Honoring Mothers and Grandmothers on Mother's Day by Reminiscing About The Past

By Carrie Gamble

Every year around Mother's Day I begin to reminisce about past Mother's Days and my relationships with my mother and grandmother. The friendship and love the three of us share is a very special part of my life. We have confided in each other and shared the good times and the bad. They have shared so much about our family history - countless stories of days gone by and of "living life the old fashioned way."

I was thinking about mother/daughter relationships the other day and a thought popped into my mind. Instead of thinking about MY relationship with my mother and grandmother, I began thinking about my grandmother, Elizabeth, and the close bond she had with her mother, Anna.

Elizabeth loved telling stories about her life and had such vivid memories of her childhood. As a naïve German girl growing up on a farm in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, she was accustomed to the ethnic foods made by her German-Hungarian mother. Anna came to America from "the old country" and raised her family on the foods they ate over there. There were lots of dumpling and noodle recipes as well as potatoes and vegetables in season. They never had much meat, once or twice a week and of course on Sundays.

Elizabeth was absolutely enchanted when she went to school and discovered "all of the wonderful things" her girlfriends brought in their lunches! She would tell her mother about them and from this they got new ideas. One such new idea was a pie! They had never heard of pies before as they were not made in the old country. Elizabeth and Anna tried their hand at their first pie - Butterscotch. They were so pleased with themselves! This was around 1918 when Elizabeth was just eight years old. And this was just the beginning of her life long love affair with cooking and baking.

For Mother's Day this year I would like to honor Elizabeth and Anna, my grandmother and great-grandmother by sharing two of their favorite and very old recipes with you - Hungarian Cheese Noodles and Butterscotch Pie. Enjoy! And Happy Mother's Day!

Hungarian Cheese Noodles

You can use store bought noodles or make your own. To make your own take 2 cups flour and make a well in the center. Add 2 eggs, pinch of salt and enough cold water to make a stiff dough. Mix until you have a stiff dough. Roll into 2 balls. Flour tabletop or cutting board and roll out each ball to about 1/8" thick. Put flakes (rolled out dough) on a clean towel and leave them to dry about ½ hour. In the meantime, mix 1 pound cottage cheese, pinch salt, dash of pepper and 1 teaspoon sugar. Set aside. When flakes are dry sprinkle with flour. Cut into 3" strips. Lay one on top of another and cut 1/2" to make noodles. Boil water with ½ tablespoon of salt. Drop noodles into the boiling water. Boil about 5 minutes. Drain. Place noodles into a bowl with the cottage cheese mixture. Combine. Using 2 or 3 slices of bread make crispies by tearing off small pieces and frying in 1 tablespoon oil or butter until golden brown. Sprinkle crispies over noodles. You may also sprinkle with some more sugar on top to bring out the flavor. A surprisingly delicious dish!

Butterscotch Pie

1 ¾ cups milk
1 cup brown sugar
2 eggs, separated
2 tablespoons flour
1 tablespoon corn starch
pinch salt
butter the size of a walnut (about 1 tablespoon)
1 teaspoon vanilla

Put 1 ½ cups milk in a pan and heat. Mix brown sugar, egg yolks, flour, corn starch and salt with ¼ cup milk. Slowly pour hot milk over this mixture. Bring to a boil. Stir until thick. Add lump of butter and vanilla. Pour into a baked pie crust.

To make meringue: Beat 2 egg whites until stiff. Slowly add 4 tablespoons sugar. Spread meringue evenly over pie filling. Bake 10 to 15 minutes at 350 degrees until meringue is light brown.

Pie Crust: Take 1/4 cup butter, 2 tablespoons boiling water and a pinch of salt and beat with a wire whisk until it is the consistency of heavy cream. Add 1 cup flour. Mix with a fork until crumbly. If too soft add more flour. Form a ball and roll out making a round crust to fit into pie plate. Trim edges to make them even and flute by pressing between your fingers. Bake at 350 degrees for about 10 minutes or until pale brown.

Carrie J. Gamble is co-author, editor and publisher of Grandmother's Cookbook, a collection of recipes, treasured memories, wildflower watercolors and feelings from the heart. Details about the cookbook and more delicious recipes of Carrie's grandmother, Elizabeth Rose von Hohen, can be found on their website. You'll experience "living life the old fashioned way" with Grandmother's Cookbook. Visit the website and download FREE recipes and "A Family Love Letter" chapter at http://www.grandmotherscookbook.com

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Banana Cake Recipe

By Elizabeth Martyn

Every family needs a great banana cake recipe, a delicious homemade cake that can be rustled up in no time at all, filling the house with that lovely banana aroma as it bakes.

This banana cake recipe is very simple, and is a great way to make use of those odd bananas that tend to languish in the fruit bowl. Once the skins go brown and spotty, they're just perfect for a recipe like this. Ripe bananas have much more flavor, and their soft texture means they blend into the cake mixture easily.

If you have a lot of ripe bananas you could make two banana cakes and freeze one. Another alternative is to freeze some of your ripe bananas. Just pop them, unpeeled, into a freezer bag and keep them frozen until needed. The skins will turn black, but that's simply a reaction to the cold temperature. Your bananas are still fine to use, and you can mash them straight from the freezer, or leave them to thaw first.

