Shrimp and sausage jambalaya~

The last of the winter fare is shrimp and sausage jambalaya which serves 6-8 hungry people.  The recipe is long, but you have already put this together in various forms if you cook at all.  This just has more ingredients than usual, but once again you can't go wrong and can use pretty much what you like.  This is the Barefoot Contessa's recipe, so if you get on the food TV network, the recipe is there too.
She made it today and I started hankering for it because I have most of the ingredients on hand. I am going to do it Friday because Saturday is a work outside day getting the furniture out, moving things around, getting the new driveway ready to seal; getting the pergola ready for spray paint; getting the antique planters and urns painted and filled...it goes on and on but this year we have Beth who is a master container gardener.  She, along with Andy, will fill each and every pot with beauty.  Matt will be here for the heavy work, so I want to have something special for him to eat.

  Oh, Andy went to the back doctor today.  His back hurts every once in a while and he wants answers.  The doctor says what CAN'T you do that you want to do.  Andy said, "well, I can't run."  The doctor said, "you are 80 years old who is chasing you?" I got a good laugh out of that one.  Andy is the healthiest man for his age any one has ever seen and I think he feels like something should be wrong with him.  Thank God he is healthy.

Shrimp & Sausage Jambalaya (Serves 6 to 8 )

Copyright 2010, Amelia Durand, All Rights Reserved

Photo: Quentin Bacon

1 tablespoon olive oil
1 pound sausage, such as kielbasa or Andouille, sliced
1 pound smoked ham, cubed
1 tablespoon butter
1 medium onion, diced
1 cup celery, diced
1 green bell pepper, cored and diced
1 red bell pepper, cored and diced
1 cup seeded and diced tomato
3 garlic cloves, minced
1 jalapeno pepper, seeded and minced OR ½ teaspoon cayenne
2 teaspoons diced fresh oregano
1 teaspoon diced fresh thyme
2 tablespoons tomato paste
6 cups chicken stock, preferably homemade
3 cups long grain rice, rinsed
3 bay leaves
2 teaspoons kosher salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
6-8 dashes Tabasco (optional)
½ cup chopped scallions divided
¾ cup chopped fresh parsley, divided
¼ cup freshly squeezed lemon juice
1 pound medium shrimp, deveined (20-24 count) 

Heat the oil in a large Dutch oven or black iron pot over medium heat, add the kielbasa and sauté for 8 to 10 minutes, until browned. Remove the kielbasa to a bowl, and set aside. Add the ham to the same pot and cook 8 to 10 minutes, until lightly browned. Remove to the bowl with the kielbasa, and set aside. Add the butter, onion, celery and peppers to the same pot and sauté for 8 to 10 minutes, until the onion is translucent. Add the tomato, garlic, jalapeno or cayenne, oregano, thyme, and tomato paste and cook until all the vegetables and herbs are blended well. Add the stock and bring to a rolling boil. Stir in the rice, and add the sausage, ham, bay leaves, salt, pepper and Tabasco. Return to a boil, reduce the heat to low and simmer, covered, for 20 minutes. Add ¼ cup of the scallions, ¼ cup of the parsley, the lemon juice and the shrimp, and stir well. Cover the pot, remove it from the heat and allow the jambalaya steam, for 15 minutes, before serving.

Garnish with the remaining ¼ cup scallions and ½ cup parsley, and a dash of Tabasco, if desired. 

Rose hams~ the very best.

Sunday steaks on the grill with onions and peppers and smashed potatoes.

                                                                       

Rose Spiral Sliced Bone-in Honey Cured Ham (I am trying this one next.)

Our delicious Spiral Sliced Ham is richly smoked, fully cooked and pre-sliced. Choose from a half spiral or a whole spiral. Weights are averaged.

Half spiral ham

10 - 12 lbs. This is the one we had for Easter along with a rib roast.

Rose Pork Shoulder Butt

Our smoked boneless Pork Shoulder Butts are lean, tender, and appetizing in appearance. Our “Private Stock” pork shoulder is 96% fat-free. 

                                                                       If  you have read this blog for a long time, you will know this is the fallow period, that which is directly after a big food event such as Easter.  I can hardly look at the refrigerator from the outside let alone see what is there to scare me from within. One thing I cannot get out of my mind is the ham from this Easter event.  I bought it from the Rose company itself on line and it was the best ham I have ever served and I did nothing to it...nothing.  I have long bought from Giant Eagle the Rose shoulder or butt hams that are small, but expensive, but worth every penny.  So I thought I would see if the rest of their products lived up to the tiny offering that we have enjoyed for years and that which is not always available, but when it is I buy several for between $9.00  to $15.00 each.  I have tried others but they don't stand a chance in this household.


https://www.rosepacking.com/shop/

                       

                                                                   

Our delicious Spiral Sliced Ham is richly smoked, fully cooked and pre-sliced. Choose from a half spiral or a whole spiral. Weights are averaged. I am trying this next.

