Garden Salad

Garden Salad

Dorcas Annette Walker

I think a tossed salad is one of the most diversified foods that an individual can prepare to eat. If you don’t believe me the next time you are at a buffet-style restaurant study the different ways people prepare their salad at a salad bar. It can be quite educational. Take my husband for example. He is the kind of person that uses the entire salad bar to make his salad. I shudder every time I see his stacked overflowing salad bowl. To me Dana’s salads are an entire meal. I’m a more picky kind of person when it comes to food. I prefer bite-sized pieces of lettuce with a few food combinations instead of taking a spoonful of everything set out on the salad bar. I can’t deny that my husband’s salads aren’t healthy. I just have a preference of using either a mixture of vegetables or fruit with my lettuce instead of mixing them all together in one big glob. Even though my husband frequently reminds me that everything you eat all goes to one place, I still can’t handle the thought of eating red beets, peaches, pickles, egg salad, tuna, pineapple, onions, tomatoes, pepperoni, cucumbers, grated carrots, black olives, bacon bits, croutons, and shredded cheese on lettuce topped with a generous amount of thousand island dressing all together- even if it is stacked in layers. In my defense I have seen other people do a double take at my husband’s towering salad creations. The way he puts together a baloney sandwich is also mind boggling, but that is another story.

Salad is a mixture of vegetables or fruit topped by a dressing and is often served as an appetizer before a larger meal. The garden salad or green salad is mostly composed of vegetables built on a base of one or more lettuce varieties either with a predetermined arrangement or tossed with a dressing. Salt is such an important ingredient in salad dressings that the word salad is based on the Latin word for salt. Salad was first recorded in a recipe book composed before 1399. The concept of salad dressing varies with different cultures. North America has a mixture of salad dressings while in southern Europe vinaigrettes are used. Mayonnaise is predominant in the Eastern Europe countries, China, and Russia. Denmark’s salads are based on crème dressings. On September 29, 2007 Spain tossed the world’s largest salad with 14,740 pounds of lettuce, tomato, onion, pepper, and olives prepared in a container 59 feet long and 15.7 feet wide with twenty cooks supervising the salad preparations that took over three hours.

Salad tips:
- For a subtle garlic flavor, rub the salad bowl with a cut clove of garlic; for a more pronounced flavor mince the garlic, mix with salt, and add to the salad.
- In addition to using Iceberg lettuce, try Boston lettuce, leaf lettuce, young spinach leaves, dandelion greens, escarole, and romaine.
- To keep a head of lettuce fresh in your refrigerator for a couple of weeks, cut out the core, then wrap the head in paper towels, and close completely in a plastic bag.
- Accent your greens with boiled eggs, crumbled bacon, and a sprinkling of fresh leafy herbs such as basil, marjoram, thyme, tarragon, and parsley.
- Garnish with croutons and colorful red or green pepper rings, sliced olives, cheese cubes or with a fruit salad use pineapple cubes and mandarin orange slices with a maraschino cherry in the center.
- To make a quick meal add shredded cooked chicken, fish, beef, canned salmon, or tuna.

Weekly tip: To make canned peas taste like fresh garden peas: drain the liquid from one can of peas into a sauce pan, sprinkle with salt and pepper, add 1 tsp flour, and bring to a boil. Turn off heat, add 2 tb margarine, and fold the peas into the thickened liquid. Serve hot when the butter is melted!

Dorcas Annette Walker is a published author, syndicated columnist, freelance magazine writer, and photographer from Jamestown, Tennessee. Contact her at: dorcaswalker@twlakes.net For more information check out: www.dorcasannettewalker.com

