Strawberry Pie.

Strawberries are on sale again. That doesn't entirely mean they're in season locally yet, but they're in season somewhere, and that was enough for my husband to bring home a 2 lb. container from the grocery store the other day. The thing with that many strawberries in the presence of two adults and a toddler...well, we cant make it through all of them quickly enough — they start to grow beards. I decided that this time they'd become a pie instead.

I rarely make a strawberry pie (or any pie for that matter, much to my husband's dismay) mainly because the chopping of the strawberries takes awhile, and I'd rather be doing something other than slicing two pounds of strawberries to manageable pieces. Still, the reward is worth it at least once a year...

 

Strawberry Pie, from Where's Mom Now That I Need Her?, by Betty Rae Frandsen, Kathryn J. Frandsen, Kent P. Frandsen

Ingredients:

3 T. strawberry gelatin

1 C. sugar

3 T. cornstarch

pinch salt

1 C. water, divided

3 drops red food coloring (I didn't use)

3 C. sliced strawberries

1 baked 9-in. pie shell (recipe follows)

Whipped cream (optional)

Directions:

Combine gelatin, sugar, cornstarch, and salt to make a paste with 1/8 cup of the water. Set aside.

Boil 7/8 cup of the water and gradually add the paste, stirring constantly to prevent lumping. Cook until thickened. Cool two hours.

Bake pie shell, if you're making your own.

Arrange sliced strawberries in pie shell. Stir food coloring into cooled glaze, if you like, and pour over strawberries. Chill completely. Top with whipped cream.

Pie Crust, from Gayle Van Camp

This is actually my mom's quiche crust, but I use it for everything, as it's delicious.

Ingredients:

1 c. flour

1/4 t. salt

1/4+1/8 c. butter flavored shortening (6 T.) (I use regular unsalted butter)

1 1/2 to 2 T. cold water

Directions:

Combine flour and salt in mixing bowl. Cut in shortening/butter with pastry blender till it resembles peas.

Add water, a little at a time. Form ball and roll out to fit a 9" pan. (I find this crust somewhat difficult to roll out, so I usually just press it into a pan.)

Bake crust for 8 or 9 minutes at 375°F. Enjoy!

P.S. This crust is also great when spices are mixed in and you wrap it around a peeled apple and bake for 20 minutes. DELICIOUS! But that's for another post…

Granola Bars (or loose granola).

A while back, we bought some granola bars to help tide us over for the long car ride home from wherever we were. Jonathan LOVED them. A bit later, we bought some CLIF bars to have on hand in case of 'emergency' (needing to leave right away and realizing we'd forgotten breakfast, or to help tide through an extra long meeting, etc.). Again, the one bar Jonathan had, he loved. And obsessed over. Nearly daily, he begged that his snack/breakfast/lunch/dinner/whatever could be a CLIF bar. This was getting out of hand! I decided that if he loved granola bars so much, I'd rather make them and know exactly what was in them. 

Then, for my birthday, Jonathan got me a new cookbook, and lo and behold, there was a granola bar recipe in it. It seemed destined to be. :)

Granola Bars, or Loose Granola, from The Supper Club, by Susie Cover

Ingredients:

3 1/4 c. old-fashioned oatmeal

1/2 c. flaxseed (recipe specifies golden, I used the regular that I had on hand.)

1 1/2 c. shredded coconut, preferably unsweetened (I used sweetened, what I had)

1 c. dried cranberries, chopped coarsely (ended up using raisins in second batch, ran out of craisins)

1/3 c. packed brown sugar

3 T. honey

3 T. maple syrup

2 T. canola oil (I used corn oil)

2 T. vanilla extract (yes, Tablespoons, not teaspoons!)

3/4 t. kosher salt

nonstick cooking spray (opt.)

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 400ºF. Line a large rimmed baking sheet with parchment paper.

Spread the oats (and flaxseed, though I chose not to put it in at this point,) on the prepared baking sheet and toast in the oven until lightly golden and aromatic, about 10 minutes. Set aside to cool.

In a large bowl, stir together the coconut and cranberries. In a small saucepan over low heat, combine the brown sugar, honey, maple syrup, oil, vanilla, and salt and cook, stirring constantly, until the brown sugar has completely dissolved and the mixture is a smooth syrup, about 5 minutes. (I frequently walked away, and there were a few granules of brown sugar left in the bottom of my syrup, but they got blended in well in the next step.)

Pour the syrup over the cranberries and coconut, add the toasted oats (and flaxseed!), and stir and toss with a rubber spatula until everything is evenly coated with the syrup and blended well.

To make loose granola, discard the parchment paper and spray your pan with cooking spray. Spread the oats mixture in a single layer on the pan and bake in a 325ºF oven, until golden brown. (Recipe says 30 minutes, but I scorched my first batch black in that time...15-20 should be fine.) 

