June Keys Sugar Cookies

It has been awhile since I posted a recipe.  Since I last posted so much has happened.

My Mini-Me has gotten her drivers license. My Mini Farmer has graduated from bicycle to dirt bike.  Both have raised calves from bottle to market and learned all kinds of skills. I graduated from Iowa State with my Masters Degree in Ag Education last May (2019) after a seven year odyssey of online and in-person classes.  I’m not the same person I was before I started that degree.  I am more tolerant of some things and far less tolerant of other things.  

Things my family said the day of my graduation just made me chuckle and were the perfect reflection of who we have grown to be as a family.  My husband as he tried to get all of us ducks in a row… “We may be red necks but we don’t have to look like hillbillies!” When the 10 year old boy was told to get back on the sidewalk, “but there were some really cool manhole covers I wanted to check out.” To my sassy 15 year daughter telling her dad he “better watch out, mom just got one degree hotter!”

When I graduated last spring, I didn’t think my degree was going to lead to what I had wanted… a teaching job. I had struggled to finish my degree.  We really didn’t have that kind of money to spend on something just for me and I was struggling to hear what God wanted me to do with it or even if He was going to bless it. I didn’t feel like I could hear Him or my family as I kept pushing toward that goal.

But as we headed into fair season with the kids, their calves and projects, the ag teaching job in our school district opened up and I was fortunate enough to be hired to teach there.  There wasn’t much time from my hired date, to the start of school and I continued to help at my old job of fundraising at the local community college the first few weeks of teaching.  I also had to overcome the issue of not being able to student teach through my masters degree before I could be in my own classroom. 

I investigated the rapid licensure program through our state’s regent universities. I found out they were unwilling to work with me and were going to require me to take the full two years of courses, even though I had taken similar if not identical courses through my masters program.  I then discovered Morningside College’s two year program and after evaluating my transcripts, they determined I could join the second year or the internship year of their program.

This first year has been a lot.  Taking two classes each semester, having six preps each day and being in two buildings was daunting… But I loved working with the kids and learning new things as I taught them to the students.  I hit several speed bumps through the year, learned how much I didn’t know and missed a lot of time with my family.  I know that the COVID19 pandemic has had some serious consequences for our family farm, agriculture and our community, but I can’t help but be thankful for some differently engaged time. I had been so sick in February and I was so grateful to be able to get some much needed sleep and recuperation from that.  Leaving school in mid March allowed me to work with two other more experienced teachers in online teaching and gave me a second to breathe in the classes that I was taking second semester. I can’t help but think it was a gift in some ways.

My house still isn’t clean though… I had such high hopes that I would get the office organized, my kitchen floor washed and laundry caught up and put away.  I’ve realized that maybe its not just that I don’t have time to do those things…maybe I just don’t want to do them.  I’m going to have to get better at wanting to do that stuff.

One thing I have traditionally avoided like the plague and washing dishes is making cookies.  Anyone who knows me very well, knows that cookies are just not my thing.  I avoid making them like I avoid washing my kitchen floor and folding socks. I have a hard time interpreting when they are done, to the point where they will still be chewy but fully cooked.  I usually error on the overdone side or get busy and don’t hear my oven timer and end up throwing away pans full of cookies just shades away from charcoal…

As I stand over my trash with my beloved SilPat nonstick cooking mats to help with the cookie mess, I can hear in my mind my mom quoting her mom.  “Grandma Fern would always say ‘Only one thing worse than a burnt cookie… a whole pan of them.’” You were so right Grandma Fern.

Cookies have been my nemesis. With social distancing, I decided that I would try to make ten batches of cookies with no burnt ones to try to redeem my lackluster cookie reputation.  I am nothing if not tenacious.  So far I’ve made triple chocolate, knock off hotel chocolate chip, and June Keys Sugar Cookies. I also made Amaretto Apple turnovers, but those were more like my beloved pie than cookies, because honestly I needed a break from my cookie pans.

The batch that was eaten the fastest was the June Keys Sugar Cookie. They are a favorite of my husband.  I’ve been making them for him since we were undergrads at ISU together.  It is one of the few cookies that if I pay attention to the timer, will turn out beautifully every time.  June was a gracious and sweet lady from my hometown who welcomed my mom to her new community as a newly wed.  June’s cookie recipe was shared with my mom and they were known by their original bakers name in our home. I hope that I can some day share a cookie or recipe with a friend and it gains that kind of name permanence. 

June passed away several years ago, but her cookie recipe lives on in my kitchen. I hope you enjoy it as much as we do.

June Keys Sugar Cookies

The groceries:

1 C Powdered Sugar

1 C Granulated Sugar

1 C Vegetable Oil

1 C Margarine

2 Eggs

(optional 1 generous teaspoon vanilla extract)

4 C All Purpose Flour

1 t Baking Soda

1 t Cream of Tartar

½ t Salt

The process:

Cream together the sugars, oil, margarine, eggs and flavoring if you use it.

Whisk together the dry ingredients.

Blend the dry and wet ingredients together just until everything is moist.

Use a cookie scoop to make balls of dough on a cookie sheet.

Squish the balls lightly with a sugar dipped glass bottom. (I use my smallest jelly jars)

Bake at 350 for 9-12 minutes depending on your oven.  Do not let get browned!