Eclair Cake

Éclair Cake

Dorcas Annette Walker

This week’s recipe is one I discovered at a camp one summer where my husband was the evangelist. I will never forget the first camp meeting my husband preached. Being a preacher’s wife and hosting numerous families during revivals I was always conscious of the workload involved in hosting and usually ended up helping in the kitchen. Between day time duties and handling the music for the evening services by the time a revival would end I was always exhausted. Boosted by my mother’s encouraging words that camp meetings were entirely different than revivals, I traveled to my husband’s first camp meeting with anticipation. The fact that the caretaker and his wife had just moved in and had never been caretakers of a camp before should have clued me in to the fact that I’d be doing more than walking in and out of services on the arm of my husband, even if I didn’t have to worry about the music. As I was starting to unpack my husband informed me that he had offered our help as the caretakers hadn’t had time to get the grounds cleaned for camp. So instead of taking a short nap to revive me after traveling all day, I found myself cleaning ancient cement bathrooms, quickly eating supper, and then unpacking enough to get my family ready for church that evening. The next morning the dining hall was in chaos. The caretaker’s wife was trying to prepare meals (she had never cooked for a crowd before) and take care of a set of twins with no help. My husband volunteered my help so with my twelve-year-old daughter babysitting the set of twins I found myself in the camp kitchen hunting cooking utensils, taking stock of the food supply for the week, and planning menus. Not only did we cook and serve the food, but we had to wash up. Just as I was getting into the sync of revival life on a larger scale I was informed that the lady’s bathroom had run out of toilet paper. The caretaker had all camp supplies under lock and key. The second time I approached the caretaker for more bathroom supplies he handed me the key and gave me the task of stocking both restrooms for the duration of the camp. Midway through camp it was discovered that the other evangelist and his wife had an anniversary. My husband and the camp board thought it would be a nice gesture to honor them with a surprise party. So while the caretaker’s wife hunted up supplies that we could turn into party decorations I baked a large cake and tried to decorate it- my cake decorating kit was back home in another state. Did I mention that at this point the only service I was attending was the evening service? I rounded up a crew of willing helpers (young and old) to help out in the kitchen and was starting to breathe a sigh of relief when I was informed that on the Sunday a band was coming. Nobody knew how large the band was. As I was trying not to panic one by one the ancient toilets in the bathrooms quit working. I am not mechanically minded- I even have trouble sometimes finding the right key to unlock my own household door. I tried jiggling around inside the back of the toilets with no success. I finally ran down the caretaker who looked at me and said, “Well can’t you fix the toilets?” Exasperated I threw up my hands and replied, “I’m sorry, but I’m not a plumber!” I slept the entire trip home. Despite numerous camp meetings since (where I was able to enjoy all the services) I’ve never forgotten my first experience as a camp evangelist wife.

This Éclair Cake dessert has a light creamy filling topped by a rich chocolate icing that will go well with any meal. My Éclair Cake takes about fifteen minutes to prepare and is made a day ahead. For a different twist you can use cinnamon graham crackers instead of honey grahams or mix peanut butter into your pudding. My Éclair Cake recipe serves sixteen.

Éclair Cake

1 box honey grahams
2 boxes of instant vanilla pudding
3½ c cold milk
1 (8 oz) cool whip
Line the bottom of a 9 x 12 baking dish with a layer of graham crackers breaking the cracker as necessary to fit. Mix the pudding mix and milk together and add the cool whip. Layer half of the pudding mixture on top of the graham crackers. Repeat and finish with a layer of grahams.

Mix together:
1 (8 oz) prepared chocolate frosting
½ c peanut butter (your choice)
Spread on top of the grahams, cover, and chill in the refrigerator overnight. Cut and serve the next day!

Weekly tip: If you beat prepared frosting with a mixer on high for a couple of minutes you will get a fluffier icing with more volume!

Dorcas Annette Walker is a published author, syndicated columnist, freelance magazine writer, and photographer from Jamestown, Tennessee. Contact her at: dorcaswalker@twlakes.net For more information check out: www.dorcasannettewalker.com

French Fry Casserole

French Fry Casserole

Dorcas Annette Walker

A major portion of motherhood is spent in the kitchen planning and preparing nutritious meals. This month I’m giving recipes that are time-saving and easy for any family member to make. So invite your family into the kitchen and let them prepare a meal while you sit on the sidelines and boss. On second thought this might be a good time to disappear- after listing all emergency phone numbers in large print - and go shopping or take a leisure bath. Either way have a great Mother’s Day!

