All-American Pasta Salad

This dish is a fresh, cool, simple, make-ahead treasure for summer pot-luck dinners like the one we are attending tonight!

Ingredients:
1 pound Penne pasta
8 ounces smoked Gouda cheese
1 jar diced pimentos
1 jar artichoke hearts
1/2 purple onion
1/2 pint grape tomatoes
1/2 green bell pepper
3 green onions
1 can sliced black olives

Dressing Ingredients:
1 cup mayonnaise
2 tablespoons sweet pickle relish
2 tablespoons red pepper jelly
2-3 tablespoons vinegar
salt and pepper to taste

Instructions:

• Boil up the pasta to the al dente stage.  Drain, rinse, and set aside to cool.

• Slice the Gouda cheese wheel in half and cut into pie shaped wedges.

• Then, dice up those wedges into small bite-sized pieces.

• Admire it just a bit because it is beautiful, fragrant, and good-a!  
• Slice half the purple onion and dice the slices up into little yummy pieces. (Save the rest for salads later in the week ahead.)

• Slice and dice half the green pepper and put the rest in the fridge for another recipe.

• Pick three beautiful green onions from Mike's garden and wash them up in the sink.  Well, you might want to pick yours from somewhere else but make sure you wash them up somewhere.  Then, snip them up into tiny little pieces. Yep, the whole thing - green and white as well.

• Drain the black olives in your favorite little colander spoon thingy.

• Drain, rinse, and chop the artichoke hearts - right in the heart of them.

• Rinse the grape tomatoes.  It's okay if you eat a couple, too.  Then, slice them in half.

• Open the jar of diced pimentos and pat yourself on the back that you thought to get the diced ones which will save you a bit of chopping.

• Plop each of the veggie pieces on top of the al dente pasta in a big old beautiful bowl.  Do it in an arranged way so that the colors look beautiful for a photo.

• Now mix up a little tangy and sweet dressing for this beautiful concoction.  Start out with a cup of mayonnaise.

• Add some home-made sweet pickle relish - about two tablespoons.  (If you don't have home-made relish, it will be okay to use some of the bought kind.)

• Plop in a couple of tablespoons of red pepper jelly to add some tang to it.

• Pour in a little bit of vinegar - two to three tablespoons.  I used some out of my home-made bread-and-butter pickles so it would have a bit more bite to it.  Then, stir all this together and admire the beautiful little flecks of wonderfulness inside.

• Sprinkle in some salt and pepper to taste and plop this right smack dab in the center of the bowl of veggies and pasta.

• Toss everything together making sure to coat all of it with a bit of the yummy dressing.

• Cover with some clear plastic wrap so you can admire the colorful beauty of it as you set it in the fridge for all the flavors to marry together for a couple of hours or so.  Give it a quick, refreshing toss just before you serve it!

(It is quite alright if you dish yourself up a spoonful to eat with some left-over chicken livers as a late lunch so long as nobody - well, at least Mike - knows.  After all, somebody has to taste it to make sure it is going to be alright for the pot-luck!)

Hot Pockets

My daughter-in-law, Jessica, was sharing a story about how her parents are surviving their house remodel/add-on with no kitchen and heating up foods like Hot Pockets for dinner.  Now, I know that there are times when we all wish we had no kitchen so we wouldn't have to cook or clean it and could just eat out or something like that.  However, in reality, I don't think any of us really, really wants to be without a kitchen at all.  Yet, her mention of Hot Pockets flung a craving on me today.  Rather than make a dash to the store, though, I decided to try to concoct one of my own.  Here is what I came up with:

Ingredients:
1 package refrigerated Crescent Rolls - when you start with this as a base, what wouldn't be easy and good?
1 pound leftover pork loin - rubbed with a secret concoction of McCormick's Grill Mates Smokehouse Maple and Mesquite seasonings and marinated overnight in a secret concoction of Johnny's Sauce, Worcestershire Sauce, Soy Sauce, and Lemon Juice

mushrooms - an ingredient that I think makes most any main dish wonderful and Mike says I add to everything and...maybe I do

grated cheddar and Monterey Jack cheese - You know I grew up on a dairy farm and how can you go wrong by adding cheese?