Cool on a rack and store in a covered container. 

These freeze well after being baked.

Dutch Letter Slab Pie

Another Recipe Mashup

The recipe for Apple Abstract is one of many in my recipe box that I attribute to my mom and enjoy reading in her handwriting but that has my Aunt Joyce’s name on. I love seeing my mom pay tribute to her older sister in the recipes that she has handed on to me.  I love that these same recipes – Apple Abstract, Peach Kuchen, baked beans and others are ones that my family loves and requests season after season. Mom and Joyce’s Apple Abstract is really what has become the trendy “Slab Pie” that is all over Pinterest and foodie blogs that have those beautiful pictures. Slab Pies are a take on pie that can be eaten with the hand more like a bar than a piece of pie and serves more people than your typical nine inch pie would.

I can’t look at this recipe and not remember sneaking down to the freezer as a kid just in from mowing the lawn one of the last times of the season or just off the dusty, fall school bus.  I can feel the chill of the basement and joy of grabbing a serving from one of several pans made and frozen by my mom with apples from our yard apple tree or a neighbor’s. I can also remember the irritating moment of opening the bag to discover that an empty cookie sheet had been put back in the freezer by someone who didn’t want to own eating the last piece. 

The treat was always made and encased in a large, plastic bag that carried the logo of the Pioneer, DeKalb and other seed corn companies that were given as a premium to farmer-customers alongside of the iconic paring knife that was used and abused in our knife collection. The plastic bag was big enough to fit two cookie sheets in and went to the freezer, potlucks and our fridge as the original and much reused and much older cousin to today’s two gallon Ziploc bag. It created the perfect micro-environment to raise rolls in 9x13 metal cake pans and folded over on the edge to keep other baked items from getting dried out on the counter.

As it is with every recipe in my collection, I love and cherish the recipe that has been shared with me.  I’m also not afraid to mess with it.  This past week at my job, I was asked to help around the edges of a major visit to our college.  Educators, elected officials and business owners from Saxony, Germany came to formalize an agreement with the community college I raise funds for.  The agreement allows our graduates to apply for enrollment in a baccalaureate college in Germany where they would also get international work experience and graduate from their institution with a German BA/BS. It is an amazing opportunity for our students. We were pleased to offer Iowa hospitality to the group which included several meals highlighting Iowa foods.  I was asked to make the desserts for one of the evening meals. They were estimating 80 guests could be present.

One of the requests was for cherry pies to go along with the Peach Kuchen I thought would be perfect use of the seasonal peaches at the grocery store. Working a regular day and then making 5 pies, even with canned filling wasn’t going to happen in my single oven… No matter how I managed my time – which was in short supply. I have not had the opportunity to travel outside of the United States, but everything I see on travel shows and international cooking shows highlight the quality and intricacies of European desserts and I felt the pressure to bring something over the top for them to enjoy. Then I thought of what could be done and I robbed the crust of Apple Abstract and added an adjusted Dutch Letter filling to cans of cherry pie filling. It worked!

Below are several ways to make this Slab Pie – the first is the original family recipe.  It is followed by the remixes that I made this week.  I hope that these options will allow you to enjoy serving a bunch and maybe think about how you could or have remixed a family recipe.  I love hearing about other people’s remixes and family treasured recipes. I hope that you will either share a family favorite with me or tell me how you’ve remixed a favorite in the comments.

Mom and Aunt Joyce’s Original Apple Abstract

Groceries

Dough:

                2 ½ Cups Flour

                1 Cup shortening, not quite room temperature

                ½ Teaspoon Salt

                Egg yolk with milk added to make 2/3 Cup (reserve white for glazing the crust)

Filling:

                3-4 Handfuls of Corn Flakes or Special K Cereal, lightly crushed

                8-10 Apples, cored, peeled and sliced ¼ inch or thinner

                1 Cup sugar

                Cinnamon

                ¼ Cup Butter sliced thin

Process:

Combine flour and salt.  Cut in shortening until well large crumb has developed. Whisk egg and milk together and add all at once to the flour, salt, shortening mixture. Lightly knead to pull together. This will be a moist dough.  Divide into two portions.  Roll out on a heavily floured surface until about 1 inch larger on all sides than a rolled edge cookie sheet.  Transfer the crust to the cookie sheet. Crumble cereal evenly across crust.  Layer apples across the sheet.  Reserve two tablespoons of sugar and sprinkle remaining sugar across the apples and sprinkle with cinnamon liberally. Dot with butter slices.  Roll out second crust and lay across the apples.  Beat the egg white to a froth and brush the crust.  Sprinkle with reserved sugar.  Bake in a 350 degree oven until golden brown (about 40 minutes).  Can drizzle with powdered sugar or amaretto powdered sugar glaze. Will serve 12 dessert or 24 snack sized servings.

Dutch Letter Slab Pie Remix

Groceries  

Dough:
2 ½ Cups Flour

1 Cup shortening, not quite room temperature
½ Teaspoon Salt
Egg yolk with milk added to make 2/3 Cup (reserve white for glazing the crust)

Dutch Letter Filling:

8 oz. Almond Paste
1 Can Almond Pastry Filling
2 eggs + 1 yolk
1 C sugar
½ teaspoon Vanilla

Fruit Layer:

2 cans of pie filling for snack like bars or 3 cans of pie filling for more luscious bars, this can be divided into more than one filling to offer multiple flavors for a dessert serving line.