Even though my father had severe hemophilia, I wasn’t prepared for the challenges I would face when my own son was born with the same condition. Raising a boy who averaged two to three internal bleeds a week has made me a stronger person, stretched my patience, taxed my strength, taken me to the brink of despair, and lifted me to great heights of joy. Motherhood with a severe bleeder is:
- the awe of holding a perfectly normal-looking newborn close and wondering if maybe the doctors are wrong
- walking a hospital floor for two hours crying as they try to find a vein in your tiny son then, kissing all the ugly bruises on his body from needle sticks
- gripping your hands behind your back to let your son fall as he learns to walk
- hearing the doctors say that there isn’t anything more they can do as your nine- month-old son keeps hemorrhaging
- feeling chubby arms around your neck and slobbery kisses of a toddler who says, Luv ou mommy, after an exhausting day
- spending hours at the hemophilia clinic or in a tiny emergency room week after week
- learning to give your son factor infusions in his veins at home in an effort to have a more normal lifestyle
- trying to keep a hyper-active four-year-old still in bed for days at a time to get a joint bleed under control
- wrapping your son’s right arm to a pillow to render it useless after talks of shooting basketball flares up his elbow falls on deaf ears, only to find him down in the gym laughing with glee as he shouts, “See Mom, I can still shoot baskets with my left arm!”
- trying to answer hard questions like: Why do I have to hurt all the time? Why can’t I be like other boys? Does God hate me?
- asking a ten-year-old with two ankle bleeds, why, after jumping out of his tree house in a race with his older sister back to the house, seeing him grin, and say, “It’s worth it mom. I beat her!”
- endless hours of tutoring for missed days at school and constantly filling out stacks of paperwork
- blinking back tears as you watch your thirteen-year-old limp painfully behind his team on the basketball court after two knee surgeries
- sitting with a sixteen-year-old on the sidelines watching him wrap numerous joints as his team warms up just so he can play in the game and trying to talk him out of it, only to see him shoot basket after basket for his team
- seeing him stagger in the door barely able to walk and trying to stay calm when finding out that he didn’t factor before playing basketball, he was knocked off balance and slammed into a wall during the game, and instead of coming home he stayed to finish the game even thought it meant he could only use one foot and one hand to drive
- reaching up to hug a young adult towering over me, hearing him laugh and say, “Mom you worry too much. See I’m alright!” after coming home from traveling out-of-state in his restored pick-up the very week a sniper decides to shoot at pick-up’s on the interstate my son was traveling

My French Fry Casserole is sure to be a hit with the entire family and is something that can be popped into the oven on short notice if you have leftover hamburger in the freezer. For a zestier taste you can add salsa instead of soup to the hamburger. My French Fry Casserole takes about fifteen minutes to prepare and this recipe serves eight.

French Fry Casserole

Brown two pounds of hamburger. Add garlic salt and a tb of dried chopped onions.
Mix in:
1 can of mushroom soup diluted with ½ can of milk and ½ can of water
¼ block of a 32 oz process cheese spread cut into chunks
Simmer until the cheese is melted. Pour into a 9 x 13 baking dish.

Top with:
2½ pounds of French fries (I split a large bag)
Bake at 350º for thirty to thirty-five minutes until the French fries are brown and cooked. Serve hot!

Weekly tip: The trick to crispier homemade French fries is to coat the sliced potatoes with two tablespoons of cornstarch before frying them in hot oil!

