Tag Archives: mincemeat

Before and After

Posted on January 9, 2012 | Leave a comment

Before last week’s layoffs I wanted to make mincemeat tarts and even have mincemeat in the pantry, but my muffin tins are in storage half a country away. Before, I would have bought muffin tins. Now, I won’t.

We’ll work our way through the frig, freezer and pantry as that’s what people do when there’s no income and expenses remain the same. I don’t know that I can get it down to $10/day but that was years ago. Maybe $15? That’s just grub.

My husband bought me a fur Cossack hat before Christmas and it doesn’t fit and I’d love to send it back and get the money but he says no. That was before.

I bought him $12 worth of undershirts for his birthday before Christmas. He bought me the hat. Zoe our dog bought me a $20 heater for the guest bathroom so I could take a bath as that room is not properly insulated. It’s where she gets a bath, too, so was not entirely a gracious gift.

Luckily we didn’t spend more than $200 on Christmas, including filet mignon for dinner, or take a vacation. Now that vacation time for three years is in the bank  we just have to sign our lives away to get two weeks severance pay.

After that and insurance issues, the before is over, and our next step is 100% of our work and concentration. That’s what we strive for. As for me, I don’t ever want to think that I could afford a muffin tin yesterday, but not today.

I see the ceo of this company, $3 million dollars richer as of a week ago, cashing in stock before it plummeted and he canned 25% of IT staff and know that he’ll go about life without a care, while 57 families know their health insurance runs out at the end of the month and they only get 1-2 weeks severance. Also that in this economy and city it can’t absorb these layoffs.

We must look toward the future for ourselves and for those my husband has been taught by, and those he mentored, over the years. If I was in his field, (and not his wife) I’d like to learn best practices from him. There’s a reason MIT tagged him at age 15. He was living on a dairy farm and didn’t know what those initials meant but was in AP classes and driving his math teachers crazy, questioning everything.

After will be a good place, perhaps not in the mountains but somewhere we can thrive. In-between is the toughest place. Don’t worry, except you may hear from me more sporadically until we get settled. Cheers, Dee

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Editorial

Tagged ,

Seasonal Blog

Posted on October 11, 2011 | Leave a comment

Grapes in September-October, capons October to November, what have I missed?

November-December is mincemeat season.  My mother and aunt made their own once, with suet and beef.  Gross.  She said she’d never do it again so our best friends for the holiday season were Crosse & Blackwell, and Nonesuch, all sans beef and with the brandy.  She did make some lovely mincemeat tarts.

A couple of years ago my brother, who lives in NYC in the middle of the best shops in the world, couldn’t find mincemeat.  One purveyor told him he might have better luck in New Jersey, imagine that.

Then he took to the internet and looked up mincemeat and what came up?  My blog, which he’d never read.  Serves him right.  I got on Amazon and sent two jars of mincemeat to my father, which was his holiday destination.  And Dad had a jar on hand and had already made Mom’s mincemeat tarts.

Fate intervenes in mysterious ways.  Ten years ago I found a glass I thought my now husband (nearly nine years now) might like in his new place, 1,000 feet away from mine.  He had nothing but a colander in his kitchen.  So I bought a box of the glasses, six in three sizes, and walked them 1/2 mile home.  It nearly killed me.

As I thought he was at work I walked up the steps and left the glasses there, knowing they wouldn’t be stolen, then walked the rest of the way home.  When I arrived home there was a note, “Home sick.  Need to take an aspirin.  Do you have a glass I can borrow?”

Hopefully my brother can read my blog and contact me on his new Mac, five years newer than mine.  Oh, well.  He doesn’t have my full-sized wireless keyboard, huge screen, speakers, trackball mouse, headphones and Skype.

See the capon entry for how to find one, also mincemeat.  Dee

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Editorial

Tagged ,

Holiday Traditions

Posted on December 15, 2010 | Leave a comment

I think now that my family always fought with them. We never knew when to get the tree. Lights went up by our mother and father. We each got our own ornament each year so got to hang them, and I was the oldest so always got two more than my younger sister. tee hee.

