Rooming House Recipes

1. OCTOBER SURPRISE - Savory Stuffed Pumpkin
2. Fresh Cranberry Relish
3. Mushroom Gravy
4. Ultimate Pumpkin Pie
5. Sweet Potato Balls
6. SCONEHENGE!
7. Welsh Rabbit
8. A Mystery Dish

This makes a great "centerpiece dish," once the turkey has been banished (except as a possible dinner guest). You might want to substitute some other big, pretty squash, and if you use rice and substitute oil for the butter, it is suitable for those who eat NO animal products.

a pumpkin - big enough to look good on the table, but remember, you'll be stuck with the leftovers.

butter, or the substitute of your choice.

traditional stuffing of your choice
I like to use a half and half mixture of aromatic brown rice (Basmati for instance) and wild rice.Traditional bread or cornbread stuffing will work as well and makes this economical dish even more so. You need about nine to twelve cups of cubed bread or cornbread (dried in a slow oven till no longer moist) or cooked rice. If this makes too much for your pumpkin you can bake the extra in an oiled casserole. Add one and one half cups each chopped green onions and chopped celery, and a tablespoon or so of crumbled sage. (Adjust these to your own family"s taste)

Cut a "lid" off of the pumpkin and scoop the seeds into a colander for later roasting.Assign a child to washing the seeds and disposing of the stringy pumpkin clinging to them. Butter or oil the inside of the cleaned pumpkin and add the stuffing. Put in a low sided roasting pan with the lid beside it and cover both with foil, loosely, to prevent scorching. Bake at 350 degrees F. and remember this will be much faster than turkey! Start checking after twenty minutes; when it's done, a fork will go in easily. Put on the table with the lid. Once seeds are clean and dry you can spread them on a buttered cookie sheet to bake in a slow oven till crisp, and sprinkle with salt or other seasoning.

I always loved to look at cranberry sauce as a kid, but it was always too tart, too sweet, too much. For years, I accepted it as a necessary decoration on my holiday plate - and never ate it! When my mother came up with this recipe, I was its most devoted convert.This is even prettier than the stuff in the can; it won't curl your toes and has, as they say in wine country, a "clean finish."

At the present time, a supermarket bag of cranberries is about 12 oz (down from a long-ago pound) and if it shrinks any further I'll have to use two bags for this recipe. Empty the bag into a colander and wash the berries, picking through them for less than desirable specimens to discard. Wash a large, spicy apple (Macintosh?) and cut into chunks. And you need a big orange, too. Leave the peels on, or at least save a little to put through the grinder with the fruit. Oh - did I tell you you need a grinder for this? Use your food processor or blender if you must, but they make mush of fruit instead of nice crisp, fine bits. Grind them all (leaving out seeds and stems, of course) - if you want to save the juice rather than throwing it away when you drain it off, it might be nice in your punch. Put it n a pretty bowl and add honey, a tablespoon at a time, until it is pleasantly sweet. Then add a teaspoon of orange flower water, or almond extract. Shape into a mound and garnish with a sprinkling of shredded coconut or a few fresh mint leaves.

Saute 2 cups siced mushrooms in butter or olive oil. mix one fourth cup of cornstarch with enough water to make a pourable paste. Add 2 cups of red or white wine to the mushrooms and reduce heat. Bring wine to a simmer and slowly pour in cornstarch paste until it has a nice consistency - use more if you need to. Season with Worcestershire Sauce, soy sauce, maybe a tablespoon of catsup, salt, pepper and a small amount of garlic or onion if you like.

WARNING:if your pumpkin pie recipe doesn't call for molasses, you have not had the ultimate pumpkin pie experience. You can substitute any winter squash, or, for that matter, sweet potatoes or yams. This will make 2 standard pies, but I just make it in one big black iron skillet - it's prettier.

