Junior’s, in the basement of the Oil Center Building, is one of my favorite Oklahoma City restaurants.  They serve choice steaks and strong drinks.  Brandy Ice, one of their after dinner drinks, is a favorite of mine.  In a recent trip to Junior’s, a waitress gave Marilyn and me their recipe.  It’s simple but wonderful.

1 pint Vanell ice cream

¼ cup dark Crème de Cocoa

1/3 cup brandy

Blend in blender until smooth then serve in a brandy snifter

Fiction South

Here is a recipe I found in the wonderful cookbook Hot off the Press – Good Cooking from the Pages of the State-Times Morning Advocate published in 1977 by Capital City Press.  This recipe was submitted by Lillian Gremillion of Frisco.

½ pkg. Yeast cake
3 ½ cups plain flour

1  cup milk
¾    tbs salt

2  tbs sugar
1    egg

2  tbs cooking oil
powdered sugar

Soften yeast cake in 1/3 cup lukewarm water to form a paste.  Warm the milk and add sugar, oil and yeast mixture.  Gradually stir in 2 cups flour and the salt.  Stir until it forms a batter.  Stir in egg until it is mixed well, and then add rest of flour.  Mix well.  Cover and set in warm place about 1 ½ hours to rise.  Take dough out and roll until about ¼ inch thick.  Cut in 2 inch pieces.  Place on cookie sheet or pan and let rise another half hour.  Fry dough until it is brown and then remove and let drain.  Sprinkle with powdered sugar and enjoy.

Musings of a Dangerous Mind                                             

Aunt Dot sent me one of Anna Pourteau’s recipes.  Anna, Dot’s mother-in-law and Uncle Bertrand’s mother, was a wonderful cook.  It sounds great, and Dot - a wonderful cook as well - gives me her personal guarantee that it is.

Pork Chops, English Peas & Tomatoes with Steamed Rice
 4  pork chops, center cut                     ¼ cup canola or olive oil
14.5 oz tomatoes, diced                        15 oz LeSuer English peas, undrained
15 oz chicken broth (fat free)                ½ medium onion, chopped
2 stalks celery, chopped                       2 cloves garlic, minced
½  c green bell pepper, chopped           ½ c red bell pepper, chopped
½ tsp sweet basil                                  2 tsps parsley
½ tsp oregano                                      ¼  tsp thyme  
½ tsp salt                                              ½ tsp pepper
1 tbsp Worcestershire sauce                 ¼ tsp Louisiana hot sauce

Steamed Rice
1 c rice
2 ¼ cups water
½ tsp salt
              
Salt and pepper pork chops.  Put oil in large non-stick skillet.  Heat oil to a medium hot temperature, add pork chops and brown on both sides.  Remove from skillet.  Turn heat down to medium and add onion, celery, bell peppers and garlic.  Cook until limp.  Add tomatoes, chicken broth, basil, parsley, oregano, thyme, salt, pepper, Worchester sauce and Louisiana hot sauce.

Stir, mixing all vegetables well.  Add pork chops back to skillet and cook until tender.  When chops are tender, add English peas.  Taste to see if you need to re-season.  Simmer approximately 10 to 15 minutes.  Cook rice and serve the pork chop with tomatoes and English Peas over the hot steamed rice.  Enjoy.

NOTE:  Cook rice according to directions.  Serve pork chops, tomatoes and vegetables over hot steamed rice.  Serves 4.

Here is a recipe for oyster dressing, just in time to stuff that Christmas turkey.

3 doz. Oysters

1 qt stale bread, wet and squeezed

2 tbsps butter

1 chopped onion

1 tbsp parsley

1 sprig thyme

1 bay leaf

3 tbsps sage

salt and pepper to taste

Drain the oysters, carefully removing all bits of shell.  Save oyster liquor for stuffing.  Wet stale bread with hot water, squeezing thoroughly.  Mix and season with sage.  Chop fowl’s liver and gizzard finely, and put 1 tbsp butter into frying pan.

Mix in chopped onion, and chopped liver and gizzard in the pan.  As the mixture browns, add the herbs, and then the bread.  Mix well.  Add remaining butter and stir, blending thoroughly.

Add the oyster liquor, and then mix in the oysters.  Stir for several minutes before using it to stuff the fowl

Eric's Website

Rice wasn’t introduced as a Louisiana staple until after the Civil War. Today it is an integral part of New Orleans cuisine. My Mother tells a story of a distant cousin that married a man from south Louisiana and was soon divorced because she couldn’t properly prepare a pan of rice. While I don’t know if the story is true, I do know that rice is an important addition to almost every south Louisiana dish.

Most rice grown in the United States is the long grain white variety. The kind used by many New Orleans cooks is long grain white rice that is regular milled. This means the milling process has removed hulls, germ and outer bran layer producing distinct and fluffy grains when properly cooked. For those of you contemplating marriage to someone from New Orleans, here are simple instructions for preparing perfect rice every time.

Do not wash the rice before cooking or rinse it after cooking. Doing so will only wash away nutrients on the grains. Many cooks in New Orleans always use the same brand of rice. This is because the most important step in cooking perfect rice is using the correct amount of water and this may vary slightly from miller to miller. Too much water makes the cooked rice soggy and too little water leaves it dry. As a rule of thumb, use 2 1/4 cups of water for every cup of long grain rice. One cup of rice serves about four people.

The volume of rice triples in size so it is important to use a pan that is large enough to accommodate the desired final amount. Bring water to a boil on the stove top then stir in the rice, salt (about ½ teaspoon per cup of rice) and butter (about 2 teaspoons per cup of rice). Cover tightly and simmer for twenty minutes. Finally, remove the pan from the heat and uncover until the rice soaks up the remaining water. This usually takes about five minutes.

Once you cover the rice, don’t open the lid until you are ready to take it off the heat. Peeking is a definite no no. Doing so lets the steam escape and lowers the temperature. Don’t stir the rice after it comes to a boil. If you stir it, you are going to have gummy rice - also a no no.

Finally, don’t let the rice stay in the pan that you cooked it in for more than five to ten minutes. Doing so will cause the grains to pack. Got all that? If you do, your marriage is safe. Well, at least from the rice cooking aspect.

Eric's Web 

Here is a recipe I found in the wonderful cookbook Hot off the Press – Good Cooking from the Pages of the State-Times Morning Advocate published in 1977 by Capital City Press.  This recipe was submitted by Lillian Gremillion of Frisco.

BEIGNETS (The French Market Type)

½         pkg. Yeast cake
3 ½      cups plain flour

1          cup milk
¾         tbs salt

2          tbs sugar
1         egg

2          tbs cooking oil
powdered sugar

Soften yeast cake in 1/3 cup lukewarm water to form a paste.  Warm the milk and add sugar, oil and yeast mixture.  Gradually stir in 2 cups flour and the salt.  Stir until it forms a batter.  Stir in egg until it is mixed well, and then add rest of flour.  Mix well.  Cover and set in warm place about 1 ½ hours to rise.  Take dough out and roll until about ¼ inch thick.  Cut in 2 inch pieces.  Place on cookie sheet or pan and let rise another half hour.  Fry dough until it is brown and then remove and let drain.  Sprinkle with powdered sugar and enjoy.