Topping:

¼ -1/3 cup sliced Almonds

2 Tablespoons sanding sugar

Process: Make crust as described in Apple Abstract Recipe above.  Set to the side with a towel over the crust in the cookie sheet and crust waiting to be rolled out to keep them from drying out.  Beat the Almond paste on high to smooth out.  Add the almond pastry filling and beat together well.  Add sugar, eggs and vanilla, beating until fully incorporated and smooth.  Using a cookie scoop evenly spread mounds of filling across the crust laid out in the cookie sheet.  Use an offset spatula to smooth the almond filling across the bottom of the crust. Layer prepared pie filling across the Dutch letter filling.  Roll out the remaining crust at least as large as the cookie sheet. Cut ¾-1 inch strips of dough.  Lay diagonally across the fillings and weave like a lattice top pie.  There will be 1 ½ -2 inch gaps between strips.  Brush with whisked egg white.  Sprinkle with sliced almonds and sanding sugar.  Bake at 350 for 45-60 minutes.  If the top is getting over browned you can lay a sheet of parchment or tinfoil across the top of the cookie sheet.

Amaretto Fruit filling:

2 Cups, packed, peeled and chopped apples or peaches

1/3 C Amaretto

1/2 C sugar

1 1/2 Tablespoons Cornstarch

Combine sugar, cornstarch and amaretto over medium high heat until dissolved. Add fruit and simmer until sauce is thickened.  Use as a replacement for a can of pie filling

County Fair Legacy

It’s county fair season.  

I’ve loved the county fair since I went to my first one in Alta, Iowa as the tag-along little sister in the mid 1980’s. 

I’m developing a different appreciation for the fair as I use it as the deadline to teach my kids the skills on my punch list of life skills I think they need to know before they leave our home. I only have four more fairs with our oldest.  She still has to do a refinishing and citizenship project.  Our son’s fair 4-H career starts next year, but he’s in his second fair exhibiting bucket calves. I love watching them care for and learn through their livestock projects.

As a recovering 4-Her I realize the real wins for me were the lifelong friends and fabulous adventures I was able to have on a 10 acre parcel of ground in a town far enough away that I needed to stay from chores to chores every day.  I participated in competitions that weren’t a part of my rest-of-the-year life and were also the culmination of month’s long chores and training of animals. I got to exhibit refinishing projects that made me a discerning buyer of furniture. I dabbled in enough creative art projects (that my art teacher mom encouraged) to develop an appreciation for hand crafted items and the process of creating art. I tried my hand at sewing and baking projects. I got to choose my own market hogs and breeding and market sheep. I gained knowledge about agriculture, food production and consumerism from my projects. I also gained the confidence to try about anything once, because I learned that if I failed it wasn’t the end of the world.

Aside from my love of showing hogs at the fair, I lived for the educational presentation competitions.  It didn’t matter if it was a working or educational presentation, I loved participating and working with people to share knowledge about something. I did presentations on everything from cream cheese mints with a club mate and how to make homemade root beer with a friend from another club in my county to one on the beef industry in Iowa and projects like marbleizing paper and other crafts.  I should have figured out from how much I enjoyed working presentations that vocational education was a passion of mine, but there weren’t many female ag educators in the late 80’s and early 90’s to look to and I didn’t see how my love for my hog and sheep projects and agriculture were tied to what we called home economics at the time.

Of all the presentations that I did, my first one was the one that lives on in our family.  I was a nervous first year 4-Her, wanting to keep up with my older sibling’s success. Thankfully mom was willing and able to help get me organized early in the summer.  I thought long and hard about what I wanted to make in front of a crowd.  I was sure I wanted to do something cooking, because I would catch Julia Child and Chen Can Cook on our IPTV station and cooking seemed like the perfect thing to do.  I didn’t have a very deep set of recipes that I could make unassisted with consistent success, but I did have a good banana bread recipe that our family liked. 

I made that recipe two times a week in the month leading up to fair.  I still could eat banana bread by the time I exhibited that bread as a static exhibit and did my presentation.  I did very well the day of the presentation, and since I couldn’t exhibit as a first year Junior 4-her at the State Fair in August, the judge elected to send me to present at the Clay County Fair. 

My fair was the third week in July.  The Clay County Fair was the second week in September.  I continued to make banana bread at least weekly to keep my presentation up to practice.  The recipe made two loaves of bread.  As we got closer to the fair, I’m pretty sure the neighbors were getting as sick of banana bread as I was.  By the time I presented at Clay County I could barely stand the smell of banana bread and couldn’t get a bite past my mouth. 

I still remember presenting at the Clay County Fair.  It was the one event that I participated in that both of my grandmothers were able to be at.  I lost one of those grandmas not long after that presentation and I treasure the picture I have of both of them with me in an auditorium that smelled like autumn. Just behind us was my Godfather holding a loaf of banana bread that was baked in the toaster oven. He held it so you couldn't see it had a burned top from hitting the roof of the oven as it baked. 