• First, unroll the roll dough and butt two of the triangles together at the base end.
• Top with some roasted pork loin that wouldn't slice when your husband tried to slice it for his birthday party company (various family members) and wound up just pulling apart like pulled pork bar-b-que. 
• Add a layer of the mushrooms and sprinkle with some of the cheese.

• Fold the pointy ends of the dough over the filling and bake in a 350 degrees oven for about ten minutes.
• Sprinkle with a bit more cheese and serve up with some home-made pickles, some Goldfish crackers you steal from the stash for the grands, and a glass of cranberry juice.

Yum!

P.S.  It also looks delish on a pretty blue-and-white plate gifted to you by said daughter-in-law's mother, Karen.  Thanks, Karen! 

Kosher-Style Dill Pickle Spears

Ingredients:

10 pounds cucumbers
1/4 cup mixed pickling spices
2-3 bunches fresh or dried dill
1 1/2 cups canning salt
2 cups vinegar
2 gallons water
6 cloves garlic (optional)
Bay leaves
6-8 cloves of garlic
6-8 hot, red peppers
Mustard seed

Preparation Steps:

I basically had two sized of cucumbers and for these pickles.  I used the larger ones.  I decided to quarter them, slicing them into spears.

• Wash and drain the cucumbers.  Quarter them, slicing them into spears
• Place half of pickling spices and a layer of dill into the bottom of a clean pickling container.  (I used a clean five-gallon bucket.)

• Add cucumbers to within top of pickling container.
• Combine, salt, vinegar, and water; ladle over cucumbers.
• Place a layer of dill and remaining pickling spices over the top. 
• Add garlic, if desired.
• Weight cucumbers under the brine.

• Store container in a cool place.
• Let cucumbers ferment until well flavored with dill and clear throughout.  Pickles should be ready to can in about two to three weeks.

• Remove pickles from brine and rinse.

• Strain the brine; bring to a boil in a large saucepot.

• Pack pickles into hot, sterile jars, leaving 1/4-inch headspace.
• Add one bay leaf, one clove garlic, one piece hot red pepper, and 1/2 teaspoon mustard seed to each jar.

• Get out your new plastic, collapsible funnel that you got on clearance at the grocery store and place it in one of the jars.  Ladle the hot brine into each jar leaving 1/4-inch headspace.

• Adjust two-piece caps.  (I'm not pleased that the brine in these jars is a little milky looking.  Wonder if that is how it is supposed to look?) 

• Process fifteen minutes in a boiling water canner.

• Allow to ferment in jars for two to three weeks.
• Hope they turn out to be tasty!

Sweet Pickle Relish

This is a recipe I found in the Ball Blue Book guide to preserving.  My copy looks like this:

It is full of wonderful recipes and you could get your own copy HERE.  Someday maybe I can try out and sample all the recipes I want!

1 quart chopped cucumbers (about 4 medium)
2 cups chopped onions (about 2 medium)
1 cup chopped sweet, green pepper (about 1 medium)
1 cup chopped sweet, red pepper (about 1 medium)
1/4 cup salt
3 1/2 cups sugar
1 tablespoon celery seed
1 tablespoon mustard seed
2 cups cider vinegar

• First, wash and sort your cucumbers.  I saved the larger of the two sizes I had to make Kosher Dill Pickles.  (That recipe will follow when I have finished that project up!)

• Next, wash peppers and onions.

• Chop cucumbers.  I used my Pampered Chef food chopper but next time I'll probably use a food processor because I will double the recipe and that is a LOT of hand chopping.

•  Chop peppers and onions.

