Retro Recipes and Traditional Fare

I have always been a fan of macaroons; almond, hazelnut, pistachio, and especially coconut.  Through the years, I have made lots of versions of this classic Passover cookie, but none as good as the one’s I found on The Michaels Restaurant Blog.

Last year, I made over 400 macaroons for the Passover Seder at our Temple.  Although I enjoyed making them, I didn’t want to look at another macaroon for some time.  

This past week our temple hosted a journey through Egypt, ending with a Seder (for the kids only). Obviously, I was asked to bring the macaroons.

This recipe for macaroons is simply one of the best.  And each and every time I bring these to someones house, I am reminded of how good they are by how well they are received.

Surprised? I know. I wouldn’t normally post a recipe for sweet bars made with crisp rice cereal and marshmallows. I’m going to a family reunion. There will be lots of kids there — little ones and big ones, too, if you know what I mean. Kids love rice krispie bars. I’m taking a very light, bright and healthful cabbage salad, too. So, it will all balance out in the sugar and calorie department.

This recipe came to me from a friend sometime in the early 1980′s. My boys were at a rice krispie bar stage of their lives. That stage coincided with a “not-much-time-to-bake” time in my life.

No-bake Caramel Krispies are made by making two layers of the rice krispie, butter and marshmallow mixture in jelly-roll pans. A filling of caramel, more butter and a can of sweetened condensed milk is heated together and when the caramels are melted, the mixture gets poured over one of the layers that has been sprinkled with more mini-marshmallows.

Now that we’re in the peak of apple picking season, I realized that I never posted a basic apple pie recipe. Some people find making pies a daunting task. There are stories, mostly said in hushed tones, about my mother throwing more than a few pie crusts against the wall.

I must admit, rolling out a homemade pie crust can be intimidating at first. There are several variables that can throw a “wrench” in your dough – humidity, temperature of the butter, amounts of water, types of flour, overworking the dough - all can influence the outcome of your crust.

Once you master a pie crust recipe, and you truly learn the “feel” of pastry in its various stages, it will be a breeze to roll out a pie. If it still seems too challenging, there are some acceptable store bought pie dough brands.

Wholly Wholesome, which has won the praise of Cook’s Illustrated, Good Housekeeping, Real Simple Magazine and CBS The Early Show, offers organic easy to use rolled pie dough and pre-made pie shells.

When my friend Sara from Culinerapy visited Concord, Mass. last year, she made a reader’s pilgrimage to Orchard House, the historic home of Louisa May Alcott. Since Sara and I (and half the women we know) share an abiding love for Alcott’s 1868 novel Little Women, she sent me a thoughtful souvenir: the author’s recipe for Apple Slump. It’s a homey, deliberately simple dessert, comfort cousin to fruit buckles, bettys, cobblers, grunts and pandowdys. Still, reading the calligraphy-script recipe, I could see where I might tweak it. And I thought, who am I to edit Louisa May Alcott?

Not editing, really. Finessing. Alcott may have mastered prose at the desk, but in the kitchen she was likely closer to Jo March, for whom the “bread burned black” and the “cream turned sour.” Making Apple Slump would be like cooking with Ms. Alcott’s domestically-challenged ghost, and while I cored and sliced I considered my years reading and rereading the March girls, picturing Amy’s limes, Meg’s vain high heels and lonely Jo in the attic with apples, writing and cursing scarlet fever, the villain that stole Beth. I regretted that my little tweaks – dash of vanilla, an extra apple – could not make Laurie come to his senses and dump Amy. Pecans would add crunch but they would never make Jo marry Laurie, nor bring Beth back. They’re a matter of personal taste, like my feelings about Meg wedding that dull John Brooke, and while they won’t change the story they can at least enhance Ms. Alcott’s kitchen legacy, and certainly perk up the Slump.