I’m in my 40’s now and I usually pass when offered banana bread, but my husband and kids enjoy it so I make it from time to time.  It works well with frozen bananas or fresh ripe ones.  

Note: If you are going to freeze the bananas I would recommend mashing them before freezing and then freeze the baggie flat so it is easier to defrost in the microwave to use in the recipe.

The groceries... 

1 Cup Sugar 
2 Cup Flour 
1/2 teaspoon Salt 
1 teaspoon Baking Soda 
2 eggs 
3 Tablespoon Milk 
3 Mashed, very ripe bananas 
1/2 Cup Margarine, melty 
1/2 Cup chopped nuts, optional 

The Process... 

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and grease a large loaf pan.

Combine all the ingredients in a bowl and barely blend them together.

Bake for 1 hour or until a knife inserted comes out clean.

Butter the crust when done and let sit for 10 minutes before running a knife around the edge of the pan to help loosen it before turning it out. 

Pecan Pie Bars… My Recipe Mashup

My two favorite sources of recipes are the backs of packages and my family.  I’ve got some great cooks hanging out in the branches of my family tree and no company wants to put out a bad recipe that could curb sales of their products.

My grandmothers were both known for their ability to turn out fabulous food.  My grandma Ruth (dad’s mom) was known for her Swedish rye bread, angel food cakes and pies.  My grandma Fern (mom’s mom) could feed a crowd with a pound of ground beef and whatever was in the cupboard. Ruth’s family was small and settled in the community where she spent her life. Fern’s family was expansive and just a bit chaotic from living with aunts after her mother died while she was an infant and as her dad remarried. I can’t help but wonder how their growing up, education and marriages influenced them in the kitchens they called home.

Fern’s children are all pretty proficient in the kitchen and food has always been a centerpiece to any family gathering among her clan.  There have been so many good recipes from the Johnson crew over the years that my mom sat down one year and hand lettered a collection of submitted recipes from her generation and one back.  That collection is one I turn to time and again, but I’m beginning to realize that my generation is totally ready to take the wheel on the food legacy of our clan.  I’m not the only one sharing my recipes – my cousin Deb’s daughter has a fabulous food and entertaining blog and I’ve asked several of my cousins for their recipe for whatever they’ve brought to our less frequent but still well populated gatherings.

I would love to say it goes back to our agricultural heritage.  When you raise what you eat and drink, food is not a luxury that must be accounted for and doesn’t allow for mistakes.  It is an adventure and privilege of abundance influenced by the weather, time and productivity. It is far too easy to take that abundance for granted when you have more than enough.

The pages of that cookbook from the Johnson clan are well marked by mixing splatter, grubby fingers and misplaced samples.  It is also heavily populated with cookies (my arch enemy of cooking), treats and desserts.  One of my favorite recipes in that cookbook is for peach kuchen, from my aunt Joyce.  I’ll share that one on this page someday.

I was looking for a pecan pie recipe that could be turned into bars for a work event, but just wasn't seeing what I thought could work very well.  So I looked in my recipe box and thought it was time to pull parts of two really good recipes together. 

After a trial, the crust of Joyce’s recipe plus our family's favorite pecan pie filling was a great way to make a dessert go further and helped finish off a come and go meal for donors, friends and staff at the community college I work for. The filling recipe was off the obscure back of a pecan wrapper that I got at Sam’s one year.  It is fabulously rich and not too many nuts so they sit nicely in the filling. 

I wish I could give credit to the pecan grower cooperative that presented it, but the package name was replaced by “Emma’s favorite Pecan Pie” in the recipe index.  Lesson learned.  I do know that the pecan tree is the state tree of Texas and there are over 1,000 varieties of pecans, many named for Native American Tribes. It is one of my favorite nuts in breads, ice creams, candy and to munch. I'm amazed at how some pecan's can add a taste almost like coconut or faintly of pineapple in certain recipes, but add a warm nuttiness to other recipes. 

Enough rambling… Let’s get to cooking!  This recipe is a great replacement for a dessert, but it could be cut into 1 inch squares, set on parchment and drizzled with melted semi sweet chips for a holiday treat swap – one pan, not a lot of fuss and you are done! That’s my kind of treat.

Pecan Pie Bars

Groceries:
Crust:

2 C Flour

1 C Sugar

¼ t Baking Powder

½ t Salt

1 Cup Margarine or shortening (don’t use butter in this one, unless you want a very firm crust which could be better for the cookie style)

Filling:

3 Eggs Beaten

1 C dark Karo Syrup

½ C Sugar

2 T melted Butter

2 t Vanilla Extract

¼ t Salt

1 ½ - 2 Cups Finely chopped, Pecans

The Process:
Crust:

Mix the dry ingredients and cut in the margarine. Pat into a 9x13 pan and bake at 350 for 10 minutes.

Set to the side.

Filling:

Blend all ingredients and pour over the crust.  Bake for 30-45 minutes at 350 degrees F.  Let cool completely before cutting and serving.  Can be served with whipped cream.

