January 14, 2015 by schrackert

Poppy Seed Hamantaschen | take one

My grandpa Joe was Jewish. His mother, my great grandma, Esther Lieberman, apparently made really delicious poppy seed hamantaschen. I never had her cookies. When I was growing up, my dad would stop by Cecil’s Deli in the Highland Park neighborhood of Saint Paul to buy poppy seed hamantaschen to bring home. It was always a really special treat. There are no words for how delicious these cookies are. Seriously. Drive there now and buy one. You’re welcome.

You can imagine how excited I was to find the article below in grandma’s recipe box! Is it possible I could make the flying unicorn of delicious cookies!? Well… I will save you the suspense of wondering and tell you that this recipe is a total flop. They are not the cookies of my dreams. But I am now on a quest to recreate Cecil’s hamantaschen. I might start here next (this blogger gives a GREAT history of this amazing food).

In case you want to re-create my horrible disappointment, here’s the recipe!

I would bet money that Cecil’s makes their poppy seed filling from scratch. I’m going to try that next time. For now I used the standard Solo poppy seed filling. It’s overly sweet and filled with corn syrup. But it tastes like every poppy seed coffeecake you’ve ever bought.

The recipe called for the juice and zest of two oranges and one lemon. I only had clementines, so decided to use four. I didn’t remember tasting citrus in my Cecil’s hamantaschen, but I humored the recipe.

The recipe also called for Crisco, which meant I had a chance to whip out the WONDER CUP (hear angels singing, dang this kitchen gadget is amazing).

Finally, after mixing up your dough, track down your nearest cute toddler to help roll out the dough. Or don’t. They really can’t help themselves from putting their fingers in your perfectly round cut outs, which really does make forming perfect little cookie hats pretty tricky.

I have these awesome biscuit cutters. I used the 3 inch and change one. Roll your dough to 1/8th of an inch. My dough was WAY too wet. I added flour until it seemed manageable. I also refrigerated the dough for a couple of hours. It was still pretty difficult to work with.

Here we are with the filling. I used a tablespoon as my poppy seed scoop.

Here are my somewhat not perfect hats. Notice they look nothing like Cecil’s.

When I ran out of poppyseed filling I decided not to open a second can. Instead, I filled them with chocolate and peanut butter chips. They’re fine. They didn’t melt. It’s a decent vehicle for eating chocolate and peanut butter chips.

Here are my final cookies. They are fine. They are nothing special. The search continues.

When I got to the end of the dough and couldn’t cut out 3 inch circles any more, I used a small biscuit cutter to make little cookies. I thought they’d be perfect for my 2 year old. I put a few more of the chocolate and peanut butter chips in. They are actually a pretty good toddler cookie. Not too sweet.

If I were actually taking the time to THINK about this, I probably should have grabbed some dried cherries and walnuts out of the cupboard instead. It would have gone better with the slightly citrusy dough– almost like a little scone.

In fact, I think these little toddler cookies with fruit and nuts might be the only reason I would pull out this recipe again.

Poppy Seed Hamantaschen

1 Cup Shortening

1 Cup Sugar

4 Eggs

1 Teaspoon Vanilla

Juice and part of rind of two oranges

Juice and part of rind of one lemon

1 Teaspoon Salt

4 Cups Flour

4 Teaspoons Baking Powder

Cream together shortening and sugar. Add the eggs one at a time. Then add vanilla, orange, and lemon. Combine dry ingredients separately. Add to wet ingredients.

Roll out dough on a floured surface to 1/8th of an inch thick. Cut dough into 3 inch circles. Place filling in the center and fold edges together to form a tri-cornered hat. Bake at 350 degrees for 15 minutes or until golden brown.

December 14, 2014 by schrackert

Chocolate Ammonia Cookies

When I was a kid, grandma baked chocolate ammonia cookies every Christmas. She called them “poison cookies.” I’ve been talking a lot about these cookies lately, and I get the same response from everyone. “Did you just say ammonia?!”