If you want to make a banana cake but your bananas aren't fully ripe, there's a cure - peel the bananas and put them in the microwave for a few seconds to soften them. Then use them in the banana cake recipe that follows:

Banana Cake Recipe

Ingredients

225g (8 oz, 2 cups) self-raising (self-rising) flour

100g (4 oz, 1/2 cup) soft margarine or softened butter

175g (6 oz, 3/4 cup) caster (superfine granulated) sugar

2 beaten eggs

3 bananas, peeled

175g (6 oz, 1 cup) dried fruit (use sultanas, raisins, currants, chopped glace cherries, candied peel or a mixture)

Makes a 2lb (900g) cake

Method

• Pre-heat the oven to gas 4/180C/350F. Oil and base line a 2lb (900g) loaf pan.
  
• Put all the ingredients except the dried fruit into a food processor and blend until well mixed.
  
• Take the food processor bowl from the base machine, remove the processing blade and stir the dried fruit into the mixture.
  
• Spoon the cake mix into the pan and bake for around 1 hr 20 minutes, or until a fine knife blade inserted into the cake comes out clean. Check the cake after 1 hr 10 minutes and if neccessary cover with a piece of foil to prevent the top from burning.
  
• Leave until cool, then turn out of the tin.
  
• This banana cake keeps well in an airtight tin for 2-3 days, or refrigerate it for up to 7 days.
  

For a banana nut cake, substitute chopped walnuts for some or all of the dried fruit, and scatter some over the top of the cake before baking.

You'll find another yummy Banana Cake Recipe in Elizabeth Martyn's collection of Healthy Cake Recipes.

This article may be published electronically or in print in its entirety as long as the author by-lines in the resource box are included and urls kept live.

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Recipe for a Perfect Mother's Day

By Jill Borash

Ingredient #1: Let mom sleep in. This means being quiet on Mother’s Day morning. No loud TV or loud music before mom decides to get out of bed. No loud complaining of “Mom, I can’t find my shirt, pants [or any other article of clothing which mom is somehow magically supposed to, and surprisingly often does, know where it is].” Surely you can find something semi-clean to wear. :-) Better yet, just give mom some earplugs the night before so she can simply sleep through anything.

Ingredient #2: Let mom have breakfast in bed. In order to make sure this can actually happen, make sure you know where all of the ingredients, bowls, utensils, and other items you’ll need are in the kitchen. Make a list of everything you’ll need and make sure you know where all of it is the night before. I have included an easy breakfast recipe at the end of these “ingredients.” It has just 6 ingredients and all you need is an electric mixer, bowl, and two bread pans. Under no circumstances should you wake mom up in order to find out where something is. Improvise. If it doesn’t turn out, a nicely arranged bowl of cereal that she didn’t have to make is still a nice Mother’s Day breakfast.

Ingredient #3: Let mom have the day off. This means no cooking, cleaning, laundry, or running errands. Chances are pretty good that she does one or more of these things the other 364 days of the year. Let her have Mother’s Day off. If she starts doing one of those things, pleasantly surprise her and offer to do it yourself. And for you kids, I am going to invoke the right of all mothers, she endured X hours of labor in order to bring you into the world, certainly she deserves one day a year off.

Ingredient #4: Tell her “I love you” at least once on Mother’s Day. You know she loves to hear that sappy kind of stuff so indulge her. Telling mom you love her does not make you less cool, less of a rebel, less of a man, or any of the other things you might be worried about. Yes, I realize I have just dated myself but I am hoping that you still get my point. Mom loves you. Admitting that you love her too is okay. You can still be yourself and love your mom.

Ingredient #5: Give mom the gift of your day. Give her your attention for the day. Perhaps even have a meaningful talk about something important going on in your life. Moms love that kind of stuff. Let her choose what the family will do on Mother’s Day. In a world where we never seem to have enough time for each other anymore, let her have you all to herself that day. Who knows, you might even enjoy having that special time with her.

Here’s the easy breakfast recipe I promised.

Poppy Seed Bread

1 package yellow cake mix
1 package instant coconut cream pudding
1 cup hot water
1/2 cup oil
4 eggs
1/4 cup poppy seed

Put all of the above ingredients in a large bowl. Mix all of the ingredients together with an electric mixer on low speed for 4 minutes. Pour the mixture evenly into two bread pans and bake at 350 degrees for about 40 minutes. (A toothpick inserted in the center should come out clean.) Allow the bread to cool for about 30 minutes (it should be just slightly warm to the touch) and then carefully take a table knife and run it around the edge of the pan. Using the table knife or your fingers, gently loosen the bread from the bottom of the pan. Turn the pan upside down over a plate. The bread should slide out. If it doesn’t, gently tap the bottom of the pan to loosen it. Turn the bread right side up, slice it up and you are ready to serve it to mom.

Happy Baking and Happy Mother’s Day!

Jill Seader shares her favorite breakfast recipes and other baking recipes along with her stories at http://www.YourBakingStory.com She also invites you to share your own baking recipes and stories. Happy Baking!

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