Fruitcake. The Joke of Americans and the Glory of Weddings in the United Kingdom?

Say the word 'fruitcake' in the United States and you are bound to get a smirk or guffaw without even saying more. If you happen to have a piece in hand you might hear 'ewww' or 'makes a great door stop!'. We Americans may have embraced fruitcake a hundred or more years ago, but it's become the butt of jokes over the past 50 years and it's certainly not in fashion to eat or make a cake that no one wants to touch.

But apparently, our friends in the UK don't feel the same way. As a matter of fact, it's a crowning glory on wedding cakes!

Reading the news this weekend and being a fan of British media, I saw an article that informs it's reportedly going to be part of Kate Middleton and Prince William's wedding cake.

If a Prince and his bride are choosing fruitcake for their wedding cake, you have to believe their country must not snicker at the dessert as we do; but I also suspect it's now going to become 'the' cake to have at any wedding in the United Kingdom over the next two years and perhaps, maybe (?) it's popularity might slowly spread back the United States.

Having never had a European version of the dessert but having seen different images and recipes for it I do believe our Americanized version of the cake is different than the European version and thus; the discrepancy arises.   The British version does seem a bit more cake like than our doorstop variety so if and when the fad of fruitcakes at weddings crosses to American borders, I hope the bakers of the United States use a more 'cake' like fruitcake than the heavy version typically given at our Christmas holidays.

Homemade Chicken Pot Pie

Homemade Chicken Pot Pie... nothing like the frozen version and oh so good when you need a nice hot dish on a cold winter night or you are in need of a good 'comfort food'.  I've been making this since the mid 1990's and it's a delicious favorite that I always make the week of Thanksgiving to use up leftover turkey as well!   Chicken or Turkey or even leaving the meat out altogether, it's filling and good!

Homemade Chicken Pot Pie

1 10 oz. package mixed carrots and pea's or all veggies
1/4 c butter
5 T flour
1/2 t salt
1/4 t poultry seasoning or sage
1/8 t pepper
2 c chicken broth (or use 2 cups water and 2-3 bouillon cubes)
1 c milk
2-3 c cooked or leftover chicken, chopped, diced or torn to bite sized pieces
1/3 c chopped onion chopped and cooked until tender in a bit of water (microwave!)
1 c cooked and diced potatoes (or use canned or dice and cook them with the onions)

Prepare the pea's and carrots (or mixed veggies). I like to cook them in the microwave while I prepare the rest. Melt butter in saucepan. Blend in flour, salt, poultry seasoning or sage, and pepper. Gradually add stock and milk. Cook and stir over medium heat until thick and smooth. Add vegetables, chicken and cooked onions and potatoes. Pour into a greased shallow baking dish. Make a biscuit topping and top the vegetable mixture. Bake at 425 degree's for 25 minutes until the top is golden brown. About 6 servings.

Biscuit Topping;

Mix

1 1/3 c flour
1 1/2 t baking powder
1/2 t salt

Cut in
2 T butter
3 T shortening

Add 1/2 c milk (scant) and stir with a wooden spoon until a dough forms. If it's too wet and sticky add one or two more tablespoons of flour. Pat down on a lightly floured surface and roll out to the shape of your baking dish. If you prefer you can cut into wedges or squares and simply top the vegetable mixture that way too. (Up to you!).  This does not need to be exact.  It will raise and become like a biscuit.

The biscuit topping mix

Ready when it comes together to form a ball

The vegetable filling - so good I can't help but snitch while it's cooking!

Patting out the top and roughly cutting to the size of your dish to top

Tiny Caramel Tart Bites

For someone who doesn't care for desserts too much, there are certain recipes that catch my eye and my attention and just have a hold on me for some reason.  This is one of them.

I love making mini tarts and 'tassies'.  From pecan tassies to chocolate filled mini tarts to tiny cheesecake bites and quiche;  they are so cute, pretty, simple and fun!  When I found this recipe I was not actually looking for it.  I don't remember what I was trying to find, but I spied this one and added it to my collection.  I hope you do too!


Tiny Caramel Tart Bites

2 c sugar, divided
1/2 c cold butter, sliced
6 T flour
4 egg yolks
2 c milk

Pastry Shells
1 c butter, softened
1 (8-oz.) package cream cheese, softened
3 1/2 c flour

Whipped Cream to decorate

Beat butter and cream cheese at medium speed with a heavy-duty electric stand mixer until creamy. Gradually add flour to butter mixture, beating at low speed just until blended. Shape dough into 72 (3/4-inch) balls, and place on a baking sheet; cover and chill 1 hour.

Place dough balls in cups of lightly greased miniature muffin pans; press dough to top of cups, forming shells. Bake at 400° for 10 to 12 minutes. Remove from pans to wire racks, and cool completely (about 15 minutes).

Cook 1 cup sugar in a medium-size heavy skillet over medium heat, stirring constantly, 6 to 8 minutes or until sugar melts and turns golden brown. Stir in butter until melted.