Dinner used to be turkey with all the trimmings, which changed I don’t know when, as Mom went to a traditional British dinner with prime rib, potatoes, Yorkshire pudding and sides. I did the “sides,” changing them every year.

Everyone discussed presents and the routine was changed every year, even though everyone said it was “routine.” Opening Christmas morning vs. Christmas Eve. After we were adults, we each picked a stocking and stuffed it for less than $20. I think our parents got each of us four a gift or two, and we got them and each other something. Hopefully my siblings don’t read this blog (unless it mentions mincemeat) otherwise the debate will start anew.

One thing we did agree on was that breakfast started early morning with Hungarian pull-apart coffee cake made by my sisters from brioche with cinnamon, sugar and nuts. We had that with coffee or tea. Early afternoon was the dinner. Then, desserts were mainly predictable, added over the years.

There were always mincemeat tarts, Scandinavians, Snickerdoodles, date squares, gingerbreads and lebkuchen. This year we are flying to my Dad’s for Christmas eve and day. Mom is gone now. My husband and I have been together for ten years and we don’t get each other Christmas gifts. But I was born in November and he in December and we don’t give gifts for those occasions either. That may be why we flew to see his family for Thanksgiving and mine for Christmas. Happy holidays! Cheers, Dee

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Editorial, Recipe Ideas

Tagged , , ,

Hoarding Mincemeat

Posted on March 25, 2010 | Leave a comment

It was in one store but was sold out way before Thanksgiving last year! I found a jar a few weeks ago and should go back and get more.

Before you say “ick” and “gross” know that most of the jarred mincemeat these days does not include meat and now they even give you the choice of brandy or no brandy. I say brandy, which infuses and sets the dried fruits and raisins that make this particularly British dessert.

Mom had two glasses to cut her pastry (I’ve given you the pastry recipe, for certain) and placed the bottom layer of pastry in a regularly sized muffin pan, filled it with her precise amount of mincemeat filling and added the top, or “hat,” according to my Aunt.

You’ll see my mincemeat woes as I now decorate my family’s pantries with jars of it, hopefully in the off-season so we’re ready to go over the holidays. Yes, I spent 2X the amount to FexEx it halfway across the country only to find out they had it already.

If you ask my husband’s family, it is an acquired taste, along with lebkuchen, that they have not yet acquired. Husband Jim can take more cayenne than I, yet I can take more nutmeg and cloves. I think that’s partly a Southern thing.

In the meantime, I’ll see if I can find some more mincemeat now so I don’t have to go crazy looking for it in November. I was just thinking of a trifle with mincemeat, applesauce, and nutmeg-spiced whipped cream. It sounds holiday-ish to me. Cheers! Dee

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Editorial, Recipe Ideas

Tagged ,

Mincemeat

Posted on February 19, 2010 | Leave a comment

Today, I was rushing through an OK supermarket for shaving cream, paper towels, potatoes, and rosemary when I glimpsed a jar of Crosse & Blackwell mincemeat and grabbed it.

Since the beginning of November, I’ve looked in and called every grocery and specialty store in a 25 mile radius and was unable to find mincemeat. This store said they just got it in and sold a lot of it over the holidays and just sold out. Most people don’t know what it is, but we had mincemeat tarts every year!

It’s safe in the pantry now. Now that I think of it I should have gotten two or more! I know where to go for mincemeat, and lemon curd. It takes a while in a new locale before one gets the lay of the land. There is a food God. Cheers, Dee

→ Leave a comment

Posted in Editorial

Tagged

Capon

Posted on November 7, 2009 | 3 Comments

Once I realized we weren’t going to be able to go to TX for the grand clan gathering of my husband’s family because of business, I’m stymied that I have to cook Thanksgiving a deux, the first Thanksgiving I’ve ever cooked alone! No, the husband doesn’t cook. He takes out the dog and keeps her out of my kitchen, and grills occasionally.

When I was growing up, Mom used to get capons a few times per year, for special occasions. The “neutered” rooster develops extraordinary flavor, is larger and tastier than the largest young hen would be, and makes for a special occasion.