Half spiral ham

10 - 12 lbs. This is the one we had for Easter along with a rib roast.

Rose Pork Shoulder Butt

Our smoked boneless Pork Shoulder Butts are lean, tender, and appetizing in appearance. Our “Private Stock” pork shoulder is 96% fat-free. 

Our delicious Spiral Sliced Ham is richly smoked, fully cooked and pre-sliced. Choose from a half spiral or a whole spiral. Weights are averaged.

Half spiral ham

10 - 12 lbs. This is the one we had for Easter along with a rib roast.
	We used every scrap of this ham.  No waste at all.

Rose Pork Shoulder Butt

Our smoked boneless Pork Shoulder Butts are lean, tender, and appetizing in appearance. Our “Private Stock” pork shoulder is 96% fat-free. Giant Eagle carries these most of the time.

2.25 - 3 lbs. avg.
	$13.99 each

La Belle Pomme

The Beautiful Apple (La Belle Pomme) cooking school ran for two decades in Columbus and many of us received a degree in cooking passion from Betty Rosbottom, the teacher.Our wonderful Lazarus Department store was its last home and with its sad demise La Belle fell as well.  I was traveling to London and Paris every other month for two or three weeks at a time, but when I was home, those classes were scheduled and attended with gusto.  I have a binder of recipes that I still use and cherish from the splendid days of cooking with Betty and the special utensils were sold in the vast culinary display right outside the doors of La Belle Pomme school. It was difficult to get into the classes because they sold out as soon as they were posted with many famous chefs coming to cook there in Columbus.  I miss it even today.

The famed cooking school originated in a small storefront in Upper Arlington and later moved into prime space Downtown at the Lazarus department store.

During the run of La Belle Pomme, some of the most famous chefs in the country — Jacques Pepin, Marcella Hazan, Anne Willan, Giuliano Bugialli, Rose Levy Beranbaum and Sheila Lukins — passed through its doors to share techniques, recipes and a passion for well-prepared food.

Those doors closed 20 years ago this month.

The founder, Betty Rosbottom, didn’t start the school with the goal of creating a Columbus institution. The native of Memphis, Tenn., was transplanted to the middle of Ohio after her husband accepted a teaching position at Ohio State University.

Rosbottom, a French major, had been studying cooking in Philadelphia before the move. She initially began working as a translator for the Columbus Museum of Art.

“No one was giving cooking classes in Columbus” at the time, Rosbottom said, so she placed an ad in the Upper Arlington newspaper and started teaching in her home.

Before long, the classes outgrew her house and she faced a decision: pursue a master’s degree in fine arts and continue working at the museum or put all her resources into the cooking school.

“I loved art, and I loved food,” she said.

The museum curator helped Rosbottom make up her mind, telling her: “Do the food. We have lots of people getting an M.A. in art history.”With a $5,000 loan, Rosbottom rented a storefront on Northwest Boulevard at North Star Road in 1976 and opened La Belle Pomme — French for “The Beautiful Apple.”

The school attracted some of the biggest names in cooking.

Television had few cooking programs at the time, and chefs had to travel to make their names known. The school had a reputation for selling out classes — which meant cookbook sales for chefs.

“I think they really enjoyed coming to Columbus,” Rosbottom said. “People were anxious to learn; they were welcoming.”

When Pepin visited in 1978, the French chef taught standing-room-only classes for three days.

After Italian cooking legend Hazan visited the next year, Time magazine wrote about the school and the growing gourmet movement in Columbus.

The school was so popular that, in just a few years, Rosbottom expanded to a larger space — and, in 1981, Lazarus approached her about buying the school and moving it to the Downtown store.

She had been in business only five years, Rosbottom said, but she eagerly accepted the offer because she would remain the director of the cooking school. There were other benefits, too: The school expanded its kitchen space, and she obtained a budget for advertising and access to a housewares department filled with state-of-the-art equipment. Plus, Lazarus sent her to trade shows annually, allowing her to stay on top of trends.

Perhaps most important to Rosbottom, the sale meant that the school could accept more students.

At its peak, 5,000 students a year attended La Belle Pomme, filling the seats of more than 100 classes.

“The best part of the school was the people,” Rosbottom said. “They came from far and wide — not only from Columbus and the suburbs but Dayton and northern Ohio, too.”