Yes, real ammonia. It was apparently used in a lot of old world cooking. You know… the kind of cooking grandmas do. And interestingly is also used for smelling salts. The ammonia functions a a leavening agent. As you bake the cookies the ammonia bubbles up, releasing gas, and creating the necessary leavening effect. Your house will smell like ammonia while cooking… it’s sort of a weird cleaning/baking combo. I’m sure I’m not convincing you to make these cookies with this sales pitch, but I promise, they’re good. The baking process deactivates the ammonia, and the cookies are totally safe to eat. And delicious. They are a bit crunchy and kind of taste like hot cocoa.

Just whatever you do… DON’T EAT THE RAW COOKIE DOUGH!

These old recipes are kind of hilarious, they don’t actually give many instructions for how to make the cookies… because clearly we all should know what to do…. clearly. Here’s what I did, and they seemed to turn out right.

I didn’t have chocolate baking squares, so I improvised with chips. No big deal. We have a scale and I assumed each square was meant to be an ounce of chocolate.

Cream the butter and sugar together. Add the vanilla.

Melt the chocolate. I use the microwave. About 30 seconds, stir, another 30 seconds, stir, and then maybe another 15-20 seconds.

In a separate bowl, combine the flour, salt, and ammonia. Slowly combine in the mixer so that the flour doesn’t go flying and make a mess of your kitchen.

Shape the dough into small one inch balls. If you make the cookies too big they won’t get the right consistency and the leavening won’t work exactly right. Place a walnut in the center of each ball.

Bake in a pre-heated oven at 350 degrees for 13-14 minutes.

CHOCOLATE AMMONIA COOKIES

1 1/2 C. Butter

2 C. Sugar

4 Squares Melted Chocolate

1 tsp. Vanilla

3 C. Flour

2 tsp. crushed Carbonate of Ammonia

1/2 tsp. Salt

Shape in balls. Place nut on top. Press. Bake in slow oven 12-15 minutes (325 – 350 degrees).

November 23, 2014November 29, 2014 by schrackert

Best Apple Crisp Ever

One could argue that fall in Minnesota is essentially over. We’ve already had a couple of weeks of snow and bitter cold. The down jackets and Sorels are in constant rotation. But today, it’s 40 degrees! The snow has melted and we can see the leaves in our front yard that we never found the time to rake. Knowing that five months of winter are on the horizon, I’ve decided to squeeze out as much Minnesota fall as I can today.

Jeremy and I had a CSA this summer… a HALF CSA share. Like most normal people in the world who optimistically order their CSA share in the spring, we had a pretty hard time using all of our produce every week. That’s why, a week before Thanksgiving, I still had a huge bowl of amazing apples in a bowl on my counter. But let’s be honest, they weren’t really looking all that amazing today. They were probably about a week away from being tossed into the woods for the deer.

But, with a little bit of creative paring knife work, I was able to save most of them!

I was excited to find this apple crisp recipe in grandma’s recipe box for a couple reasons. First… apple crisp… need I say more? But look at the two recipes below! The one on the left is one I copied out of my mom’s recipe box when I moved to Chicago when I was 21. (Please forgive the embarrassing typo of “walnets.”) I pulled out this recipe earlier this fall and realized that I never copied over the amount of butter to use! When I made it I used one stick. Note grandma’s original recipe on the right calls for TWO sticks. Clearly everything is better with more butter. Thanks, grandma. The final thing I love about this recipe is that minus the missing butter… the recipe is the same almost word for word. It’s like I just got a hug from grandma.

Now for the recipe. Start by cleaning your apples. It’s the worst part really… but good things come to those who peel and chop apples.

Next… when your baby starts crying in the middle of baking delicious, gooey apple goodness…. strap him on and keep peeling.

When preparing your 9×9 baking dish, I suggest just grabbing a fingerful of the soft butter on your counter and smearing it along the bottom and sides. Fill 2/3 of the way to to top as grandma clearly writes, and you’re good to go.

Next you’ll get your ingredients together for the streusel topping. The recipe calls for quick oats. I only had old fashioned oats. I think they work just fine.

