll be smoother, darnit!

Cocoa, orange slices, and coconut were added as garnishes and aren't part of the recipe. Add whichever garnishes you would most enjoy, I would recommend green olive and pimentos on a toothpick with some salsa... but then my taste-buds are slightly odd.