Bacon Wrapped Maple Spiced Squash Bites

Pork-tober Food Challenge

Bacon is considered meat candy in our home.  My almost 9 year old son will try anything that has bacon in it. Most grownups will try about anything that has bacon in it too. The Farmland Bacon Club and Altec animal feed in their National Pork Month shout outs say the average American will eat about 18 pounds of bacon annually… That’s a lot of pork belly – which ironically comes from the lower sides of the market hog.

When I grew up in the 80’s, bacon was a breakfast food and a swanky restaurant might wrap it around a London broil on the grill. Today bacon is found about everywhere… in potato side dishes, wrapped around cream cheese stuffed jalapeno peppers, around a smoked loin, on about any kind of burger you can imagine and fast food and high end dinning have embraced bacon as a way to embellish their offerings… Bacon has finally earned a place of respect on our plates and has turned what was once a hard to move cut into a prime source of retail income in the local and national chain restaurants and at the meat counter.

Bacon isn’t just for breakfast anymore.

When I was a senior in high school, I was our county pork queen and my favorite part of the duties were the annual visits into elementary classrooms to talk about pork production with kids who thought meat came from the grocery store, not realizing it began on farms like the one I had grown up on. It was almost like food came from a fairy or a bit of magic over night when the store’s lights were dimmed. It was an amazing moment when the kids would realize that my family helped to feed them. It was an experience that helped shape my love for agriculture communications and consumer education. 

I didn’t really think about who I would be married to 25 years later and that I would still be supporting the pork industry as the wife of and mom to the next generation of Iowa pork producers. I spent a year working out of state while the Farmer and I were dating and many weekend dates were spent helping to run electrical wire or pex tubing for water and heating systems in the farrowing barn we still use. I made a crock of chili for the night a few neighbors joined us before we filled it with sows ready to give birth. 

I’m really proud of what my family raises and I’m even more proud of the improvements that we have made in our production techniques from the days I was a county pork queen and eventually the Iowa Pork Princess.  Sorting hogs in our confinement finishing barn is a much different experience for our hogs as well as for us as producers.  When I grew up our hog buildings were open front finishers that provided shelter from the elements, but not the temperatures. Those buildings were an improvement from pasture a frames and free-running sows.  Feeder fills were at the mercy of the producer’s management and time, water access was easily contaminated as lids either stuck flipped open or animals wrangled for position to drink.  Animals sorted from different pens to be loaded for transport or market the night before many times fought to figure out new pecking orders.  That’s not what our hogs experience today.

Hogs on our farm have stable temperature buildings and well bedded and managed hoop structures that allow them to eat to grow, not eat to stave off hypothermia.  Our pens have watering systems that provide clean water that many hogs can drink from at the same time.  Pens are built with sorting and holding fences and gates that can sort off sick or injured pigs for treatment and recovery or can be used to hold hogs for market sales alongside their penmates who have already established a pecking order and will eliminate or at least reduce fighting between animals.

I’m really proud that our farm has introduced our children to the ideas of responsible use of medications, how to care for animals at all stages of the production cycle and how to share the story of our livelihood with others.  I can’t tell you how many friends have gone through our farrowing barn to see piglets and nursery pigs on up to our market weight hogs.  Each time they leave saying they had no idea how much thought or work goes into raising pork.

I love to share good recipes that feature the pork our family proudly raises and when my friend Shannon Latham asked if I would like to make a recipe and give samples at her pumpkin farm’s last weekend – I knew I had to come up with something that showed how pork pairs with flavors we might not think about every day. My offering for Shannon’s customers and the three other accomplished food bloggers also sharing their kitchen know-how this weekend was a bacon wrapped, maple spiced squash bite that could be served as an appetizer or as a specialty side for the upcoming holidays.  It passed the kid test and was a fun way to feature two great foods that are abundantly produced in Iowa. 

Get out and find a local pumpkin or squash patch and buy up some of their amazing produce to store for the winter holidays. And if you have some locally produced pork from a locker or regular bacon from your local grocery store, know that families like ours worked hard to provide that food for your family.

Maple Spiced Bacon Squash Bites

The Groceries:

¾ C Real Maple Syrup

½ t Pumpkin Pie Spice (my favorite from scratch recipe follows in the end notes)

2 T brown sugar, packed

1/4 C Orange Juice

1 T Canola or Vegetable Oil

1/8 t Cayenne Pepper

1/8 t Smoked Paprika

1 1/2 pounds bacon

1 Cinderella or Pie type Pumpkin, sweet squash or sweet potato will work, too

The Process:

Combine the syrup, pumpkin pie spice, brown sugar, orange juice, oil, pepper and paprika in a small sauce pan and bring just to a simmer to bloom the spices.  Remove from heat and set aside.

Cut the squash into 1/3 inch thick slices and then into bacon width pieces. (about 60-65 pieces of squash will fill your cookie sheet and use the 1.5 pounds of bacon) Toss the squash with 1/3 cup of the sauce.

Cut bacon slices into thirds.  Wrap around the seasoned squash bites and lay seam side down on a parchment paper lined rimmed cookie sheet. (The parchment paper will make clean up a snap! Don’t use waxed paper, the bacon grease will melt it and it will be a mess.) Leave ¼ inch between each row and column on your cookie sheet.

