Indispensible Holiday Corn-See For Yourself!

I'm going to show you how to make my favorite holiday corn, I really am. But first, let me tell you about our weekend. We had cousins come into town early for Thanksgiving. They had barely stepped foot out of the car when we whisked them away to a Riders in the Sky concert. These are four of the silliest goofball cowpokes you ever did see. (Um, I'm not sure if I'm talking about the singers or the kids. I'll let you decide.) I hope I get to see them in concert again. Kids and grown-ups alike were doubled over with laughter. We left tapping our toes and humming through smiles. This weekend was also our local hospital fundraiser, The Jubilee of Trees. Talented people in the community decorate and donate trees for auction. Generous people in the community buy these decorated trees. Last year my parents bought a Peter Pan tree that I inherited this year. I'll give you a peek later (and a peek of the one they bought this year), but here's a sample of one of the themed trees available for purchase. This one caught my eye for the Quiet Man's parents. It would be perfect in their Nantucket room. If I had a million dollars....

The charges were part of the entertainment at the Jubilee. Sailor has been playing the violin there for the last five years, and West for the last three. He's come a long, long way. (I used to have to crouch behind him for moral support. Now I sit in the audience making silly faces at him.)I never get sick of watching them play, not at home or abroad. I'm getting my money's worth for those violin lessons. I've got my own little string duo that always owe me a favor. And of course, we had to take part in all of the good times at the Jubilee, in the name of charity, tut tut! I almost almost almost stood in line for face painting myself. I want a pretty snowflake on my cheek.

This one was a crack-up. For a buck, the kids could be inside a giant bubble. Who thinks of these things?Boy in a plastic bubble.All right, enough with the weekend and let's get one to the week. It is THE week. Thanksgiving is a mere few days away. Are you making pie crusts and freezing rolls and brining turkeys? I ought to be, but I'm getting a slow start due to excessive play. (See above photos.) But today, doggone it, I'm making this corn and putting it into the fridge. This recipes hails from a beautiful restaurant in Fullerton, California known as the Summit House. Some people (me) go there and order bowl fulls of the fantastic stuff. This is corn at Daddy Warbuck's house on Christmas morning. It doesn't get any better than this. It's decadent all right, but that's why I save it for holiday meals and dinner parties. Start off with a handful of easy ingredients: frozen corn, flour, butter, sugar, cream, and salt and pepper. (Sugar, where are you? Did you not want your picture taken?)

Place the corn, salt, sugar, pepper, and cream in a saucepan and bring to a boil.

In a small bowl, combine softened butter and flour to make "kneaded butter."

Add to the corn mixture to thicken.

Pour it into a buttered casserole dish. Store it covered in the fridge and warm it up in the oven right before you're ready to eat it.

If you want it to be extra over-the-top delicious, sprinkle the top with parmesan and put it under the broiler to brown. Oh, yes. It's going to be good. And you might want to double it, since I have never, ever had any leftovers no matter how much I make. Try not to eat it all for dinner tonight.

PS Have you got any questions about Thanksgiving dinner? It's time for Prudy's Online Thanksgiving Hotline. Leave a comment and let me at 'em.

Money Saving Tips:

Swap out the cream for evaporated milk. Use canned corn in place of the frozen, if that's what you've got. Canned and frozen corn should be on sale for pennies this week.

Creamed Corn Au Grautin from the Summit House

Estimated Cost: $4.oo for 8 servings

1 lb. frozen corn

1 and 1/2 cups whipping cream

1/2 teaspoon salt

2 tablespoons sugar

pinch of pepper

1 and 1/2 tablespoons softened butter

1 and 1/2 tablespoons flour

3 tablespoons finely shredded parmesan cheese

Combine corn, cream, salt, sugar and pepper in a pot and bring to a boil. Simmer for five minutes. In a small bowl, mix flour and butter until completely smooth. Add to corn mixture and stir until well combined. Return to a boil. Simmer for one minute. Remove from heat. Pour into a buttered oven-proof dish (an 8 or 9 inch square, pie or quiche dish will all work). Place tightly covered in fridge until ready to serve. Just before serving, heat oven to 425. Sprinkle corn with parmesan and bake until hot and bubbly. (For Thanksgiving dinner, I bake it completely in advance and heat it in the microwave just before dinner time. )

Up Next: Prudy's Online Thanksgiving Hotline-leave a comment and ask away!

