Do you have a favorite recipe you’d like to recommend? Are you hunting for a particular recipe? Please use the forum for both giving and getting. And welcome to the neighborhood!
One year, someone sent us the predictable Christmas tin of fruitcake, which we didn’t even bother to open but stashed on top of the refrigerator. And forgot about. Sometime in January, we spotted the tin and decided to make a pot of coffee and sample the well-aged fruitcake. After all, doesn’t fruitcake last forever? Alas, not if it is actually cheesecake!
Since then, whenever we receive a tin of anything, we open it right away. Some fruitcakes are scary, and even our dogs won’t eat them. But if it’s a fruitcake from the Collin Street Bakery in Corsicana, Texas, we treasure it. Collin Street’s Deluxe Fruitcake would more properly be described as a pecan cake. The company’s pecan-shelling plant is the largest in the world, and they don’t stint on the nuts in this honey-batter cake studded with pieces of pineapple, papaya, cherries, and golden raisins. The recipe dates back to 1896, when baker Gus Wiedmann of Wiesbaden, Germany, immigrated to Texas and set up a bakery and hotel in Corsicana. His business got a big boost when the Ringling Brothers Circus came to town. The troupe loved his Christmas cakes and ordered them sent to friends throughout Europe.
Do you have a treasured cookie recipe that you only use during the Christmas holidays? Whether it’s a family heirloom recipe or simply the cookie that your kids prefer above all others, we’d love to hear about it at "Another Bite." Please include a few lines telling us about the recipe’s place in your holiday traditions. We will award prizes of genuine, pure New Hampshire Maple Syrup, Grade A, for the three best original recipes for Christmas Cookies. Deadline is December 1, 2000. Winners will be announced in the December issue of "Another Bite."
On a cold Saturday night about a year ago, friends of ours invited us over for dinner. Their kitchen windows were steamed up and a wonderful smell — roasting meat, fruit, garlic, and who knows what else — filled the room. "Oh, it’s just pot roast," the cook, Greg, said modestly. We think he could tell from the way we ate (like ravenous famine victims trying to be polite) that we liked the pot roast. In fact, a few days later a copy of Cold-Weather Cooking by Sarah Leah Chase (Workman Publishing, 1990) appeared on our kitchen table, courtesy of Greg, with the recipe for "Winter Pot Roast" bookmarked.
"Just" pot roast indeed! This lucky piece of meat was basted and sauced and stewed with an army of sweet and savory ingredients.
Cooking your way through Cold-Weather Cooking can’t make winter go away, but it will definitely make it more fun. Although many of the recipes are too complicated for any but the most special occasion, and the author’s writing can go over the top (one chapter is called "The Brumal Fire of the Viands"), the recipes will inspire you. A few of the simpler ones are given here.