The recipe doesn’t explicitly tell you to do anything with the walnuts, but it would be a crime not to toast them first. Stove top toasting is my method of choice. Just don’t forget about them. They go from perfectly toasted to burnt pretty fast.

The streusel topping is pretty easy. I used a full 1/2 teaspoon of cinnamon, because 1/4 teaspoon seemed stingy. My two big tips are to chop your butter before adding it to your dry ingredients to make your life a little easier. Also, keep it in the fridge until you use it. You’ll want it nice and cold. My butter got a little warm because… you know… kids. But it’s butter and is delicious always.

When pouring your streusel topping on the apples, be gentle. If you pat it down too aggressively your streusel topping will be just a little sad. You want happy, fluffy, crunchy streusel topping.

Bake for 50-60 minutes and serve warm with vanilla ice cream. The vanilla bean kind. And Breyers if you have it. Don’t waste your time with whipped cream.

APPLE OATMEAL CRUNCH aka APPLE CRISP

About 6 medium apples
1 C flour
1 C brown sugar
1/4 tsp cinnamon
1 C butter
1 C quick oatmeal
1/4 C walnuts (optional)

Fill well buttered 9″ x 9″ baking dish 2/3+ full with chopped or sliced apples.

Combine flour, brown sugar and cinnamon. Blend in butter as for streusel topping. Add oatmeal and walnuts. Mix well and pour over apples.

Bake at 350 for 50 to 60 minutes. Serve warm with ice cream or whipped cream.

Update: I just talked to my mom about this recipe and it is actually hers! The credit given on my poorly copied recipe was correct. Grandma copied it over because She liked it so much. Mom got the recipe from one of the old Lutheran church cookbooks from generations and generations of farmers. No wonder there is so much butter in the recipe!

November 17, 2014November 29, 2014 by schrackert

Grandma’s Recipe Box

My grandma was a child of the Great Depression. She was a World War II newlywed. She worked outside of the home and raised three children with my grandpa in an era when most women chose to stay home to raise their kids. She was a feisty, strong-willed, smart, and kind woman. She loved generously.

Ten years ago my grandparents moved into assisted living and gave away a lot of their things. I was home on a visit from Chicago, where I was living at the time, and saw a box full of recipes tucked off to the side — forgotten about. No one else wanted it and I remember thinking, “One day I’ll go through that and find grandma’s old bakalva recipe.” So I took it, packed it away in my parents’ basement and returned to Chicago.

I have since moved back to Minnesota. I am married and have two sons — almost two years and three months. Today, I stumbled across that old recipe box in a Rubbermaid bin my dad sent over to my house as he was cleaning out his basement.

As I sat at the kitchen table reading through all of the recipes in my grandma’s handwriting, I was overcome with emotion. She died almost two years ago, right after my first son was born. She’d lived a long and wonderful life and was ready to join my grandpa, her husband of 66 years, who had passed away the year prior.

In these recipes for jello salad, and hot spam sandwiches, and chicken casserole I saw my grandmother as a young working mother of three in a post war era trying to get food on the table for three fussy kids after a long workday. I thought about my husband and I who both work in non profit jobs. We passionately love to cook and yet find that a grilled cheese sandwich and frozen peas have become a common dinner around our house. I see myself in my grandma when I look through these recipes. And it makes me want to be feisty and strong-willed and smart and kind just as she was… and to build a legacy of love and good food.

I want to cook these recipes! The good ones and the (let’s be honest) downright gross-sounding ones. I want to see which ones my toddler will eat and which ones I can improve upon. I want to work a job that I love outside of the home and still work with my husband to put dinner on the table to eat as a family. My grandma might not be here to give me advice on raising my young family, but perhaps her recipe box can give me a little insight into how she managed it so well.

DeLores & Joe

Just a few WWII love letters that built our family.

Category / Grandma’s Recipe Box

Poppy Seed Hamantaschen | take one

Chocolate Ammonia Cookies

Best Apple Crisp Ever

Grandma’s Recipe Box