My Favorite Pumpkin Pie with Pecan Streusel

I was getting ready to post my pumpkin ginger cheesecake, one of my signature dishes around the holidays. I started to look through pictures, making sure that I hadn't posted it already. This is what I found from last year. They look like babes in arms compared to this year. I like them just like this, chubby cheeked and smiling. These were our guests.and this was our dinner last year. Here's Dad reading to the kids later in the evening.

If you peeked in on us this year, I suspect it would look just about the same, except for last year's wee ones are a bit taller and trimmer and there are new little babies taking their place. When it's all said and done, even though Thanksgiving is a truckload of work, I am so happy to be able to share it with my family. My whippersnappers aren't going to be little forever. I'm so glad they have such happy memories with their cousins, aunts, uncles and grandparents. They might not be little forever, but a happy memory is eternal.

After looking through all my old pictures and posts, I discovered that I hadn't shared my ultimate favorite Pumpkin Pie with Pecan Streusel. I will still post my cheesecake, but it's going to take a backseat. (Don't worry Heidi-I'll still make you one for your birthday.) The cheesecake can stick around through New Year's but this pie, this pie is all about Thanksgiving. I found the recipe in Bon Appetit in 1994, when I was a college student. I've since tinkered, but the credit should be theirs. (The original top-rated recipe is here. )The spiced pumpkin filling is silky and rich, just like you would expect. What makes the pie exceptional is the ginger scented pecan streusel topping. I have to guard this pie like a hawk, or my pesty little brother Roy will steal all the streusel off the top. It's a little game we play, he and I. We've been raging a pumpkin pie war for sixteen years now and I wouldn't have it any other way. Make my pie and drive your own little brothers crazy. It's all part of the happy memories.

Money Saving Tips: Stock up on canned pumpkin this week when you can get it for a buck. Substitute evaporated milk for the half and half, if you don't have it on hand. Walnuts would be everybit as nice as pecans, if you can find them for cheaper this week.

Pumpkin Pie with Pecan Streusel, adapted from Bon Appetit

1 pie crust, partially baked (click here for my recipe and tutorial)

Filling:

1 16-ounce can solid pack pumpkin
1 1/2 cups half and half
3 large eggs
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 cup packed golden brown sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoons ground allspice
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
1/4 teaspoon salt

Topping:
1 cup all purpose flour
1/2 cup packed golden brown sugar
1/2 cup coarsely chopped pecans (about 2 1/2 ounces)
1 tablespoon finely minced crystallized ginger, optional
1 1/2 teaspoons ground ginger
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, cut into small pieces, room temperature

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.For filling:Whisk all ingredients in large bowl until combined. Pour into partially baked, cooled pie crust. Bake until skin begins to form on filling and filling begins to set, about 50 minutes. Remove from oven. Let pie stand 10 minutes to set slightly. Maintain oven temperature.
Meanwhile, prepare topping:Mix first 5 ingredients in medium bowl. Rub in butter with fingertips until mixture begins to form small clumps. Sprinkle topping over pie. Bake until pie is set and streusel is golden brown, about 25 minutes. Transfer to rack and cool completely. Serve with whipped cream.

Next Up: Summit House Corn

Grandma's Buttery Holiday Rolls Tutorial

Hiya everybody. We're just one week away from Turkey Day. Woo-hoo. I'm starting to dust off platters, count chairs, and scribble grocery lists for my Quiet Man. We've got a count of about 35 I believe, but there's always room for more if you're thinking about a visit. I've still got one lonely cardtable, so come on over. One of the items on our table that draws the crowd is my Mom's buttery holiday rolls. Light and feathery, soft and pillowy, these rolls are a favorite with young and old alike. I know it might seem intimidating to work with yeast, but once you get the hang of it, these rolls are really quite easy to make. They require very little kneading since a long, cold rise will turn the task over to the yeast. Make them the night before and shape them during the final hours of prep. I like to pop the rolls in the oven just as the turkey comes out, since the turkey needs to rest for about 30 minutes. There's nothing like a piping hot turkey dinner with a warm, homemade roll resting on the side of the plate. I'm not going to name any names (Sailor, Reeve, little Adam) but there are some in our family that will skip the dinner and load the plate up with rolls. They're that good! Here's a step by step guide that will help any baker churn out perfectly delicious, positively pretty holiday rolls.
The ingredients are simple and inexpensive: milk, active rise yeast, butter, eggs, water, salt, sugar, and flour.

"Proof" the yeast by mixing it with a bit of sugar and warm water. When I say warm water, think baby bottle warm. No hotter than you would offer to a wee screaming babe.