Lee Ritchie, a German Village real-estate agent, still keeps a binder filled with the recipes she received from the classes she took, beginning in 1985, at La Belle Pomme.

“I feel like Betty Rosbottom kind of made a difference in my life,” Ritchie said. “Not only did I learn how to cook — techniques — but also how to source ingredients, where to shop. They introduced me to the North Market.”

Ritchie remembers Rosbottom as warm and gracious. The school’s teachers made the classes fun, and she later joined a wine-tasting group with some of them.

“It opened up my world, really, to food and wine, and I really thank her for that.”

Rosbottom put together a small, loyal staff of teachers — including Steve Stover and Rich Terapak, who have been teaching together for 35 years.

The school, Stover said, became a touchstone for central Ohio food enthusiasts — a small fraternity at the time.

“Betty deserves a lot of credit,” he said. “She really brought cooking to the masses in Columbus.”

The school’s closing, in 1995, was bittersweet for Rosbottom.

On the one hand, the closing allowed her to be in the same city with her husband, who several years earlier had accepted a teaching position in Massachusetts. (The couple were commuting between there and Columbus.)

Yet the school had propelled Rosbottom into a career in food that continues. For decades she wrote the syndicated cooking column “For the Gourmet,” which appeared for 20 years in The Dispatch; she is at work on her 12th cookbook.

Rosbottom still teaches — including an occasional class in Columbus, often at the Seasoned Farmhouse cooking school in the Clintonville neighborhood.

The class, owner Tricia Wheeler said, typically fills up in an hour.

Wheeler, an Akron native, had heard so much about Rosbottom when she moved to Columbus more than 20 years ago that she featured her in the first issue of Edible Columbus, a magazine she began publishing in 2010.

Before opening the Seasoned Farmhouse, Wheeler tapped Rosbottom for advice on how to run a cooking school.

“She really is a teacher at heart,” Wheeler said. “She really taught a whole generation to cook." 

Easter is here~

Andy and I married 56 years ago today.

Matt, our grandson, brought me flowers and Tim Horton's coffee this morning.  He has the day off and came to help with Easter preparations.  I have for him a big pot of corn beef, his favorite.  Some for today and the rest to take home.
 So far:
I have seventeen dishes ready for the two-meal
Easter day. Plus the rib roast is covered with marinade and ready for the oven. I just finished
a big pot of (creamed) wild mushroom soup.  The
way it is disappearing right now, that may be absent from the Easter meal.

I stopped in the middle of everything today to make
these as they appeared out of no where in my email.
Just marshmallows with melted white chocolate poured over the top.  I used Amish marshmallows in the form of baby ducks, but she used regular miniature marshmallows.

chicken and noodles Like · Comment · Share orange chicken to top the fried rice

Lemon loaves~

This simple recipe is right out of the oven with a delicious mix sinking into the loaf.  Once that has gone through, take it out of the pan. Then apply a thicker icing mixture on top if you wish. (I left that off.)
Lemon loaf:
1 lemon supreme boxed cake mix
1 package lemon instant pudding 
4 eggs
1/2 cup oil
1 cup water
Mix all ingredients together in a large mixing bowl and beat together for 3 minutes.  Pour into 2 greased loaf pans (I am going to use paper liners the next time.) and bake @ 350 for 40-45 minutes or until a toothpick comes away clean.
Let rest in pans for 5 minutes and then glaze immediately.
After the icing has soaked in and the loaf has cooled you can apply a thicker glaze if you want:
juice of 1 lemon
juice of 1 orange
1/2 cup powdered sugar
mix and paint the loaves allowing the glaze to run down the edges.
NOTE: Next time I will bake it with parchment or a paper loaf liner because one of them stuck pretty badly in the pan.  The other came out pretty well.  Live and learn.  Also, I will not put another coat of icing on because the loaf is sweet enough.  It is a tasty treat for sure and very easy.

I think I have the menu (s) set for Easter. 
1:00 starters and drinks
1:30  rib roast in garlic and wine; ham, mashed potatoes with gravy, scalloped potatoes/ham, brussel sprouts, asparagus, green bean casserole from Glenda, deviled eggs from Glenda, large tossed salad, large pasta salad, corn souffle, pepper bacon butter beans, rolls and pies (from Pam.)

Late in the day towards evening:
Kathy's hot pasta dish, beef stew, chili, mac and cheese/ pepperoni,  fruit salad, potato stick chicken salad, and more pies from Chee.
That should do it!

