Who the Heck is Nadine? I sure liked her Chicken Casserole

I wanted to have my Dad and Sister over for dinner so I decided to make Nadine's Chicken Casserole and my Aunt Maxine's Lemon Jello Salad. Both turned out great, my son especially like the Mushroom Sauce.

The recipe card for Nadine's Chicken Casserole is very very stained and after making it, it makes me realize that this was a popular recipe for my mom. The flavors were vaguely familiar and I kinda think that this was something mom made for pot-luck dinners but not for home consumption. The quantities were enormous, so I decided to halve the recipe.

Nadine's Chicken Casserole

2 Chickens (4 lb. dressed) 4 C soft bread crumbs
2 Cups Cooked Rice 2 tsp. salt (unless broth is salty)
1 tsp. paprika 1/2 C. chopped pimento
8 eggs (beaten well) 1/2 C. butter or chicken fat
1 1/2 qt. milk or chicken broth or half and half.

Place chicken in bottom of roaster (boneless.) Sprinkle bread crumbs over and mix other ingredients and pour over top. Mix with a fork only enough to get sauce to bottom. Bake at 350o for 1 hour. Sprinkle top with juice of one lemon and 1 tbsp finely chopped parsley. Serve with Mushroom Sauce.

Mushroom Sauce for Chicken Casserole

1/2 C. butter or chicken fat
1 lb. mushrooms
1/2 c. flour 1/2 C. Cream
1 qt. chicken stock 1/2 tsp. salt
4 egg yolks (beaten) 1/4 tsp. paprika

Brown mushrooms in butter. Add flour and salt, then stock and cream. Add seasonings and wehn don add egg yolks and cook one minute longer. (Half quantity and add a can of cream of mushroom soup.)

As I prepare these recipes I am impressed with how much "institutional" knowledge was just expected. This recipe has no instructions on how to cook the chicken and nothing to indicate that you better temper your eggs before you add them to the sauce. I've learned a lot of these tips from watching the Food Network, but where did Mom learn this? Home Ec Class? I wish I could ask her.

Lemon Jello Salad by Maxine C. (My Great Aunt, written in her distinctive and beautiful script)

2 boxes lemon jello - dissolved
1 #2 can chunk pineapple
2 or 3 bananas (or small can grapes)

Drain juice from pineapple and add enough water to make 1 Cup. Put on heat add 1/2 Cup Sugar, 1/2 Cup Cornstarch. Cook until thick. Cool. Add 1 Cup Cream, whipped. Spread on hardened jello to which fruit has been added.

Dad is diabetic so I wanted to make this as sugar free as possible so I used sugar free Lime Gelatin (I did not have any Lemon) and used Splenda in stead of sugar. I decided to make my own whipped cream and guess what. It was not hard to do at all. It took a few minutes but was satisfying.

I must admit that I had a very close call with the pineapple juice and cornstarch mixture. I had just put it on the fire and turned my attention to something else. Fortunately I turned and saw that the mixture had solidified and was scorching on the bottom of the pan. 10 Seconds more and I would have had an unfixable mess of burned yuck. I dumped the block of pineapple flavored cornstarch into another bowl, added water and beat it to thin it out. It turned out fine, LUCKY me. The flavor of the topping was very subtle and not too sweet.

Happy Belated Birthday

Tonight I celebrated my birthday, the birthday of my step-mom's husband, and his grandson. Like most folks our family tree has its share of twists.

I volunteered to make something to bring and figured this would be a great excuse to make something from the file.

My step-mom, Gena, asked for a vegetable salad so I decided to make two. Corn and Black Bean Salad and Wilted Spinach Salad.

Corn and Black Bean Salad by Joanna H. a good friend from Castro Valley, CA

1/3 C. Lemon Juice 2 Green Onions sliced
1/4 C. Minced Cilantro 1 15oz Can Black Beans (drained)
1/1/2 Teaspoon Sugar 1 large Red Pepper Chopped
1 Clove Garlice minced 1 15oz Can Corn Kernels
1 Jalapeno pepper, stemmed, seeded and minced

Mix lemon juice, cilantro, sugar, garlic, jalapeno and 2 Tablespoons water. Mix onions, beans, red pepper and corn. Add dressing to beans and salt to taste.