After ten minutes, it should be a spongy mass. (I let mine go a little longer. I got distracted laughing with Mary Kate on the telephone.)

Meanwhile, heat your butter and milk in the microwave for a minute. Make sure it's not too hot-think baby bottle warm again.

Add your milk and butter, sugar, eggs and salt to your yeast mixture. Stir in 2 and 1/2 cups flour with a wooden spoon. Just stir until it's mixed in.

Just like this. It's a little thicker than pancake batter.

Cover and let rise for one hour.

Now you've got a bubbly, sticky mass that's about 50 percent larger.

Stir in the remaining 3 cups of flour. You don't need to knead. Just keep a stirrin' for a couple or minutes, cowgirl.

You'll be left with a sticky, ragged dough. Perfect. Now cover it up with some buttered plastic wrap as a blanket and say good night. Put it somewhere nice and cold, like the fridge if you've got space, or maybe the garage or the shed. Just make sure it's cold and not freezing. (Even if it did freeze, you'd be fine-you'd just have to thaw out before moving forward.)

About 90 minutes before you're ready to bake, pull back the covers and take a look at your dough. It should be a big fat ball full of air pockets.

Butter your hands and gently punch it down.

It's going to be sticky, so use a light, cold hand. Divide the dough into two equal balls and set one aside.

Flour your work surface. Use as much flour as you need depending on how sticky your dough is. If it's really cold, you won't need too much. My dough was at room temp, so it needed a bit more.

Turn the dough out onto the floured surface. Roll or pat the dough out into a 12 inch circle. (Thanks to Sailor for laying down her math to snap pics while my hands were buttery.)

Generously butter the dough circle. I used 2 tablespoons here, but sometimes I go crazy and use twice that. Ooh, boy. Crazy I tell you.

Coat a sharp knife with cooking spray.

Divide the dough in half. Repeat four times, making eight wedges.

Divide each wedge in half again for a total of 16 pieces. Don't worry if they aren't perfect. Perfect is for bakeries. Rustic is for home.

Start with the wide end of your wedge and roll up snugly.Tuck the skinny ragged end of the wedge to the bottom of your roll and place on a greased cookie sheet.

I scooted them all over and ended up putting all sixteen on a standard cookie sheet. Repeat with your remaining ball of dough.

Cover them and let them rise for about 45 minutes, or until almost doubled.

Bake for 12 minutes at 350 degrees. Pick up a roll with a spatula and make sure it's nicely browned on the bottom, too. Let them cool for a couple of minutes before placing them in a basket.

See if you can resist eating one before dinner. Bet you can't.

There you have it. Now go forth and bake yourself some buttery holiday rolls. I can almost smell them now! See you this weekend with my favorite pumpkin cheesecake.

Grandma's Buttery Holiday Rolls

Estimated Cost: $2.50 for 32 rolls

5 teaspoons active dry yeast

1/2 cup warm water (baby bottle warm)

1 teaspoon sugar

1/2 cup softened butter (or heat it with milk in microwave)

1 and 1/2 cups warm milk (baby bottle warm)

3 eggs

1/2 cup sugar

1 and 1/2 teaspoon salt

5 and 1/2 cups flour, plus more for rolling

4-8 tablespoons softened butter, for spreading

In a large bowl (or freestand mixer) combine yeast, water, and 1 teaspoon sugar. Let stand for 10 minutes to "proof" the yeast. If the yeast rises, continue. If it does not, discard the yeast and begin again. Add butter, milk, eggs, 1/2 cup sugar, and salt. Stir in 2 and 1/2 cups flour with a wooden spoon. Dough will be extremely sticky. Let stand, covered in a warm place for one hour. Add remaining flour, stirring with a wooden spoon for two minutes. Dough will be sticky and ragged. Place dough in refrigerator or cold place (basement or garage?) overnight. About 90 minutes before serving time, divide dough into two balls. On a floured surface, roll one ball out into 12 inch circle. Generously butter top of circle. Cut circle into 16 equal wedges. Roll up, beginning with wide edge. Tuck raggedy edge under and place on greased cookie sheet. Allow to rise, covered in a warm spot for 45 minutes to 1 hour, or until almost doubled. Bake at 350 degrees for about 12 minutes. (Rolls can be frozen at this point, tightly wrapped. Bring to room temperature before warming in oven for five minutes.)

Next Up: Pumpkin Ginger Cheesecake