Whisk together flour, egg yolks, milk, and remaining 1 cup sugar in a 3-qt. heavy saucepan; bring just to a simmer over low heat, whisking constantly. Add sugar mixture to flour mixture, and cook, whisking constantly, 1 to 2 minutes or until thickened. Cover and chill 4 hours. When chilled, spoon caramel mixture into pastry shells, and top with whipped cream.

Mussels with Garlic Butter & Wine

Where we live, winter lasts about 7 months out of the year and everything is covered in deep snow. This year we seem to be blessed with what might (?) be an early spring - or, we are just being teased because the last couple days the sun is out, the sky is blue and the snow is quickly melting.

My husband and I long to live near the ocean and make at least one annual trip to the beach every year; lately we've been trying to make it two. We are currently planning the first one, coming up next month and with the thoughts of sun, sand and sea coupled with the blue sky outside my kitchen window, my thoughts turn to the amazing seafood I will have.

In honor of mussels, here is a photo of the last mussels I bought and a recipe I found online a year or two ago but is a very basic recipe that everyone uses and is written easy enough for all to understand.

Mussels with Garlic Butter and Wine

1 1/2 pounds fresh cleaned mussels
1/4 cup white wine
1 teaspoon minced garlic
dash lemon juice
1 tablespoon butter


Preheat a pan over medium heat. Once you have chopped your garlic, place a small amount of butter into your preheated pan. Stir the garlic into the butter. A light olive oil could be substituted for butter.

Cook the garlic in the pan until it becomes a tan color. Do not burn the garlic, as burned garlic is very bitter. If you do wind up overcooking the garlic, throw out both the butter and the garlic, then wipe out the pan and start over.

Once the garlic is tan, add the mussels. Do not add too many mussels to the pan at once. If the mussels are stacked on top of each other, the weight of the other mussels will make it more difficult for the mussels on the bottom to open. Using this method, you should only cook enough mussels to cover the bottom of the pan at one time. Toss the mussels around in the garlic butter and coat the shells with the fat. Be careful not to be too rough when tossing the mussels in the butter, as the shells are somewhat fragile and will crack and chip.

Once the mussels have been coated, add about 1/4 cup of wine per dozen mussels. This creates the necessary steam required to open the shells. It will also decrease the overall heat within the pan. Cover the mussels with a lid to finish cooking.

After about 4 minutes, remove the lid. At this point, most if not all of the mussels will be open. Mussels, unlike clams, will open before they are cooked all of the way through. If some of your mussels have not opened, then it is possible that either they were not cooked long enough, or they are bad and should be discarded. If most of them have not yet opened, place the cover back on the pan and wait another minute or two. Be careful not to cook the mussels for too long, as they will become tough and grainy if overcooked.

Remove the mussels from the pan. Pour the juices left in the saucepan into your serving plate or bowl with the mussels. The juice is delicious when sopped up with slices of fresh bread.

Easy chicken with mushroom wine sauce (can be made in a crock pot too)

Another one of those recipes that isn't really a recipe but you can play with it and make it your own... 

There are many versions of this dish, thought up by millions of men and women who use the same general idea and then tweak it a little to use what they may have on hand.  The basic idea is chicken breasts, some liquid, a can of soup, some mushrooms and cream cheese.  Herbs, dried salad dressing mixes, etc.  all optional as well.

It's one of those 'keep it in your back pocket' recipes for a day or night when you don't really feel like cooking and you have an hour before you have to eat OR you throw it together in a crock pot earlier in the day so it's done at dinner time.  Not incredibly healthy some would say, but you can use lower fat cream cheese, the healthy version of the soup and fresh mushrooms.

Now that you know this is an easy recipe that can be improvised in a hundred ways; let's get started!

Chicken with Mushrooms and Wine Sauce

4-6 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
1/2 c white wine - not fruity (or water or chicken broth)
1 can cream of mushroom soup
1 can mushroom slices or fresh mushrooms, sliced (4 oz, 8 oz. up to you!)
1 pkg. cream cheese
1 - 1 oz. pkg. dry italian salad dressing mix (like Good Seasons Italian)

Puree the sauce ingredients in a blender or food processor until smooth.  Add a little more or less wine for your sauce to be nice and thick or if you want more of a 'gravy' later if you are serving with a side of potatoes, you can add about 1/2 cup more.  Another option for less of a wine taste is to use water for the liquid OR my favorite; chicken broth.  I rarely cook with wine but will make this when I have the last of a bottle of wine to 'use up'.


When smooth, pour over chicken breasts in a greased or sprayed baking pan.  Bake at 350, uncovered for about an hour or until done and no longer pink in the center.  The size and thickness of your chicken breasts determine this.  If you are putting these in the crock pot, just pour over chicken breasts in the slow cooker and heat on low for 8 hours or according to your crock pot's instruction booklet.  Serve with pasta, potatoes or steamed vegetables. 

Smooth

Ready to bake

My kids love the sauce most of all