Bake the bites at 350 for 40-45 minutes or until the bacon is rendered and looks to be getting done.  Take the rest of the syrup mixture and baste the bites with it.  Return to the oven for another 5-10 minutes watching that the glaze doesn’t overbrown.

Serve immediately or put in a crockpot on low with any remaining glaze drizzled across the top.

Notes:

You can make the pieces of squash larger, just allow for more baking time and be ready to throw a piece of tinfoil across it if the bacon is cooking faster than the squash.

If you don't like the heat of Cayenne and Paprika, feel free to omit or just use a dash which is about a 1/16 of a teaspoon.

My favorite pumpkin pie spice recipe is:  

2 t Ground Cinnamon

1 t Ground Ginger

1/4 t Ground Cloves

1/8 t Ground Nutmeg

Tuna & Noodles Hillcrest Farm Style

Can Tuna Noodle Casserole Be Comfort Food?

I say yes.  If a dish has noodles, cream of something, shredded cheese and some kind of crumb topping… it most certainly is comfort food.  Or at the very least it is something you can shove in your freezer for an easy, eat-it-later kind of meal.

This week is the first time that I have wondered how we will get through spring in our home.  My seventh grader is on an FFA speaking team, shooting on the trap team and is trying to sell pizzas for her church youth group trip in July.  This week we have had one night of no activities… tonight. The rest of the nights we have had multiple activities and events that we needed to be at. It has been a week of divide and conquer and frozen pizzas and cereal in our home.  My husband going one way and me another.

Last night I had had it. I could not make myself go to another activity as a good mom.  There was a drift of dishes, no silverware left and I knew my people would come in the door starved and cold from being outside for a damp, chilly Iowa afternoon and evening of walking the bucket calf, standing (if you are the dad) and playing (if you are the younger sibling) at trap practice. I was not going to do gourmet – I needed something that could cook away while I attacked that mess on the counter.  It was two dishwashers full!  I think we may need to come to some expectation about dishes while we are so busy or we may just need to buy stock in the Hefty paper plate and Solo cup companies.

The temperature and the activity level made it a night that screamed for comfort food.  Warm, filling and fast..ish.  I decided to bring out my simple Tuna Noodle Casserole recipe since I didn’t have elbow noodles for mac and cheese or goulash or Grandma Hattie’s Spagetta.  Tuna and noodles aren’t my family’s favorite meal… but all the ingredients were there and a few things I thought I could try to throw in to make it more to our family’s taste.  The end result was good enough the Farmer took thirds… I think it passed. The 7^th grader even said I should write it down because it was better than regular Tuna and Noodles… Even if it did have peas in it.  Peas are an evil food to my kids…I don’t know what I have done wrong with those two. Peas are fabulous and taste like spring.

The Groceries:

1 pkg wide Egg Noodles, boiled and set aside

2 C Frozen Peas

1 large can tuna, packed in water, drained

2 cans Diced Water Chestnuts, drained

1 C diced Onion

½-3/4 C diced Celery

2 T Butter

1 Can Cream of Chicken Soup

¾ C Miracle Whip salad dressing

¾ C Milk

1 ½ Cup hand shredded, Extra Sharp Cheddar Cheese, divided into ¾ C portions (not packed into the measuring cup, just filled)

1 – 1 ½ C lightly crushed French’s Onions

The Process:

Boil Egg noodles and add peas to the boiling water just before draining.  Set aside. 

In the sauce pan, melt the butter and sauté the onions and celery until just softened.

Add the soup, Miracle Whip, Milk, water chestnuts and ¾ C cheese. 

Stir sauce into the noodles with peas and the tuna.

Pour into a well-greased 9x13 glass baking dish.

Sprinkle the remaining ¾ C sharp cheddar across the top and then top with the crushed French’s Onions.

Bake uncovered in a 350 degree Fahrenheit oven for 30-45 minutes or until heated through. (note: this freezes well, but don’t thaw before cooking and leave the last layer of cheddar and onions off until the last 10 minutes of baking.  Bake it uncovered.)

Serve with a tossed salad to make yourself feel better about eating a large serving of comfort food. 

Tomato Basil Bisque & A Special Kind of Soup Supper

I love cooking but not many people know that I really enjoy music, too.  I’m not particularly talented and I don’t have much time to practice.  But music is a bit like standing at my stove.  It starts out a little stiff, but as I let the stress that drove me to my piano go – the music starts to come along and peace starts to develop like a good loaf of bread or great soup in my stock pot does.

Since I don’t have time or amazing musical talent, I love the music of others and the opening songs of services are what help to open my heart to worship.  A well selected hymn with reasonable harmonies fills my soul and reminds me of my childhood worshipping with my family.  A good modern chorus helps me to open my heart to the message and time in God’s house.  I have to admit that sometimes when my heart isn’t in the right place for the message from the sermon, the music often feeds my heart.

I’ve been blessed to be in churches that have amazing people who have talent that surpasses mine and our church home is especially blessed right now with musical gifts that are freely shared.  This weekend some of the crew from the worship team and other worship teams from churches around our community shared their talents and provided a concert of praise while community folks ate soup and some desserts for a free-will donation that supports a local home.