Wilted Spinach Salad by Gena G. my step-Mom
Cut roots and tough stems from 1 pound young spinach. Wash thoroughly. Drain and break into bite sized pieces. Slice 6 green onions and mix with spinach.
Bacon Dressing
Saute 3 slices of bacon until crisp. Remove from pan, drain and reserve bacon fat. Beat together 1 egg, 1 Tablespoon Sugar, 1 Tablespoon Tarragon Vinegar, 1 Tablespoon Red Wine Vinegar. Pour slowly into warm bacon fat stirring constantly until slightly thickened. Season to taste. Pour over spinach and toss well. Crumble bacon and sprinkle over salad. Serve immediately.

The Corn and Bean Salad was great. I made way too much, probably because I doubled the recipe using 1 can black beans and 1 can kidney beans. I found the salad was missing something so I added about a 1/4 C. of olive oil and seasoned liberally with salt.

The Spinach Salad was also great. What's not to like about bacon and bacon fat? I boiled a few eggs and put them on the side to use as a garnish for those who like them on their salad.

For my birthday, I was given a new digital camera and was able to use it to take pictures of these two dishes.

Chicken Loaf with Ritz Crackers

Here is the recipe:

Chicken Loaf with Ritz Crackers from the collection of Dorothy, written in her hand.

Cook chicken, remove bones and cut up meat. Salt to taste. Place in a large mixing bowl.
Add: 1 1/2 cups cubed cheese, 1 1/2 cups diced celery, 1 medium onion chopped, 1/2 tsp pepper, 1 can mushroom soup, 2 eggs beaten, 4 cups Ritz cracker crumbs, 6 cups chicken broth.
Mix all together. Top with additional crumbs. Do not spread to deep in pan. Bake 45 min @ 350o

I decided early on in committing to this project that I would not be a slave to the recipes and that it would be OK to substitute reasonable items. Leave other items off and basically change things up as needed. After all that is how my mom cooked. So I made a few modifications on this recipe.

The recipe did not say how much chicken to use so I guessed and figured I would use about one whole chicken. I had some leftover thigh meat, a couple of leftover chicken strips and a couple of KFC thighs and drumsticks and decided to use it all.

No cubed cheese so I used grated sharp cheddar. Only one sleeve of Ritz Crackers so I added some Oyster crackers and a leftover biscuit from the KFC. I had some left over sauteed onions and poblano chile that I wanted to use and finally, 2 cans of chicken broth made everything really soupy so I was not going to go for the full 6 cups.

It turned out OK. The texture was a bit "mushy" but the flavors were good and my son who told me he hates stuffing ate two helpings. Is this a repeat? Maybe, maybe not. I guess it depends on whether or not I have a bunch of left over Ritz crackers that need to get used up.

Dorothy's Son

Sorting the File

I spent a fair amount of time going through the red recipe file box and categorizing the recipes into categories and trying to figure out which recipes came from where. 153 recipes, in 24 categories and that is just the beginning. I also have several cook books with recipes contributed by my family. I'll get around to them after I've done all the recipes in the red box.

So when am I finally going to get around to actually cooking something? I have the ingredients for a casserole and I'll be making it tomorrow.

Who, Why and Getting Started

Hi, I'm Dorothy's Son, a transplant from California, thriving in Texas with deep roots in Kansas and Oklahoma.

This blog is a tribute of sorts to my Mom, Dorothy, and to the other women in my family who were, in my opinion, great cooks.

In the early 70's my mom gave me a Betty Crocker Boys and Girls Cookbook. This started a lifelong love of cooking and recipe collecting. A few years later my mom transferred all of her recipe cards from 3x5 to 4x6 and gave me all of the 3x5s in a red plastic recipe box. Over the years I have cooked some of these recipes, ignored others and added to the red box. I have also collected recipe books including several from Women's Auxiliary groups to which the women of my family have belonged.

I took the movie Julie and Julia as inspiration to start my own blog and to cook my way through my mother's recipes and the recipes of the other women of my life. In fairness there are a very few recipes from men in my life as well and I'll include them also, but I think I can count them all on one hand.

I've not counted how many recipes there are and I am not done collecting them. My hope is that I will uncover more from the earlier generations and get some new ones from the women and men of my generation as this project progresses.

So that in a nutshell is what I plan to do. I'm not going to make a grandiose promise of how often I'll post, or even set a goal as to when I will finish.

Thanks for reading and send me a comment if you find this and like what you read.