I’ve happened upon Wapsie Farms, the nation’s largest capon producer, and asked them where I can find a capon for Thanksgiving. It’s just the two of us and I’d rather a 6-8 lb. bird rather than a minimum 12-16 lb. turkey. Today, I asked a Whole Foods butcher, who had information out for holiday ordering, where I could find a capon and she’d never heard the term and advised me to look elsewhere. So that’s when I sent an email out to Wapsie Farms.

A turkey breast sitting over stuffing is a last resort, and WF has Diestel organic turkeys. Aside from Labor Day, it’s the only holiday Jim will have this year. I don’t want to make it all about cooking. Just a bird, great stuffing, mashed potatoes (my fourth masher, others in storage) and perhaps glazed carrots and roasted brussels sprouts. And perhaps a mincemeat tart to salute the Penny sisters.

So, are there any family farms in Utah who raise organic capons? Cheers, Dee

→ 3 Comments

Posted in Editorial, Utah

Tagged , , , ,

Mincemeat

Posted on December 15, 2008 | 2 Comments

My brother sent an email today. He lives in Manhattan, The Big Apple, and went to Zabars to find Crosse and Blackwell mincemeat to bring to Dad’s for Christmas. Apparently Dad is supposed to make the mincemeat tarts. Zabars didn’t have it. He went home and looked up mincemeat online.

First, the Crosse and Blackwell site pointed him to Hackensack NJ for the nearest jar of this fruit and sometimes meat mixture that is all apples and raisins and rum and brandy and all kinds of good stuff to put in a short crust and bake.

That didn’t work. So he went further and what did he find? My blog. That’ll teach him for not reading me from time to time!

It may be better that Mom is gone to find that her beloved Crosse and Blackwell label is now owned by Smuckers. But with Kevin in dire straits I was ready to send him my sole jar of mincemeat.

At the last moment, I found it on the Smuckers’ site under “specialty” items and Kevin ordered three jars to be sent directly to Dad pre-Christmas so he can make the tartlets. Mom always had a special Marie Antoinette champagne glass to cut the bottom piece, a precise “Mom” measurement of mincemeat, then used a champagne flute for the “hat.”

Let’s hope Dad figures that out. In the meantime I always remember Mom’s pastry recipe:

1.5 cups flour
1.5 sticks butter, chilled and cubed (3/4 cup)
1 teaspoon salt
3T ice water (maximum, depending upon consistency of the dough, weather, everything)

Pulse the flour, butter and salt in a food processor until it looks like peas or lentils. Add 2T water and pulse. If it comes together right away, it’s done. It shouldn’t look like a solid mass but should pull together if you grab a tablespoon full with your hand and it comes together. If it doesn’t, add a few more drops of ice water until it does so.

Hey, I’m not the pastry lady! My hands melt the stuff. DO NOT overwork the dough as you will enhance the gluten (which you want in bread but not in pastry) and make the resulting dough tough. Place the dough on a clean flat surface and make it into a small round. Wrap it in plastic and let it rest in the frig for at least 20 minutes. This allows the dough to relax and the gluten strands to stop forming.

Roll out and use your preferred cutters. I wish I’d asked for Mom’s. Mincemeat tarts were always a family staple from Thanksgiving through Christmas and while the glasses she used to cut the pastry were not valuable to any collector, I actually think Kevin should have them for offering mincemeat this year.

So, Dad, here’s how to make Mom’s mincemeat tarts, except for the year that she and A.L. made their own, with meat! I told you this already – they went back to C&B that is now owned by Smuckers.

There’s no getting near the post office today, the busiest day of the year for shipping. And USPS site is down is well and holding postage funds that it won’t allow me to print. Happy holidays to you, too, Uncle Sam!

It is going to be a new year and we can only hope to have a better economy and our troops home from Iraq. Wishing you the best this holiday season – Dee

→ 2 Comments

Posted in Editorial, Education, Friend Alert, Recipes, Recommended Pantry Contents

Tagged