Gramps' Pumpkin Pie

A visit to Grammie and Gramps' house in Kane, PA for the holidays was always accompanied by Gramps' family-famous pumpkin pie. He actually did that part of the cooking, which was one of his very few specialties (along with his daily oatmeal-to put hair on your chest.)



Tip: use pre-made Pillsbury crust flour a little before putting in the pie pan and cover the edges of your crust with tin foil (cut a longer sheet into long thirds), you can remove for last 5 or 10 minutes, it will keep the crust from getting too brown. It will make several pies with a little "pumpkin juice" left over- which everyone in our family fights for.



Pumpkin Pie


Combine:


1 large can of pumpkin
3 eggs beaten lightly
1 cup sugar
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/2 tsp ginger
1/4 tsp cloves
2 cups scalded milk



Except for the pumpkin can, triple all the ingredients... this third of the recipe works for the smaller can of pumpkin but somehow is never a good as the big batch.



Bake for 40 minutes at 400 degrees.

Cope's Corn P-A Style

Growing up in Pennsylvania, this dish was always a staple at Thanksgiving and Christmas for us. I've adopted it and kept it going in Chicago, even being able to find Cope's brand corn occasionally. Love this stuff!

TIP? Mom always cooked it in another flat pan full in an inch or two of water to help even the cooking and added crackers on top...

Cope's Corn

Baked Corn Supreme

1 15 oz can Cope’s corn, drain liquid***
1 tbsp sugar
1 cup scalded milk
2 eggs, well beaten
1 tsp Salt
1/4 tsp Pepper
1 tbsp Butter
2 tbsp crackers to top

Combine all ingredients. Bake in buttered baking dish for 40 minutes at 400 degrees.

Serves 4 – 6

***Note: Dried corn may be used in this recipe as follows:Grind contents of package (7.5 oz), in a blender or food chopper, add 5 cups cold milk, 3 ½ Tbsp butter or margarine, 2 tsp salt (optional), 3 Tbsp sugar, and 4 well beaten eggs. Mix thoroughly. Bake in buttered 2 qt casserole for 60 mins in 375 degrees F preheated oven.

Sabrina's Sweet Potatoes

I don't like sweet potatoes and we never had them growing up for holiday dinners but many friends who I was cooking Thanksgiving dinner for would talk about how they loved sweet potatoes as part of their Turkey Day dinner growing up. I just didn't make them. But, when a former co-worker, Sabrina, swore by this recipe... her family, she said, fought over it... I thought I'd give it a try. Not only did I love it but she was right- it was a big hit and now it graces all my holiday tables and is always requested by my friends. Thanks Sabrina!

Sabrina's Sweet Potato Souffle

Blend:


2 cups mashed sweet potatoes (29 oz can or 2 15 oz cans)
3/4 stick of butter
2 eggs
1/2 cup milk
1 1/4 cup sugar
1/2 tsp Cinnamon


Topping:


1/2 cup flour
1/2 stick butter
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup chopped pecans


Blend the first 6 ingredients and and pour into a casserole. (Can prepare the day before and cover leaving it in the fridge). Bake at 400 degrees for 20 minutes

Crumble the topping ingredients together. After the 20 minutes, remove the casserole from oven and sprinkle topping over top. Return to oven and bake and additional 10 minutes or until set.

Review: A Carina Little Story- Doesn't Blow

I sort-of liked The Glassblower of Murano. Nora goes to Venice after her husband divorces her for a uglier woman. Her idea is to focus on her glassblowing career, inspired to go not only by a desire to develop her own artistic skill with glass but also by a desire to find a link to family, more precisely to a famous glassblower ancestor of a father she never knew. Not surprisingly she has to overcome some obstacles and finds some romance along the way. A lot of her success comes from her being a pretty blond that inspires men to move mountains to help her.

What did I like? Well, I lived in Italy for a year, love Venice and the clever juxtaposition of the two family members lives being tied together generations apart was done fairly well and the vehicle was good. If you like romances and a little historical fiction, you will enjoy very much. The history of the glassblowers was the most intriguing part, I thought.

What didn't I like? I didn't really like the heroine of the book, and those kinds of books are always hard sells. I never really connected to her and didn't really ever feel bad for her. I think it is just a character development issue for me. Her fish out of water story wasn't from her living in a new place, it was because she gets shunned at the workplace? She spends time telling us about the mother and her relationship with her. Then, for someone so concerned about "family" I didn't see a mention of her calling her mother to tell her about any of her big news, though she didn't have a problem mentioning how our erstwhile detective hero called his friends right away. She's supposed to not be concerned about money after the divorce but then we find out she's relieved she's been paid so she can make one month's rent... no other mention of money in the whole thing.