• Combine chopped cucumbers, onions, and peppers in a large bowl.  Sprinkle with salt and cover with cold water.  Let stand 2 hours.

• The mix will bubble and start to stink emit a strong smell become quite fragrant.
• After 2 hours, drain.  Rinse and drain thoroughly.  (I put the chopped stuff into an old, thin, clean pillow case and squeezed all the liquid out to drain this thoroughly.)

Celery Seed

Mustard Seed

Just wanted to show off my pretty new measuring spoons I got for Mother's Day.

Thanks Corey, Bridgette, Lillie, and Lydia!

• Combine sugar, spices, and vinegar in a large sauce pan.
• Bring to a boil.
• Add drained vegetables and simmer 10 minutes.

• Pack relish into hot jars, leaving 1/4 inch headspace.
• Remove air bubbles by sliding a wooden or plastic spoon down the side of the jar.
• Attach two-piece caps.
• Process 10 minutes in a boiling-water canner.

The Ball Blue Book suggests that one allow pickled foods to sit in jars for a couple of weeks to fully ferment.  I'm not sure I can wait that long!

Sweet Pickles

First, let me say that stepping into the world of pickling was brand new adventure for me! 

My brother-in-law brought home a truck-load of vegetables last Friday with the idea that he would set up a vegetable stand.  Then, he had some sort of crop chore such as disking or cutting hay or something and my sister-in-law wound up sitting alone in the near 90 degree weather under the tent on Saturday morning.  Well, let's just say that the vegetable stand didn't become a sudden popular commodity and there were quite a few boxes of vegetables unsold.  So, Mike and I became the lucky recipients of a couple of boxes of cucumbers, a box of squash, and a box of green beans.  When I called the sister-in-law to ask for ideas of what to do with all those cucumbers, she suggested pickles and Mike said he likes his mother's sweet pickles.  So, I decided to try my hand at pickles using my mother-in-law's recipe. 

It really has been an adventure.  I have learned loads.  I hope the pickles turn out edible.  I followed the mother-in-law's recipe as closely as I could but along the way I had to deviate a bit. 

Step One
Ingedients:
2 gallon sliced cucumbers
2 cups salt
boiling water

As I washed them, I separated the cucumbers into large and small ones.

The ones I used for the sweet pickles are the smaller ones.

• Put cucumber slices in crock or large plastic container. 

• Sprinkle salt on top.

• Pour on enough boiling water to cover the cucumber slices.

• Let stand two days in this mixture.
• Pour off and rinse with hot water.

I followed this precisely (well, except that I don't have a crock and used a five-gallon plastic bucket, instead) and had a smile on my face and a feeling of satisfaction at the end of the day.

Step Two
Ingredients:
rinsed cucumbers slices from above
2 Tablespoons alum
boiling water

• Put cucumber slices back into rinsed container.
• Sprinkle alum on top.
• Cover with boiling water

• Let stand one day and rinse.

Here was deviation from the recipe part one.  The way the recipe was printed in the book was not put in clear steps and the ingredients were not listed out separately like I have done here.  So, when I got to this part, I had not realized the recipe called for alum.  I had NO IDEA what alum was and, of course, had none in my repertoire of spices.  So, after I rinsed and returned the cucumbers to the crock bucket container, I looked back at my cookbook and got some glasses on and looked again and did a bit of cursing with my hands on my hips and turned around in the kitchen a couple of times.  Then, I just poured the boiling water over the cucumbers and dashed to the store in search of alum.  When I got home I sprinkled the alum atop and poured on a couple more quarts of boiling water and my smile was a bit more like a grimace and the feeling became one of ponderance.

Step Three
Ingredients:
2 1/2 quarts vinegar
16 cups sugar
2 Tablespoons celery seed
1/2 teaspoon tumeric
2 Tablespoons mustard seed
1 teaspoon ground ginger
2 teaspoons black peppercorns
1 Tablespoon whole cloves
rinsed cucumbers from above

• Combine vinegar and sugar in large pot and add spices listed above.  It would be ideal to tie the spices up in a small cheesecloth sachet bag.
• Boil five minutes.
• Put rinsed cucumbers into solution and simmer seven to eight minutes.