This is a special home…It is a refuge for women who have been recovered from the sex trade and human trafficking and want to leave that life behind.  These women are provided the basics of shelter, food and maybe for the first time they are also given safety and support and exposure to God’s love.  It’s a faith based shelter and not everyone who has come through the home has been able to leave the industry when they leave the home, but so many have risen above what has been done to them and their past experiences to be survivors moving forward in a life that can only be seen as redeemed.

I went to the event with my teenaged daughter.  We didn’t get to stay as long as I would have liked.  There was really good music happening, but there were responsibilities to deal with at home.  I shared some soup from my kitchen along with over 20 other kitchens in my community. That is the stage I’m comfortable on and this cause is one that touches my heart deeply. I look at my beautiful daughter and her friends and classmates and I wonder how anyone could hurt them like that… Those women are someone’s daughter… We are called to stand in the gap for them and their chance at freedom.

If you don’t know much about human trafficking and how it fuels the sex trade, low paid labor and the fashion industry internationally, please take some time and visit these websites…

https://polarisproject.org/human-trafficking

https://love146.org/

http://wingsofrefuge.net/  

Actor, Ashton Kutcher recently testified to a congressional committee about his organization Thorn and the work that needs to be done in human trafficking.  His testimony broke my heart and will teach you a few things about the victims and the systems that are trying to save them. You can view his testimony here : https://www.c-span.org/video/?c4656862/ashton-kutcher-human-trafficking

Now think about hosting your own soup and music event to make donation and a difference. There are several places that can make a difference in human trafficking from Foster Care support to recovery homes or organizations like Kutcher's Thorn. 

My point is do what you can.  Sing, make a pot of soup, sell Tupperware, make cookies or holiday cards, have a garage sale...It doesn't have to be amazing, it just needs to get done.

If you do have a soup and praise supper I'm sharing my recipe for an easy one for you to make as the host.  It will give you plenty of freedom to do what you need to.  It is the smaller version of what I brought to share at this weekend’s event.

Tomato Basil Bisque or Freedom Soup

The Groceries:

3 T Olive Oil

Garlic Paste equal to 4 cloves of garlic

1 packed cup of Yellow Onion, chopped

½-1 rib of celery chopped fine

2 mini Sweet Peppers chopped fine

1 28 oz can crushed tomatoes

1 28 oz can Italian chopped tomatoes (I like Dei Fratelli brand for both)

1 C chicken stock/broth (can substitute vegetable stock for vegetarian and if your stock is gluten free this soup will also be gluten free)

2 T sugar

1/3 C 1/2&1/2

1-2 t basil puree (to taste) 7 leaves if using fresh

¼ t dried oregano

Salt and pepper to taste

The Process:

Sauté veggies in olive oil until softened.
Puree veggies with tomatoes and return to soup pot.
Add stock and seasonings.
Let simmer 12-15 minutes stirring until thickens a bit. 
Pour 1/2n1/2 in very slowly while whisking vigorously so it doesn’t curdle in the soup.
Taste for seasoning and add additional basil or oregano to taste.  (I use garlic salt at this point as well if needed.)

I serve with toasted garlic chips or seasoned croutons or grilled three (provolone, Gouda and farmers) cheese sandwich.

Makes 4 servings

Credit where credit is due... I've adjusted a few things in this recipe from this original recipe: http://www.thenovicechefblog.com/2013/09/creamy-tomato-soup-panera-copycat-recipe/

Garlic Basil Pork Meatballs

Garlic Basil Pork Meatballs

It is October and National Pork Month is here!  Kick Halloween kid costume stress to the side. Put a pig cut out among the fall mums, pumpkins and gourds you are curb-scaping your yard or deck with!

This year I would challenge all of us to consider about how many people the Iowa and American Pork Industry touches. Think about all the people you know who are involved in growing the feed, taking care of health and housing and handling the hogs… Now think of the folks involved in hauling live animals to the processing plants and meat to the grocery store…  Now think of the folks in the meat counter and grocery stores, restaurants and customers who are a part of the consumer chain that is influenced by what my family produces! We depend on every person in that chain.

Most of you know that I wholeheartedly support our farm’s decision to produce pork.  I love sorting hogs in our confinement buildings with my husband and kids.  I love that my kids work with piglets all the way to market hogs and that they understand this fall’s wet weather will impact our ability to apply both liquid and composted manure to our fields. That manure will build soil nutrients back up for next year’s crop that will feed the following year’s hogs. This isn’t a short-sighted process and it takes planning and thoughtful production to get that pork chop to your plate.

This year the MiniMe reached the critical age of babysitting without supervision and she also reached the critical age where she can do Sunday afternoon chores in the barns without an adult being by her side.  These were a rite of passage that made me realize how quickly her time in our home is flying by and how much her time helping on our farm is shaping her developing responsibility and ability to follow through on tasks.

Over the years I’ve enjoyed swapping recipes with other pork producing families, but this new recipe is one that morphed from a Facebook plea of needing ideas of how to use up an avalanche of frozen, pureed basil from our garden. I don’t think I can ever make enough spaghetti sauce to use that much up!  My west coast cousin Laura suggested pesto turkey burgers and we wondered through Facebook comments back and forth if pesto burgers would work for ground pork which is something I have in my freezer. I love being able to swap kitchen and food ideas with cousins half a country away through this technology.  Her caution was to start light on the pesto, because who really wants to eat a green burger.  So right.