Dorcas Annette Walker is a published author, syndicated columnist, freelance magazine writer, and photographer from Jamestown, Tennessee. Contact her at: dorcaswalker@twlakes.net For more information check out: www.dorcasannettewalker.com

Lime Salad

Lime Salad

Dorcas Annette Walker

Lawn mowers are buzzing and garden plots are being tilled and planted here in the mountains. I always reveled in the freedom this time of the year from a mother’s point of view that allowed my kids to play outdoors without the time consuming task of putting on coats and hats of winter days. Springtime also takes me down memory lane of my days as a youngster when spring meant the beginning of toughing bare feet by daring each other to walk across gravel, the exhilarating feel of soft grass under our feet for the first time, and racing about in sheer ecstasy without the burden of cumbersome coats and hats. It was a time of fascination as we discovered all kinds of spiders and bugs crawling around. We thought nothing of pulling off ticks that somehow mysteriously latched onto our skin after a day of outdoor pleasure. Bug spray was an unknown factor.

Today things have changed quite radically. When I discovered a tick on my foot after kicking off my shoes several years ago at an outdoors Sunday dinner in the western part of the state I wasn’t alarmed. The next day my foot swelled up and a red streak ran up my leg so I went to my local doctor. At the time Lyme disease was not known to be active in Tennessee and I wasn’t showing the symptoms of the bull’s eye that was characteristic of Lyme disease. Little did I know that from that day forward my life would be changed forever. The Lyme spirochete travels rapidly throughout the body embedding inside tendons, muscle, the heart, and the brain triggering multiple sclerosis, fibromyalgia, Alzheimer’s, chronic fatigue and other degenerative diseases. Only a minority of cases show the bull’s-eye rash and a positive Western Blot antibody test- the criteria used to make a Lyme diagnosis. Antibiotics only put the Lyme biotic into remission and can trigger again without warning. I had finally put the nightmare days of searching for answers of what was happening to my body after being infected with a tick behind me with relief. I didn’t have time to be sick as I helped my daughter prepare for a wedding, traveled with my husband around the United States, and home schooled our son for his high school years. When Dwight graduated I turned my attention to writing full time with great anticipation. Suddenly my body began going to pieces for no apparent reason. My doctor ran tests that didn’t identify anything matching my symptoms. I slowly got worse. My husband kidded me that I was going through the change of life stage. I pushed myself to keep going, but my body refused to cooperate. Despite increasing medication I became bedfast and unable to function normally. After eight months of continuous antibiotics, my Lyme has finally gone back into remission. It has been a long slow haul to get back on my feet again. Today I have continuous bone pain with bouts of chronic fatigue, arthritis, and fibromyalgia. Everywhere I go I warn people to make sure and spray before spending time outdoors. Children are especially vulnerable as they play outside during summer months. For more information about Lyme disease visit my website at: http://www.dorcasannettewalker.com/ or contact me by email.

My Lime Salad is a decorative addition to any meal with its cool zesty taste. It is easy to make and uses only five ingredients. This Lime Salad embodies the warm days of summer and can be served in different creative ways: by itself in a glass dish, put into a mold, with fruit, nuts, or on lettuce. The Lime Salad takes only ten minutes to prepare then can be left to sit in the freezer until stiff and cooled until firm in the refrigerator while other tasks are done. This recipe of Lime Salad serves ten.

Lime Salad

Mix together in a microwave bowl:
2 (3 oz) boxes of lime jello
1 (20 oz) can of crushed pineapple
1 (8 oz) cream cheese
Microwave for three minutes until the cream cheese is melted stirring often with a Wisk.

Add:
1½ c cold water
Place in freezer for about two hours until the mixture becomes stiff.
Then add:
1 (12 oz) can of evaporated milk
Mix thoroughly and chill in the refrigerator until firm. Garnish with cool whip and serve!

Weekly tip: To slide out a molded salad with ease first spray the mold with a cooking spray or rinse with cold water. Also rinse the salad plate with cold water before turning out so that if the salad is off center you can slide the molded salad on the plate to center it!