To make granola bars, lightly spray the parchment paper with cooking spray (or not, I forgot to!) and spread the oats mixture evenly across it. Press down until everything is one large, evenly layered rectangle. Bake until golden brown, about 15-20 minutes in a 325ºF oven. Let cool till only slightly warm, then cut into bars. Transfer to the refrigerator and let the bars set and cool completely, about 1 hour. Then, using a thin spatula, remove bars from the pan and serve. (I removed the bars from the pan when I cut them, and packed them in a container in the fridge to cool.) Enjoy!

New Name, New Address, Same Great Taste

There are going to be some changes around here. Don't worry, the content will remain of the same vein, it's how you get to it thats changing.

The site is renaming to Life & Sundry. The new address is lifeandsundry.com (the current address will work for a little while, but please switch your bookmarks and such to the new one). 

I'm also switching to a combined RSS feed for your feed readers. Right now, everyone has to subscribe to all four feeds. Now, people can subscribe to one feed and get everything. Click this for the new feed.

You can also get site updates on Twitter from @lifeandsundry.

Egg Fried Rice.

My first real date with Chris was to a school dance. We went on a double date with mutual friends, and we left the pre-dance dining choice up to them. They chose a local Chinese restaurant that I enjoyed and had been to many times with my family. Unbeknownst to me, at this time, Chris hated Chinese food. He was, (and still sometimes is), a notoriously picky eater, and didn't know of a single dish he enjoyed there. He wanted to impress me though, and didn't protest the restaurant choice (especially after I made known that I enjoyed going there). If I remember correctly, he discovered he liked beef fried rice that night. I ordered the chicken fried rice, which was my favorite dish there, and is my go to dish to order at any new Chinese restaurant we're trying out. Since that night, Chris has found many Chinese dishes he enjoys, as have I, but we keep coming back to our mutual favorite — fried rice.

I usually halve this recipe (it's huge!) and it barely fits in my wok. I also tend to throw in whatever vegetables I have on hand. In fact, I don't think I've actually followed this recipe to the letter yet! It's very flexible, and forgiving if you accidentally put too much soy sauce or too little ginger, or any other adjustment you may find yourself making. Fresh ginger is a wonderful thing in this, and completely worth buying if you don't keep it on hand, but ground ginger can be substituted in a pinch. Make sure to precook any larger/thicker veggies you want to use, otherwise they will end up undercooked. 

Egg Fried Rice, from Simple Chinese Cooking by Kylie Kwong

Ingredients:

6 eggs

2/3 cup finely sliced spring onions (scallions)

2 T light soy sauce

1 T finely diced ginger

2 T vegetable oil (I use peanut oil)

1 small red onion, finely diced

4 cups steamed rice

1 T light soy sauce

1 1/3 c. finely shredded chinese cabbage leaves

optional other vegetables: peas, broccoli (precook), corn, water chestnuts, bamboo shoots, etc.

Directions:

Place eggs in a bowl with spring onions, soy sauce, and ginger, and beat lightly with a fork.

Heat oil in a hot wok until the surface of the oil seems to shimmer slightly. Add onion and stir-fry for 30 seconds. Pour in egg mixture and leave to cook for 10 seconds before folding egg mixture onto itself with a spatula and lightly scrambling for about 1 1/2 minutes or until mostly cooked through. Add rice and extra soy sauce and stir-fry for about 1 1/2 minutes, using the spatula to break the egg up into smaller pieces. Lastly toss in cabbage and any other veggies you choose and stir-fry about 20 seconds, or until vegetables are combined and heated through. Enjoy!

Bagels.

Bagels are a lovely thing. Made well, they are chewy, lightly browned, with a lovely light texture. Poorly made, they are so tough your jaw may just wear out before you finish eating them. Now, I do not claim to be a bagel connoisseur, I have not had the famed H&H bagels or anything like that, but I do know that I do not want to wear my jaw out on food that is supposed to be tasty. On top of all that, storebought bagels, the ones that are usually the worst offenders of the toughness issue, are much too expensive per bagel for me to justify buying regularly.

Normally, I would attempt to solve these problems by making them at home. You see, though, I've tried that. Back when I was a newlywed, still trying to figure out what I needed to learn in our little postage stamp sized kitchen, I attempted to make mini bagels. After several hours in a hot, steam-filled, noisy kitchen, (our smoke alarm was ridiculously sensitive - it went off every time the oven door was opened, no matter what temp it was set to!), the only passable results convinced me that bagels simply had to be purchased, not made.

Recently, I came across a few different bagel recipes that made me rethink my stance on bagels. Many called for ingredients I didn't readily have on hand, though, so I kept putting off the attempt. Then, yesterday, I found this recipe. I decided the wait was over and the same day began the process of making what resulted in delicious bagels.

My advice to you, if you choose to attempt these, (and you should), make sure you read through the entire recipe and consider how much time they take to make. They are very time consuming, at least in the "hurry up and wait" department. You work with the dough a bit, and then put it in the fridge. Then you pull it out, shape it, and put it back in the fridge. Then you leave it overnight, and then pull it out, let the dough rest for an hour, and then you begin the baking process. Consider yourself warned, but know that it's totally worth it. Enjoy!