Line your pan with pie crust pastry and bake at 425 F. for 10-15 minutes. It should be done but not brown - this helps prevent a soggy crust.lower your oven to 350 F. and make the filling:

• 3 cups pumpkin puree (1 large can or two small)
• 6 eggs
• 3 & 1/3 cups half & half or milk
• 1/2 cup of dark UNsulphured molasses
• 1 tbsp ginger, or to taste
• cinnamon, allspice, cardamom, to taste (feel free to use your own favorites or leave out the ones you don't care for)
• nutmeg to taste - grate it yourself if possible
• 1 cup sugar

Mix eggs and then molasses thoroughly into puree and then add milk gradually. Add sugar and taste - add more if it isn't sweet enough for you; if you don't care for sweets start with 1/2 cup. Add spices to taste (if you use fresh ginger you may need more than 1 tbsp. but it tastes better) Pour into shell and set your timer (or you'll forget!) for 30 minutes. It won't be done, so set your timer for another ten minutes, then five. If it isn't done after an hour, check to see if your oven is ON. When it is done, it won't jiggle in the center. Once this is accomplished, slip a knife into the center; it should come out with no pumpkin clinging to it. We like it better cold. If you make more than one skillet-size pie you might have some left over the next day, when it will be even better.

I don't think whipped cream is appropriate on this earthy dish, but I have become accustomed to my guests bringing a can of too- sweet fluff to spray over it. If you or your family expect whipped cream on pumpkin pie, you'll do much better to buy heavy whipping cream and add to it a tbsp of rum or bourbon and 2 of sugar. Much better.

• big can of sweet potatoes
• marshmallows
• shredded coconut
  
  

  Drain sweet potatoes and save the liquid. Mash them, adding liquid only if necessary.Sprinkle coconut thickly on a plate and butter a shallow baking pan. Wash your hands and dry them - this is messy if you do it right. Take up a marshmallow in your left hand and a handful of sweet potato in your right and mold the sweet potato around the marshmallow - no holes, because that's where the marshmallow could leak out. Roll each one in the coconut and arrange in the baking pan or small iron skillet. Bake it for 20 minutes at 350 F. Kids love this one, it's really easy and fast and looks very traditional.
  
  

  Scones/Soda Bread
  
  

  When I needed a recipe for scones, I noticed two things about the ones I tried: first, scone recipes bear a remarkable similarity to my soda bread recipe; second, none of the ones I found were as good as my soda bread. So I compromised - I made soda bread and cut it into wedges and called them scones. So far they have passed for scones even among the Scots who come to The Celtic Arts Center. A number of our visitors have been surprised to discover that these are not the tough, chewy, overly sweet "scones" that are sold in L.A. coffee houses.

  
  
  • 4 cups of unbleached flour or half unbleached and half whole wheat flour
  • 3 tsp. baking powder
  • 1 tsp baking soda
  • 1 tsp salt<1/4 cup cold butter, grated for ease of mixing
  • 1 & 2/3 cup buttermilk (if you don't have buttermilk, make some other sort of rolls!)
    
    
    Preheat oven to 425 F. Mix flour, baking powder and soda, and salt in a big bowl. Wash your hands at this point and rub in the butter until it's all evenly in a crumby state - or you could use a pastry blender if you have one. Then stir in the buttermilk and mix to a soft dough. Turn it out onto a floured surface and knead just until it is smooth. For soda bread, shape into a round loaf and cut a deep cross in the center. For scones roll out to a circle 3/4 inch thick and cut in 6 or 8 wedges. In either case, place on buttered sheet and bake from 12-15 minutes for scones, to 25-30 minutes for soda bread. Serve with butter. These are also good with Welsh Rabbit (or Rarebit), orange marmalade, etc.Or make
    
    SCONEHENGERoll out the dough to a 3/4 inch thick rectangle and cut in bars 2 inches by 5 inches. Bake as for scones and cool slightly, put one aside, then slice off a little of each one of the rest on the narrow end so that they will stand up. Put a round platter on the table from which they'll be served and arrange them in a mystic-looking circle. Use the reserved scone for a lintel across the top of two of the others. Wait for the Sun.
    