Dorcas Annette Walker is a published author, syndicated columnist, freelance magazine writer, and photographer from Jamestown, Tennessee. Contact her at: dorcaswalker@twlakes.net For more information check out: www.dorcasannettewalker.com

Coconut Pecan Cake

Coconut Pecan Cake

Dorcas Annette Walker

I love springtime as the earth becomes ablaze with color. It is fascinating to watch the barren ground burst forth with life overnight as the temperatures slowly rise; a miracle I never tire of experiencing. Even Sandy, our aged chocolate lab, perks ups and acts young again while Lucy Lou, my mixed poodle that was abandoned and rescued, races madly in circles and rolls around in the new grass. Another mystery is the green eggs Emma and Agnus, our two Dominique hens, lay. The poor dears can’t help that they are so ugly, so in return they give the most colorful and intriguing eggs. I used some of Emma and Agnus’ eggs to make a Coconut Pecan Cake, which is the perfect springtime dessert.

In the 6th century Arab merchants brought coconuts to Egypt from East Africa, but it wasn’t until the 15th century when Portuguese explorers, who came across coconuts in the Indian Ocean Islands, were credited with giving the coconut its name. Coconut means monkey face due to the three round indented markings or eyes at the base of the coconut. The Nicobar Islands used whole coconuts as currency for the purchase of goods until the 20th century. Coconuts are the largest seed known, although botanically they are classified as the fruit of the coconut palm. Coconuts are native to Malaysia, Polynesia, and Southern Asia spreading quickly throughout the tropics of the Pacific and Indian Oceans due to the coconut’s light fibrous husks that allows the coconut to drift on the ocean to other areas where it propagates. The coconut palm blooms thirteen times a year so that even though it takes a coconut one year to mature fruit is constantly forming yielding a continuous harvest with the peak season being between October and December. The average harvest from one coconut palm is sixty coconuts with some trees yielding up to three times that amount. Coconuts can be stored at room temperature for up to four months. In Sanskrit the coconut palm is known as the tree which gives all that is necessary for living because nearly all the parts of the coconut palm can be used. The coconut fruit is used for its milk, meat, sugar, and oil and furnishes its own dish or cup. Coconut cream is concentrated coconut milk. The husk was burned by the natives for fuel, but today the seed fiber is used to make brushes, mats, fishnets, rope, lumber, and fertilizer. A potent fermented drink is made from the coconut palm sap. Coconut oil is used in commercial frying, to make candles, margarines, as well as soaps and cosmetics. The coconut meat is used in pies, cakes, custards, and other baked goods. Processed coconut is sold in bags in a flaked or dried form and in cans, sweetened or unsweetened. Coconut contains calcium, potassium, and B vitamins and is said to lower cholesterol and heart disease. Its lauric acid is reputed to boost the immune system.

My Coconut Pecan Cake makes an elegant dessert that is luscious and light. Pecans blend with the coconut to make an intriguing taste, but can be optional. The Coconut Pecan Cake can be made in either two or four layers. Preparation time for my Coconut Pecan Cake takes only fifteen minutes (not counting the baking and cooling time) and this recipe serves twenty.

Coconut Pecan Cake

Mix together in a large bowl for two minutes:
1 yellow cake mix (any brand)
1 pkg (3.4 oz) instant vanilla pudding
4 eggs
½ c cooking oil
1½ c water

Fold in:
1 c shredded coconut
½ c chopped pecans
Pour into two, 9 inch greased cake pans and bake at 350º for thirty minutes until done. Cover and cool completely.

Icing:
1 (16 oz) container of cool whip
2 c shredded coconut
Spread cool whip over first layer and sprinkle with coconut. (For four layers cut the two layers in half.) Add next layer and cover with cool whip and coconut until entire cake is iced and sprinkled with coconut. Chill and serve. Garnish the top of the cake with tinted coconut!

Weekly tip: To tint coconut place one cup of coconut in a baggie. Dilute a drop of food coloring in ½ tsp of water and drizzle over coconut. (More food coloring and water can be added for a darker shade.) Seal the baggie and shake until the coconut is evenly tinted!

Dorcas Annette Walker is a published author, syndicated columnist, freelance magazine writer, and photographer from Jamestown, Tennessee. Contact her at: dorcaswalker@twlakes.net For more information check out: www.dorcasannettewalker.com