I could scream.  There are ads everywhere.  I am so sick of TV commercials that are longer than the actual show's content. Now people are introducing ads in their blogs.  I am not going to do that.  Surely there should be one place a person can go to read in peace without ads competing for and taking over the space.  No wonder people are hyper with all the external exposure every place they look.  We should just calm down. My Facebook site has so much stuff on there that I had no part in introducing that I find no contentment there now.  So much of it is stuff I absolutely do not believe in or want to be associated with in any form.  I delete it when I can yet something else pops up in its place and then the questions of why I don't want to see what I just deleted. Well, that's my soapbox speech for the week. So far this blog is commercial free unless they find a way to insert it without permission.

Lemon and coconut bars~

Lemon coconut bars~

  Add this to your Easter menu, those lemon lovers will thank you!

• 1 1/2 cups flour
• 1/2 cup icing sugar
• 3/4 cup cold butter, cubed
• 4 eggs
• 1 1/2 cups sugar
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• Juice of 2 large lemons
• 1 teaspoon lemon zest
• 1 cup coconut

1. Combine flour and icing sugar in a bowl. Add butter cubes and using a pastry blender cut in the butter until you have fine crumbs.
2. Press the mixture evenly into a greased 9" x 13" pan.
3. Bake at 350º for 15 minutes.
4. While the crust is baking, beat eggs, sugar, baking powder, lemon juice, and zest together until well combined and the mixture has turned a pale color. 
5. Pour mixture on the crust, sprinkle coconut over the top and return to the oven to bake another 25 minutes until golden.
6. Cool on cooling rack and cut into bars. Dust with icing sugar and serve.
7. From Mennonite Girls Can Cook (blog)

Today I am testing this luscious butter bean recipe from the English Kitchen's recipe which was pinched from someone else.  I figure if we put it out there, there it is, so use it. I am changing it up as well and making two large dishes of it, one for today and one for Easter's second meal.  I am also using soaked (dried) butter beans rather than the canned.  I am also using pepper bacon and Mr. T.'s bloody Mary mix.  Hey, this is turning out to be my recipe after all.

1 tbs. vegetable oil (I used the bacon fat)

cup of pancetta; also pepper bacon

one whole onion; plus packet of Lipton dry onion soup

1 tsp dry mustard; instead I used several squirts of the hot chili mustard from Stalin's market

2 tsp. tomato paste

2 tsp Worcestershire sauce

 1 tbs. soft brown sugar (I used at least 3/4 cup)

several squirts honey (She used maple syrup, but I didn't have any of that.

1/2 cup chicken stock

1 can of chopped tomatoes in tomato juice, undrained (14 ounces) I used enough Mr. T's to cover the beans before putting in the oven

2 can butter beans (I used soaked dried beans so that made two large casseroles of baked beans.)

I added a lot of cooked pepper bacon and the pancetta.

Actually you cannot miss with a baked bean recipe--let yourselves go and add what you like.  Taste and refine, taste and refine.

My rendition about to go in the oven.  Family already swooning.

                       

Easter preparations~

I was feeling a little slow about the Easter preparations this year. It's so early, and, there is snow on the ground this morning AGAIN.  I have a basic idea of what I want to do, but am feeling a little lazy about going ahead with it...that is until I started decorating the long table. I started opening drawers and checking table linens and matching flatware and then things started happening.  I am pleased to say one long table is ready and waiting and covered to keep it neat and tidy.  Beth and I took a turn at World Market today and they had some really cute accessories as well as a nice assortment of candy.  I bought some little felt baskets that look like flower garden plots and filled them with an assortment of tiny bottles of liquor and colorful candy eggs.  I will tackle another long table tomorrow with the items we bought and some traditional items from years past.  I don't care for the crafty look and was never much for craft work in general because I am a fool with a needle; but, it is good that we do not all have the same interests and ideas. Isn't it? I admire the people who like to do this and they seem to gain a great deal of pleasure from their hobby. (And, I do like these crafty little felt baskets.)

Here is the Cincinnati Lechlers' recipe for Skyline Chili Dip. (It disappeared so fast I only got three little scoops.) Kroger sells it frozen or making your own is even better.

Skyline Chili Dip:

Spread a softened 8oz cream cheese in a baking dish (approx 8 x 11)

Thaw 1 package frozen Skyline Chili in microwave (I cover with paper towel to absorb excess liquid) Be sure you buy Chili not Chili Spaghetti.

Spread thawed Skyline Chili over cream cheese.

Top with 8oz package shredded cheddar cheese

Microwave or place in oven just to melt cheese.

Serve with Tostito Scoops. 

                                                                       

                                                         

I got these sweet spring napkin rings in Paris years ago. Also the colored flatware in several different colors that match different dinner plates.