    Welsh Rabbit
    
    I am not sure of the absolue authenticity of this recipe - but it is muched loved by the Welsh people to whom I have fed it, and it doesn't lump or get stringy like some recipes sometimes do. You need a bottle of beer, ale or stout (depending on your preferences - but if you want to use milk, it will work - just don't credit the recipe to me.) and 3/4 pound to 4/5 pound of cheddar cheese (again, use a cheese as sharp or mild as YOU like it) 1/4 cup of cornstarch (plus a little more in reserve - this is not an exact science) good mustard (not sweet for this dish) and Worcestershire Sauce.
    
    Grate the cheese. Put the beer in a saucepan over medium heat and bring to a simmer, while you mix the 1/4 cup cornstarch wth enough water to make a paste that will pour. When the beer boils, turn down the heat to a simmer and stir it while pouring in the cornstarch. Continue to simmer and stir until it thickens. If it seems very thin after it has simmered awhile, add another tablespoon or two of cornstarch mixed with water. The cheese, of course will make it somewhat thicker. Dump in the grated cheese and stir it in. Add a tablespoon of mustard and taste for seasoning - add more if you want. Then add a teaspoon of Worcestershire - or more, to taste. Caraway seeds are nice if you like them, and for some uses, a drop of liquid smoke is interesting. You can pour this over potatoes, cooked pasta, toast, or scones. NOTE: This amount will not feed the whole roominghouse gang; it will generously dress a pound of cooked pasta - so adjust the amounts accordingly.
    
    CUCHULLAIN - formerly known as "The Vegetable Dish Formerly Known As Colcannon"
    
    

    I have never encountered this hearty, fragrant dish anywhere outside my family, but it is sadly nameless. A few years ago, for a Celtic Arts Center shindig, I made it and served it to a highly appreciative new audience under the misnomer "Colcannon." Never mind how I fell into this dire error - I have been assured in the harshest possible terms, by an American Expert on Irish Cooking (actually a kind of expert-at-large), that colcannon must contain potatoes, bacon, milk, and cabbage. Friends from Ireland had never questioned my "colcannon," and so I had persisted in the inadvertent hoax. In answer to my request that readers email me with suggestions, I got tow: one was "rutpot" or "rutpot greens," but it bore a disturbing similarity, I thought, to less desireable culinary terms, so although it did contain a hint of the ingredients, I rejected it. A friend chipped in "Cuchullain," which is the name of a legendary Irish hero, for this hearty, earthy dish. the only drawback here is that Gaelic is generally unpronounceable, so try this: koo-HULL-en - with a touch of catarrh at the top of the second syllable. But whatever it is called, it is VERY good. It contains no bacon, milk, or cabbage, and in my opinion, is better than colcannon. (Someone suggested I call them potatoes and swedes, since rutabagas are commonly called swedes in Ireland. But I serve this dish to vegetarians; I have enough trouble convincing them that Welsh Rabbit is meatless - how could I ever get them to eat "Swedes?")

    
    
    

    • one part rutabagas, peeled and diced
    • three parts potatoes, peeled and quartered
    • collard, mustard greens, chard, spinach, or even cabbage, as you prefer. Important: do not shred the greens: cut them in 1-inch strips, then cut those across to make squares. (The greens are optional, but taste good and add a touch of politically correct green to what would otherwise be a stricly orange-colored dish.)

    
    
    Start an hour before dinner to steam the rutabaga - this is rather slow, and the rutabagas should be mashably soft. Put them in a warm place, add more water if necessary to the steaming liquid, and steam the potatoes thoroughly. Put the potatoes and rutabagas in a big casserole-style dish and mash them, adding liquid from the steamer as necessary, but not so much that they lose their texture. Put the vegetables in a warm place or in a slow oven and steam the greens briefly, and mix them in to the mashed root vergetables. This is a perfect base for mushroom gravy, Welsh Rabbit, or butter.