I made the Pesto Pork burgers for a field food night with provolone cheese…winner, winner, ground pork dinner!  And then MiniMe and I chatted about how we could reinvent the burger… Hmmmm, we thought these would be really good meatballs for tailgating, meatball subs, in spaghetti sauce on noodles or zucchini noodles… This could be my new go-to transformation food in cook once for a bunch efforts! It is also gluten free, so extra bonus for my friends with wheat sensitivities.

Even if you don’t make this recipe, think about my family the next time you load a burger with a slice of bacon or throw a chop on the grill.

Garlic Pesto Pork Meatballs

 The Groceries:

2 pounds of ground pork

2 Eggs

½ C Milk

3/4  C Oatmeal

3-4 tablespoons of Kate’s Garlic Pesto, Recipe below or your favorite pesto with a ¼ t garlic paste added.

1 t salt

Optional: Provolone cheese cubes or mozzarella cheese sticks cut into ¾ inch sections.

The Process:

Preheat oven to 400 F.

Line a rimmed cookie sheet with aluminum foil that has been lightly sprayed.

Combine all the ingredients until very well mixed.

Using a cookie scoop measure out the meatballs and place on the cookie sheet.  (If adding cheese, form the ball around the cheese chunk before putting on the cookie sheet.)

Bake at 400 for 10 minutes and then lower the temperature of the oven to 350F and bake until internal temperature has reached 160 degrees.

Once cooked you can freeze for a fast reheat or add to your favorite sauce to eat on noodles or in a meatball sub.

Kate’s Garlic Pesto

The Groceries:

2-3 T of pureed basil leaves

2 T Pine Nuts

2 t minced garlic

Canola Oil to puree/emulsify

The Process:

Combine basil, pine nuts and garlic in mini-food processor and process while drizzling oil over as it blends and emulsifies.  Will become 1/3- scant 1/2 cup of (avocado colored and somewhat creamy looking) pesto that can be used as a wet rub on pork roasts or whole chickens for roasting or in pasta dishes.

Agtines 2.0

Well folks Valentine’s Day is almost here again.  I had grand ideas that I would have this done weeks ago, but a real life in an Iowa winter got in the way. 

I discovered that the Mini Me no longer needs Valentine’s for her 6^th grade class.  My heart literally dropped to my shoes when she told me that.  When did she outgrow Valentines? Did I blink too many times? I seriously must have. 

I think she still needs some to swap with friends…she firmly says, “NO, mom!”

 

I am struggling to deal with the age we are leaving behind with her.  She turns 12 next week. This will be the last year of not parenting teenagers. I literally want to put my head down and sob.  I only have five summers left to teach all the things I think she needs to know to be a productive and responsible human being… It suddenly doesn’t seem long enough.

While I’m freaking out about that, I still have a kid who is firmly in elementary.  I need to stop mourning what my daughter is leaving behind and enjoy what my son is working on. He’s learning to read and spell and add and subtract.  He’s at the edge of an explosion of learning and before I know it he will be in 6^th grade… Not needing Valentine cards for his class. Sniffle, sniffle.

Oh for goodness sake!

This year Gus wasn’t sure he wanted to have any fun facts on his Valentine… He wanted them to just be Valentines.  Kind of hard when he wanted a decidedly unValentine-y theme – Baseball – on his cards.  There are some great things in sports to tie to agriculture and you could use any of these facts on your sporty Agtines….

An acre is about the size of a football field.

There are 150 yards of cotton in a regulation baseball.

One cow hide can make either 144 baseballs or 10 footballs.

The NFL will use more than 6,000 footballs to play a season of games and will use more than 600 cattle hides to supply those balls.  Iowa raises 1.49 million cattle every year.

Going to a sporting event? Ag touches about everything you can think of from the plastics in the seats that can be made from corn and soy by products, to the food you buy at the concession stand and the fuel that could have biodiesel or ethanol blended in that got you there. Sports depends on agriculture.

I’ve got a Agtine for baseball included here. 

I’ve also got a sweet treat for the folks who spend time reading about our life, my kitchen and how much pride we have in feeding the world through the beef and pork, row crops and garden project.  

I’ve got a cookbook from the Iowa Food & Family Project to give away!

A good friend gave me one for the Mini Me’s hope chest and one for my kitchen that is getting a little grubby. My mom gave me an additional one.  Three of one cookbook in a house is probably cause for a visit from a Hoarders tv show or some kind of organizational intervention so comment below with what recipe you’ve tried from my blog how it went over with your family and I’ll randomly pick a comment maker and share a cookbook with you! 

If my recipe flopped… let me know.  I may be able to give you some help to get it to turn out better next time. If you loved it, I would love to have you tell me that too!  If you double post, once here and on the recipe you tried, I'll double enter you in the drawing for the cookbook.

In the meantime…. Enjoy our Agtine 2.0 and feel free to use it, but please do not remove the photographers mark on the image.  An amazing photographer from the D.C. area – Rasheid Scarlett – shared this image on Flickr and gave me permission to use it as he had presented it.