Cookbook Wednesday: Made With Butter?

When my mother died, she had bookshelves full of cooking magazines, along with quite a few paperback cookbooks, and a very few hardcovered cookbooks.  Since she didn't like to cook, and therefore wasn't a good cook, I have no idea why she had accumulated all of these books, but there they were.  I gave most of them to Goodwill, but kept about 4.  This is one of them.

THE LAND O' LAKES COOKBOOK

Land O' Lakes equals butter, right?  Butter equals buttery goodness, decadent flavor, and all of that, right?  This had to be a keeper.  It's a ring bound book, which is nice; in theory, you can take out the page you need, and keep the rest of the book away from the perils of cooking, wherein liquids and food grub might fly about and attack your book at any moment. Or at least wet hands might handle said cookbook.

 (Note to self: Always use the flash.  Not just sometimes.)  Some of the recipes used butter or margarine or cheese, but some didn't.  I don't believe these appetizers did.

 But look at that creamy soup goodness!  You know butter and cream are both involved in this baby.  One thing that irritated me a little is that the picture is on one side of the page, and the recipe is on the other side.  So in the photo above, the picture does not correspond with the recipes beside it.

 These chicken recipes had nothing to do with butter, but they do look pretty good.  The biggest sections in this book were Poultry and Sandwiches/Salads.  I'd have thought breads and desserts would be really big in Land O' Lakes world, but that shows just what I know.

 So I'm glad I snagged this cookbook.  I'm even going to try a chicken recipe out of it tonight.  And maybe some of these salads will make it into rotation this summer.

 This is my Cookbook Wednesday post, for Louise, who's on hiatus until after she visits her daughter!

Anyone who wants a link provided here, just let me know!

Nellie's Children's Cookbook!

Poppie's Cooking Electrically!

Celebrations!

It's a tradition in our house to hold Easter dinner on Saturday night; I started that when the big kids started going off to college, and needed Sunday to travel back to school.  Now that most everyone is an adult, it still works, giving them time to visit spouses' families on Easter, or just travel home early and relax before Monday takes over their worlds once again.

This year, I cooked a standing rib roast on Good Friday.  It wasn't planned that way, it's just that I had an extra left over from Christmas.  Don't try to puzzle out how I could just happen to have an extra 18 pound chunk of meat and bone in the freezer; it's one of life's great mysteries.  Suffice to say that it was very much enjoyed.

Easter Dinner (on Saturday) was the traditional leg of lamb (actually, two legs of lamb, totaling 14 pounds), carved by Ryan, along with rolls and other lovely sides.

 (In case anyone noticed, yes, that is a new tablecloth; I ordered the fabric in January and it finally arrived the week before Easter.)

Tank hoped he found a sucker to feed him.  Sitting right next to the fierce midget?  Nope.  Ryan's not that dumb.

Of course, Tank and Natasha each had a beef rib bone on Saturday afternoon, and another on Sunday.  Then Tank took home the remaining 4 rib bones, and Natasha took home the 2 lamb bones.  Fair is fair.

I'd intended to post these pictures yesterday, but my wireless router died Sunday night, and it took me all of Monday to get it diagnosed and a new one ordered.  Hooray for Amazon and their overnight delivery!  Everything works again!

I hope you're all having a nice Tuesday; see you tomorrow for Cookbook Wednesday.

Happy Easter!

I found a picture of me!  This was Easter, when I was 6 months old.  Obviously, I'm the runt looking at the floor.

My mother was holding me, and my grandmother's excellent creation, Hebsibah, was presiding over her living room.  (Would that I had such talent.)

Happy Easter, everyone; see you next week!

Cookbook Wednesday: Bread, Again

Ever since I got my new bread machine, I've been rereading my bread cookbooks.  This was the second bread machine cookbook I ever got; my mother bought it for me for Christmas right after I got my first bread machine.  It was simultaneously the most useful and nicest present I ever received from her, which rather makes me sad.

Anyway, Bread Machine Bounty!

 The categories of bread are pretty basic.

 You can see that this is a very early cookbook, before the advent of 2 pound machines.  A little math is in order to make larger loaves.

 Some of the recipes are based on classics, like the Anadama Bread above.  Others are not, like these two.  And I don't know about you, but there's no way eggplant is ever going into a loaf of bread I make.

 There are a number of sourdough breads, including the recipe for starter.

 Some of their sweet breads are lovely, perfect for Easter, in fact.

 And, of course, they have some recipes for yeast raised products which aren't finished in the bread machine, like rolls...

 ..and coffee cake.

 It's always nice to have a myriad of choices when making breads and yeast raised sweets.

This is my Cookbook Wednesday, usually hosted by Louise, who has taken a leave of absence.  In her absence, I'll be hosting again for a while.  Leave a comment if you want to be linked up!

Other Wednesday Cookbooks:

Grannie Pantries: Serious Cookbookage!

Almost Diet Peanut Butter Cookies!

This is Tuesday.  And I should have sunshine and maybe a little green popping up here and there.  But there's white crap falling out of the sky.  So I'm skipping Garden Tuesday, and going to something more cheerful: Cookies!

When I was posting about my falling-apart cookbook, I also thumbed through it.  This recipe caught my eye, because it seemed to have less sugar than other recipes.  Bonus!  I altered it a little bit, and made these Peanut Butter Cookies that are "almost" healthy, diet cookies!