• Put into sterilized Ball canning jars, leaving 1/4 inch headspace. 

• Remove air bubbles by sliding a wooden spoon handle down along the inside of the jar.
• Place two piece caps on jars.
• Process ten to fifteen minutes in a boiling-water canner.

Did I ever deviate from the original instructions on this step!  First, after I had rinsed the cucumbers and was double-checking the recipe, I noticed that the cookbook's version called for two and a half pints of vinegar and sixteen cups of sugar.  I was a bit blown away by the amount of sugar and decided I'd better check with the mother-in-law to make sure this wasn't a typographical error.  She assured me that the sugar amount was correct but went back to her recipe card and said that actually there should be two and a half quarts of vinegar.  So, that was a lucky save. 

Next, the original recipe called for two tablespoons of pickling spices.  Again, I didn't have this in my repertoire of spices.  So, I dug around and found the Ball Blue Book guide to preserving that my parents gave me for Christmas one year and began mixing up my own concoction of spices.  I also found this Pickling Spice website to guide me a bit.  So, I created the combination of spices listed above and dumped them one-by-one into the vinegar/sugar mixture and began to cook the mix to a boil.

While I was awaiting the vinegar/sugar/spice mixture to come to a boil, I decided I had time to rinse the cucumbers.  Well, I wasn't watching my pot closely enough and all this boiled over onto the stove top.  What a MESS!  There was a flurry of cursing and me hopping all over the place to get the pot off the heat and burning my fingers and searching for a potholder.  There was stuff dripping down the front and the back of the cabinet door and into the stack of skillets stored within and onto the floor.  Then, I had to clean up the boiled over mess and do you know how bad a sugar/vinegar/spice mix smells when it is burning on the stove eye?  Whew! 

As I read on into the recipe, I learned that all these spices were supposed to be placed into a little cheesecloth square and tied up into a sachet-type bag.  Well, too late for that!  So, I strained the mixture using my little metal strainer only to notice that there were still little specks of ginger and cinnamon floating around.  So, I tried using a coffee filter to get those little specks out.  Well, the vinegar/sugar solution was too thick to go through a coffee filter and it broke and the little specks swooshed out into the bowl and I gave up.  So, these sweet pickles will have little freckles of ginger and cinnamon in them. 

So, actually, step four actually should be to wash down all the cabinets and mop the sticky kitchen floor! 

Finally, I thought the recipe book was a bit unclear about how long to simmer the cucumbers in the vinegar/sugar/spice mixture.  The directions said boil for five to ten minutes.  As witnessed previously, there could be a big difference along five and ten minutes.  So, I simply decided to split the middle and landed on the timing of seven to eight and that seemed to work well. 

I guess this pickling was just a skill that must have been handed down from one generation to the next and one learned it from the elders.  Maybe it was sort of a coming-of-age sort of right of passage or something that I somehow missed out on.  I do remember my mother stinking up the house making delicious pickles as I was growing up.  However, being the farm girl that I was, I guess I always got away with driving the tractor for Daddy during that time or something and never learned the art of pickling till now.  I searched through my recipes that I have gotten from Mom over the years and didn't find a pickle one.  However, this recipe must be similar to hers because the stink odor fragrance was much the same and, more importantly, the taste is too!

In the Ball Blue Book one of the suggested tips says to let the pickled dishes set in the jar for a couple of weeks.  I hope I can hold out that long before I taste!

* Update *  We couldn't hold out.  Mike opened up one of the jars and we ate a few slices.  I guess the venture was successful, Mike said that all he needed was some cheese and crackers and a piece of baloney to go with the pickles.  He had a big grin on his face and ate another three or four slices.  Guess what he took to work as his lunch today?