Do I want to spend a whole book with someone I wouldn't like very much at a dinner party? As far as I could tell, Nora's only redeeming quality was that she was pretty and could decorate an apartment... interesting tidbits, but not a fleshed out person for me to like. Yes, yes, if the writing is good enough, the character development is good, the story is good I don't have to like the character... here, the writing was decent in parts, the story was good in parts. The problem was that just when I was getting ready to keep reading, I kept getting distracted by the break-out italicized thought quotes that were thrown in. The way I read-and I'm a fairly fast reader-made me stop this book a couple times and put it aside to read something else because I would stop and slow down so often in order to read the quote bubbles. If Marina had just told me what they were thinking in the text, I would have been happier. Again, maybe not an issue for everyone.

Enough of this story stuck for me, in the end I would say that especially if historical romance is your deal, then read it. For me, I'm going to wait to see what Fiorata Marina comes out with next... with such smart ideas to anchor the book, I think practice with her writing will only make her better and I'll be willing to give her another chance.

GIDDY As a SCHOOLGIRL Over This One...

I... AM.... SOOOOO...EXCITED!!! I mean I am jumping up and down, excited!!! Okay, so I posted before about Song of Fire and Ice being done by HBO back in October of 2008. Oh. So. Long. Ago. So, long ago in fact, that I kind of thought it wouldn't happen.

But, fast forward ahead and here I am today... looking at an IMDB page that has some of my FAVORITE actors cast in the roles I so love in the books. First off... can we say JENNIFER EHLE playing Catelyn Stark? She is amazing (I simply adore her as Pride and Prejudice's Eliza Bennet.) Okay, so for one of my favorite characters, she is perfect. I like her enough in that role that I would be excited for that alone.

But now consider that we also have SEAN BEAN!! playing Eddard Stark. Can that be any better? Perhaps you remember him as the bad guy he played in National Treasure or the great Sharpe series (based on the Bernard Cornwell books). Mark Addy, the guy who plays Roland in the guilty-pleasure flick, A Knight's Tale (also with Heath Ledger and Paul Bettany) cements it and that is only three characters. If they're doing this good of a job at casting these roles... the rest of them have to be stellar as well. Just see who they have playing Tyrion Lannister...

I'm officially excited.

Review: A Gentleman's Daughter and the Pentagram of Death

Pride and Prejudice AND Zombies? Come on! I was so excited! A longstanding Pride and Prejudice/Jane Austen fan, the A&E/BBC television miniseries which featured Colin Firth and Jennifer Ehle left me firmly gaga over the story. I got the added benefit of the craze with the Helen Fielding Bridget Jones series- both movies and books parroting P&P (and even talking about Collin Firth's swimming scene) and the Bollywood version-Bride and Prejudice, and I loved them all, except for the Kiera Knightly version, which I thought was okay but why try to remake something so soon after the last one which was perfect in all respects. Though Jennifer Worick does make a good point when she says she wants to punch Mr. Darcy in the face (see her blog post here.) because Darcy ruins all other men for we of the Austen-loving set. How does one measure up? (Unless you're Jamie Fraser, which alas is another literary character and one we won't get into here *sigh*.)

To this book, I say-eh.

Don't get me wrong, it gives me another chance to read Jane Austen. I like zombies. However, I think Seth Grahame-Smith stole some of the non-girliness and integrity that I like about Miss Eliza Bennet. That may sound strange because he does let her be a Chinese-trained zombie killer. She still swoons a little much for my taste. If it weren't for Jane Austen's filched language, I might even pick this as a really good book... but unless you're going to really spin a story with with your own spin... the stolen language left me a feeling a little disappointed and the original is so good that I think this version was a little flat for me.

I still liked it, think it was fun and especially if you're not a big Jane Austen fan, you probably wouldn't know the difference and would really like it.

Read it, it is fun and one can never get enough P&P in my humble opinion.

Review: Terre D'Ange Gets a Fresh Breath of Air

I happily picked up Jacqueline Carey's Namaah's Kiss after reading the other books in this Kushiel Fantasy series, first with Phedre and then with Imriel's stories, but they are the stuff of legend when we finally get to Moirin's story.

Moirin grows up a little bit of a witch in the woods with her mother and discovers that her father was from Terre D'Ange, so the goods of both her parents are speaking to her and giving her guidance. She ends up controlling her powers working with an Asian guru, who takes her on the adventure of her life. She rises to the challenge and helps in the quest to save the Princess... a nice change from the boys always saving the day.

I really like this series, usually a proponent of the George RR Martin or Robin Hobb books, they are a total guilty pleasure and I'll keep reading them as long as Carey keeps churning them out. She does a nice job in creating worlds and with her characters. Sometimes the characters are a little shallow (I admit) and the story is obvious but it does what it advertises and gives me a good fantasy read with a little bit of happy smut for good measure. Enjoy!