PEANUT BUTTER COOKIES - DIET STYLE
1/2 cup butter or margarine
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 cup peanut butter
3 egg whites + 1 tsp water
2/3 cup flour
2/3 cup white whole wheat flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt

Cream the butter with the brown sugar; beat in the vanilla and peanut butter until smooth.  Whisk the egg whites with the water, beat it into the creamed mixture.  Stir together all of the dry ingredients, and beat into the creamed mixture.  Drop onto greased cookie sheets and press a fork into the cookie tops twice, to create the crossed lines pattern; bake at 375F for 8 to 12 minutes, until lightly browned.

These cookies used half the sugar of other recipes, and by using egg whites instead of whole eggs, the cholesterol is reduced greatly.  No one even noticed the white whole wheat flour, either.  For more texture, try using chunky peanut butter.  Trust me, these were good!  Better yet, trust Mark and his father, cookie lovers both!

Happy Tuesday, everyone!

Cookbook Wednesday: For Bread Machines

From time to time, Louise's Cookbook Wednesday posts have been about cookbooklets.  And last week, Poppy posted about a recipe book that came with knives.  That got me to thinking about my new bread machine and its predecessors.  The first ones came with some half decent cookbooklets.

The first bread machine I bought was in the late 1990s.  It made a 1.5 pound loaf in about 4-1/2 hours.  It came with this spiffy little book, which has a fairly sturdy cover - standard paperback book cover material.

 It included the basics about the ingredients used in bread,

 and some recipes.

It wasn't long, but it was functional, and its recipes were good.

The second bread machine made a 2 pound loaf in 3 hours.  Oh, happy day!

Its recipe book was 3 times the size of the book that came with the original machine.  Its cover wasn't as good, as you can see from the water damage to it.

But it included color pictures!

I'm not sure where someone came up with the idea for chocolate yeast raised bread.  Sounds suspicious to me.  Plus, they clearly didn't include proper instructions, since the source of the chocolate is chocolate chips, and they don't specify melting them.

Dough setting recipes are included, too.

I don't have many appliance recipe booklets, but I've kept every one I ever got.  Maybe it's time to look through them again.

Happy Cookbook Wednesday, everyone!  Pop on over to see Louise and check out what she and others have to offer.

Garden Tuesday: Melting, Again

It's only been above 30 degrees here one day in the past week, but, somehow, we are losing our snow cover!

And the sky looked pretty today, too.

Happy Tuesday, everyone!

First Day of Spring? And A Visitor

Happy First Day of Spring!

Oh, I know the vernal equinox doesn't officially occur until around 6PM, but look at my weather.  Does this look like spring to you?

Nah. Me neither.  Those aren't flowers falling out of the sky.

On another note, Jeffrey came to visit last weekend.  And he brought a new friend.  No, not a new girlfriend; she's the same one who was so enthusiastic about going to the used book sale with me.  I'm talking about a new little friend.
 

His mother was an Amish father's black lab, a house/hunting dog.  She went slumming with the German Shepherd who lives in his barn.  Jeffrey's clearly quite pleased with him.

When I was cooking dinner, Tank came to the kitchen to talk to me.  I tried to explain to him that dogs are not allowed in the kitchen when stoves or ovens are in use. (Stupid blogger won't show the picture turned in the correct direction, so you'll have to tilt your head.)

He tried to explain to me that puppies have cuteness overload.

Tank found this small Oriental rug which I'd removed from the hall for the winter, which was rolled up in the corner.  The tiny little corner of that rug became HIS perch.

He brought a couple of sticks in to chew on and shred on my kitchen floor.  I hunted up a new rawhide bone I had hidden away for a visiting dog.  Note that the amount of rug he had rolled out greatly increased in one day.

So these were my visitors last weekend, including Jeffrey's new friend.  At least I have pictures of cuteness overload to cheer me through the not-flowers outside on the first day of spring.

Have a great weekend, everyone!

Cookbook Wednesday: Family Cookbook

It's Wednesday again, and that means it's time to look at one of my cookbooks!  This one is a tried and true favorite.  You can see that from the condition of the spine.

This is actually the first NEW cookbook I ever bought, in the late 1970s - I wasn't even married yet.  I bought it at Kresge's, which was the older cousin of K-Mart.  This store was in Danbury, CT, and it was a marvelous, dingy home of cheap stuff.

There are recipes for all categories of food.  I can't say that I cook a lot of potatoes; it's just that this is where the book's spine chose to break after about 30 years.

 I like the fact that with each main dish recipe, they suggest a menu.  Plus, who ever knew there was Pot Roast and then there was Pennsylvania Pot Roast?  (Hold the gherkins in mine, please.)

 The Orange Sponge Cake recipe on the left page here is my go-to for Lemon Sponge Cake, my dearly beloved's favorite snack.  I just change it up a little.  All of the cakes and desserts I've tried have been really good!  (This is the book from which my Lemon Angel Tort comes.)

 Then there are frozen desserts.  I like that they put the calorie count on them, back in a time when that was not "in vogue" yet.

Obviously, this book contains only recipes, and none of the pretty pictures we see in cookbooks today.  That's OK, because the recipes are all straightforward and easy to follow.

This is my entry for Cookbook Wednesday with the charming Louise at Months of Edible Celebration!

Happy Wednesday, everyone!




Note that the price on the cover is not what I paid; I paid about $2.  I would never have paid $6.95 for a paperback book at a time when minimum wage was $1.01.

Garden Tuesday: Melting

At long last, we've been above 35 degrees for a week (and almost hit 50 one day), so the snow is melting.  A little rain over the weekend and last night helped.

Friday is the Vernal Equinox.  Come on, spring!

Happy Tuesday everyone; I hope your corners of the world are turning green!